Smartphones and are enabling methods of human interaction that are just starting to be explored, and the societal effects of these phenomenon are potentially far reaching. This article will focus on tokenized ecosystems as a new avenue for mobile application developers to generate an income in addition to creating novel user experiences. tokens Before diving into what’s arising, a quick review of the current state. At the time of publication, two categories of mobile interaction reign. These, of course, are free and paid. In a free ecosystem, the user’s attention is either traded for advertisement revenue or the This business model powers many of our most popular social networks. user’s data becomes the product. Paid ecosystems create an immediate barrier to entry or purposely gate a full experience behind microtransactions. Many of the most popular mobile games have adopted this model. There’s a third option that’s in the midst of emerging, . The general idea is that everything on the internet is essentially copied ad infinitum and becomes valueless. Real value comes from what can be traded but not copied. Better Than Free Digital tokens are designed to be scarce; they are not copied when traded. Using the lens of mobile apps, ecosystems are when they reward users for their involvement and enable them to trade that reward for a benefit. Better Than Free For example, let’s imagine a hypothetical mobile attention lottery. This ecosystem rewards winners with the crowd’s attention opposed to a sum of currency (a mobile / video version of ). Here’s how it can work: the Listserve 1. Multiple users commit tokens to enter a lotto. 2. One user wins the lotto which provides them with the ability to upload a video (“winning video”) that would be showcased in the app. 3. Other users who watch this winning video, within a certain time period, will receive some tokens. These users can use their tokens to tip winners or enter a lottery. If they choose to enter a lottery, the more tokens they contribute, the higher their chances of winning. An ecosystem like this has a couple of unique attributes that apps should strive to incorporate: Better Than Free Tokens let the user secure a benefit In the example, tokens give users a chance to be in the spotlight. An incentivized action of one user provides benefit to another user. This creates a and network effect. viral loop From the example, a user who views a video receives tokens for giving attention to the uploader. There’s one more major benefit to tokenized ecosystems: the tokens are not bound to the application! This opens up the a new way for developers (and possibly power users) to generate income. Better Than Free Provided that a token is useful and valuable within an application, a market will emerge via third party exchanges. Ecosystem creators (aka app developers) don’t need to do an (ICO) to get started. Instead, the initial focus can be on creating an environment where their tokens can be earned and spent for some benefit. Initial Coin Offering It’s worth noting that creating a ecosystem is not a shortcut to success. Creating interaction within a new ecosystem faces the challenge that all consumer products and services do. At any given moment, they need to be more compelling than all substitutes (Netflix, Facebook, sleeping, etc). Better Than Free As application developers think big about their next project, they should consider building new and private economies instead mere applications. Thanks to and for reading drafts of this. Steve McGarry Yalda Mousavinia At , we’re obsessed with token ecosystems and are creating elegant who build them. If you’re thinking about building a application, please reach out! We’d love to see how we can help. Attention, Inc tools for developers Better Than Free

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Better Than Free: The New Business Model for Apps (and possibly everything else)

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David Sneider

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