Using Blockchain to Monetise Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality Advertising

Virtual reality and augmented reality monetisation platform Gaze Coin has announced the launch of its blockchain token for VR and AR, based on gaze control/eye tracking, alongside plans for a public Initial Coin Offering set for the 28th of November 2017. The platform offers a monetisation, adtech and DRM solution for VR and AR, measuring and employing user gaze as a unit of exchange and digital record among advertisers, content owners or creators and users.

By combining gaze control and eye tracking with blockchain, Gaze Coin calculates the exact amount of time users spend looking at, interacting with, or being immersed inside VR and AR content. It then creates a micro-transaction that charges the advertiser for that time, pays the content owner or creator, and rewards the user for consuming the content. The mechanic also works without an advertiser, in which case it incentivises content owners, creators and users from the Gaze Coin ‘user growth pool’. The transactions are handled using blockchain technology, with the unit of currency — GazeCoin token (GZE) — being an Ethereum-based token which can be bought and sold in or out of VR and AR, and will be able to be exchanged for other Ethereum tokens.

Founder of Gaze Coin, Jonny Peters remarked: “For too long, VR/AR monetisation has been constrained by last-century models that work for web and mobile, but miss the mark terribly in VR/AR, where literally everything you see or touch can be monetised. We designed Gaze Coin to bridge the gap between the promise of virtual worlds and the ability for brands and content owners to capitalize on it, at the heart of how the medium is actually consumed.”

The company believes this overcomes many of the major current hurdles for advertisers in VR and AR, including the ability to calculate precise ROI on branded campaigns, collect consumer behaviour data in VR or AR, and evolve the ad format from interruptive ads that obstruct immersion to more native, engaging formats. Gaze Coin can also solve copyright tracking issues for content rights holders in VR and AR, allowing owners to track content throughout its lifecycle as it is consumed, changed, licensed, transferred or ended.

Gaze Coin has also built a functional proof of concept and working demonstration of the platform within its interactive virtual world experience, Dream Channel VR, which featured at the Cannes Film Festival in May and will be available on Vive/SteamVR, Oculus Rift and Gear VR later this year.

To coincide with the ICO, Gaze Coin has welcomed blockchain and cryptocurrency experts Evan Luthra, George Samman and Bok Khoo to its advisory and executive team who join media producers and adtech/fintech executives including Landon Curry and James Sugrue.

Peters added: “As consumers increasingly embrace VR and AR, they expect brands and media companies to be there with innovative content to capture their imagination. Gaze Coin provides the infrastructural backbone of the VR/AR creative economy, delivering the security, parity, exchange mechanisms and material incentive for all stakeholders to ensure creativity can flourish.”