AMA Recap: Swash meets the BasedClub Community

Swash joined the BasedClub Community, an engaged circle of blockchain and crypto enthusiasts, looking to learn about crypto-native solutions like Swash.

This Friday, Swash’s CMO went over to the BasedClub Telegram channel to engage with the community, delving into thoughts about Swash’s First Wave Solutions, how crypto mingles with Swash, partnerships, milestones, data monetisation, and more.

Keep reading for the full conversation.

Can you briefly describe what Swash is?

Chloë:
Yes. So Swash is a movement for reimagining data ownership. It’s an ecosystem of tools and services that allow for people to earn from the value of their data, businesses to access high-quality, zero-party data at scale, and developers to build the next generation of data solutions.

Swash started as a browser application that currently has over 60K users. It allows for people to capture, pool, and sell their data while receiving their share of the profits it generates, while they surf the web as normal.

Now, it’s expanding into a universal data ecosystem with its own native token ($SWASH). You can read all about it here and you can join our mailing list to be prioritised for whitelisting when the public sale commences!

What makes Swash different from other competitors?

Chloë:
It depends whether you mean more traditional competitors, such as big data collectors like SimilarWeb and Comscore, or if you mean other web 3 solutions!

For the big data collectors, their collection methods aren’t so transparent and secure, putting them at risk of increasing regulation around data (e.g. GDPR and CCPA) and without viable alternatives when third party cookies are restricted. Their data is often expensive and bad quality, which isn’t good for the businesses who purchase it.

Also, they often collect data in ways where the everyday internet user doesn’t have knowledge or consent, and those people don’t receive anything for their contributions despite the data economy being worth TRILLIONS. Swash wants to change that by putting individuals first and giving them ownership over their data so they can have control and receive their share of the profits it generates, leading to high-quality, zero-party data that is given with consent.

For web 3 solutions, we haven’t really encountered anyone doing exactly what we’re doing at Swash, but given that the data space is so huge, there’s no way one company can do it all. Instead, we collaborate with those who are working towards the same vision as us as partners, such as Ocean Protocol, Streamr, and Tapmydata. We’re stronger together.

What are the major milestones that Swash achieved so far and what are your further plans?

Chloë:
The first milestone on our development roadmap is Rise, where we launched and grew Swash to a community of 60K+ people who believe in our mission through the first application (browser extension). Now we’re evolving Swash into a universal data ecosystem. Our roadmap spans until 2024, which you can read more about on our website and whitepaper.

This roadmap is focused on the products and services which will be built on top of Swash core technology, these include:

• Data Union: Optimising individual agency as a collective force by rewarding union members for the value of their data.
• sIntelligence: Bringing unique insights to businesses across all industries through a customisable, comprehensive web-based platform.
• sApps: Expanding the Swash ecosystem with the tools, community, and culture for building the next era of data solutions.
• sCompute: Uniting innovation with access by making on-site data computation capabilities a reality.

Find out the top 5 questions from the BasedClub community on Twitter

Can you list 1–3 killer features of #Swash that puts it ahead of its competitors? What is the competitive advantage your platform has that you feel most confident about?

Chloë:
💥 Swash operates on a ‘better-than-free’ model. That means that, when you join Swash, you get paid for surfing the web as normal. The first application is live and you can start using it today — it takes just a few minutes to get started.

💥By putting the individual first, Swash aims to rebalance the data economy to provide more value to everyone involved. This means individuals, businesses, and developers can come together and work in harmony.

💥The First Wave Solutions built on Swash are steps towards mass adoption, as we prioritise creating value for new stakeholders in new ways and with a friendly user experience that anyone can use. It’s the best way to get crypto to the masses because people don’t have to change their habits.

How does the Swash system work, when the data becomes more valuable? What is the responsiveness of the page when it grows in users? What will happen when more people install the Swash plugin? It would be slower or there would be a Data Union of all the users who have installed the plugin?

Chloë:
So, data is unique in the sense that the more of it there is, the more valuable it becomes. That means, when more people join Swash, then more value will be returned to the people (or members). It won’t be slower, as it’s designed for scale.

What is the most ambitious goal of your project? What is the ultimate vision that #Swash is trying to achieve within the cryptocurrencies market? I would appreciate it if you could share with us any upcoming updates?

Chloë:
Swash is on a mission to rebalance the data economy by bringing profits back to people. By doing this, we hope to end the shady, extractive practices that currently dominate the data landscape and tpo, ultimately, create a more transparent, sustainable, and equitable internet.

