A little mainstream exposure for BAT

Today, USA Today wrote an article promoting the Basic Attention Token project and Brave Browser. So far, the mainstream media has been hostile to the idea of blockchain projects getting attention from news. In fact, many news organizations termed bitcoin as a bubble or a scam.

The crypto adoption can't gain traction until mainstream websites and media platforms start accepting cryptocurrencies. This was definitely good for both BAT and the entire crypto community that a crypto project is positively taken by a mainstream media outlet. USD Today reports:

Instead of being tracked, get paid to see online ads

Many of us are upset about the level of tracking that Amazon, Google and Facebook engage in as we use their websites. They follow our every move and beyond changing some settings, there's not enough we can do to stop them.

If you're as concerned as I am, here's a fun weekend project for you — switch internet browsers. And potentially make a few dollars for your efforts.

Most of us use Google's Chrome, which as the Washington Post's Geoffrey Fowler recently reported, is such a data hungry browser, he found 11,000 trackers from his Chrome surfing in just a week.

I downloaded the alternative Brave browser Friday, which is aimed at those of us who aren't cool with having our privacy invaded. In just three hours of using it, Brave told me that 10 trackers had been blocked, along with 887 ads.

Now that's service!

Apple's Safari and Mozilla's Firefox also claim to be vigilant in terms of blocking trackers and ads, but they're not as vocal as Brave is in showing you the results. And they won't pay you to watch what Brave hopes are less evasive ads.

Chrome is the windows to the Internet from Google, which makes its money by selling targeted ads. (Google reaped some $136 billion in revenue in 2018.) The browser connects you to the Google search engine, YouTube, Maps and other cash machines from the Google empire.

Brave has a different idea. "You are not a product. Why use a browser that treats you like one?" it asks consumers.

So it blocks "third party" ads, the ones that come from ad exchanges and follow you around the Web, say, from Amazon to Facebook to CNET, but will allow "first party" ads. If Amazon is advertising something on its website, Brave lets that through.

Brave will reward you and I for looking at one to five ads per hour via its browser. The idea is that you agree to look at ads from sites you like and thus get rewarded. The advertisers send 70% of the revenues to us, and Brave holds onto 30%.

Read the full article at usatoday.com