How Bitclout Aims To Let People Bet On Twitter Influencers Using 'Creator Coins'

A new social network that allows followers to buy tokens in accounts is taking the world by storm. The network, called Bitclout, has seen interest from large investors, athletes, celebrities, retail traders and creators. 

The Basics On Bitclout: Bitclout offers a way for users to speculate on people and posts with real money by using a custom blockchain.

Bitclout can support complex social network data like posts, profiles, follows and much more. The company is a fully open-source project that uses coins and code with no company behind it. 

Bitclout uses a proprietary cryptocurrency named after the company. Bitclout coins can be used to buy “creator coins” in accounts on the social network platform.

Similar to Twitter Inc TWTR, users on the platform can follow accounts, like posts and retweet posts — or in this case, reclout.

Setting Up Bitclout Accounts: Users can create a Bitclout account with their name and phone number. To fund the account and buy social tokens of users on the platform, users need to have Bitcoin BTC/USD to buy the platform’s Bitclout cryptocurrency. The price of Bitclout doubles for every 1 million coins sold.

Bitclout's Large Backers: Bitclout has attracted some top names as investors in the platform.

Investors include Social Capital, Sequoia Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, Coinbase Ventures COIN, Winklevoss Capital and Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian.

Many of the same backers of Bitclout also backed Basis in 2018. Basis was a company based on an algorithmic stablecoin and created by former Google engineer Nader Al-Naji. Basis closed shop after several months of operation and $130 million in funding due to regulatory concerns.

Related Link: Etoro Vs. Coinbase 

The Largest Bitclout Accounts: As part of the creation of Bitclout, the founder reserved the profiles for the top 15,000 influencers from Twitter. That means users can buy and sell creator coins of people who may not even be on Twitter.

Users can see which of the top creators have verified their accounts with a blue check mark indicating verification, similar to Twitter.

The most valuable account on Bitclout belongs to Tesla Inc TSLA CEO Elon Musk, although he's not verified on the platform. Musk’s coin is worth $61,532.

Top verified accounts include that of Craig Clemens at $30,990, Chamath Palihapitiya at $29,293 and Whalesharkdotpro at $23,322.

Other notable verified names on Bitclout include Ohanian, Grant Cardone, Steve Aoki, Diplo, Jordan Belfort Wolf, Snoop Dogg and Paul Pogba.

Users can buy coins in people who are not on the platform in anticipation of whether they will ever join. Along with Musk, celebrities like Justin Bieber, Katy Perry and Donald Trump are among the top accounts. Pre-reserved top account holders have to tweet out when they set up and verify their account, which can cause coins to go up in value fairly fast.

Growth Ahead For Bitclout? Bitclout has attracted many creators to its platforms, including artists, writers and musicians. The platform promises new opportunities in the future, including stakeholder meetings that would be for only certain coin holders.

“Can you imagine if Elon Musk or Chamath did an AMA with a minimum threshold for buying their coin in order to participate? Or if they answered questions in order of coin holdings?” the one-pager from Bitclout reads.

Improvements will also be made for the company’s messaging system, premium content and sponsored posts.

Ultimately, Bitclout is working on ways for users to monetize their platform and reward users who own their respective coin.

Possible Bitclout Risks: Bitclout has faced criticism for several items that may keep some top names off of the social platform.

There is no means on the company’s platform to directly withdraw your money. There are some ways around this, but not being able to withdraw directly is seen as a potential red flag.

Concerns from people creating their accounts and cashing out their coins as a pump-and-dump remains a concern. As more coins of a person are sold, the price of the coin falls.

While the top 15,000 accounts were reserved for users, there is nothing preventing users from creating names based on celebrities and pretending to be the person. This has occurred with some names and led to lawsuits, Benzinga previously reported.

Posted In: CryptocurrencyNewsMarketsAlexis OhanianAndreessen HorowitzBitCloutBitcoinChamath PalihapitiyaElon MuskJordan BelfortRedditSequoia CapitalSocial Capitalsocial mediaWInklevoss Capital
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