You can read more about how we’re doing this here!

Regarding upcoming news, we’re preparing to launch the $SWASH token, which will fuel the new ecosystem. You can read all about the token here and you can make sure you’re whitelisted by signing up here!

Follow us and join the future AMAs with engaged data and crypto communities.

Almost 80% of investors have just focused on the price of tokens in the short term instead of understanding the real value of the project. Can you tell us the motivations and benefits for investors to hold your token in the long term?

Chloë:
Of course. The first thing is that, as adoption of Swash grows, as will the adoption and use of the token. The earlier people are, the more value they will receive as Swash’s audience grows and the data gets sold. Also, it’s likely that generated value may be used to balance the token supply, likely through periodical token ‘burning.

Explain your plans on global expansion. And, is your focus on building or developing and getting customers and users, or partnerships?

Chloë:
Swash already has a very global audience! We haven’t targeted any specific geographies and growth has been organic so far. Swash works for anyone with internet access 🌏

We’re focused mainly on development and have a very strong technical team with unparalleled knowledge in the blockchain space, but also in the world of data. Our technical solutions are a priority, as well as working with our partners to create interoperable solutions and collaborating to reach a common vision.

Our partners include Chainlink, Ocean Protocol, Streamr, Boson Protocol, Tapmydata, 1World Online, Amasa, the World Ethical Data Foundation, the Data Privacy Protocol Alliance, and many more. Check out this blog for details on what they do and how we work together.

Where can I buy your tokens and how can I buy them? And, what are your current contracts?

Chloë:
The tokens haven’t been minted yet, but I recommend you sign up to the Swash newsletter to be the first to know about the launch and to be prioritised for whitelisting.

Where can I get all the latest news about Swash? Do you have a Twitter/Telegram/Discord community? If yes, can you share the link here because there are a lot of fake telegram/twitter groups?

Chloë:
Yes!

Twitter > twitter.com/swashapp

Telegram > https://t.me/swashapp_group

Newsletter > swashapp.io/newsletter

What is the role of the token in the ecosystem? Where can users currently buy it, and what would be its use?

Chloë:
SWASH will be a utility and governance token. Its use cases $SWASH are:

• Incentivise: As an incentive system, ecosystem actors will be rewarded with Swash tokens in return for their participation.
• Transact: All data transactions across all marketplaces, platforms, and applications will be distributed in SWASH. This includes value generated within the business intelligence and analytics platform (sIntelligence), the data computation environment (sCompute), and solutions developed utilising Swash technology (sApps).
• Govern: Swash token holders can vote for projects they wish to see receive funding from the Swash DAO fund, decide on new roadmap developments or modifications, and to take part in token-related decisions.
• Multiply: People can individually and collectively contribute the value of their data to social development causes and use it for value exchange both within and outside the Swash universe, such as redeeming earnings for products or staking liquidity.

For long term holders, the value of Swash will increase with adoption and growth of the ecosystem. As more people join, not only does the value of data become more valuable but adoption of the $SWASH token will increase also, so there’s plenty of incentive to get in early.

Plus, as demand for $SWASH will increase alongside network adoption, generated value may be used to balance the token supply, likely through periodical token ‘burning’ 🔥

What’s your plan to bring non-crypto-natives into your ecosystem? How do you keep a balance between developing the technology and also improving the value of your token?

Chloë:
We have several options in mind for this:

• To make Swash as friendly and easy-to-use as possible so people who are less tech or crypto-savvy can benefit.
• To bring value to people beyond blockchain. The data industry is massive and growing more and more each year. It’s time we were all aware of the importance of our role within it.
• We will soon be releasing a Data for Good initiative where people can automatically donate the value of their data to their chosen social goods organisation. People who want to support those orgs can easily install Swash (sort of like how Ecosia makes it easy for people to plant trees as they surf the web).

How many team members do you have? Do they have enough experience in the blockchain field? Do they have any experience on working in crypto and non-crypto projects?

Chloë:
I’m proud to be working with one of the most skilled and diverse teams in the blockchain space, all with strong backgrounds in software dev, cybersecurity, and blockchain. The team have been working together for over a decade across various industries including enterprise, research, application security, media & advertising, to name a few.

We’re lucky to count our advisors as part of the team too. We work closely with them and many of them are founders in the space already so they know what works. Others are coming more from a data privacy and even a data buyer perspective, so we’ve got all angles covered 😊

About Swash:

Swash is an ecosystem of tools and services that enable people, businesses, and developers to unlock the latent value of data by pooling, securely sharing, and monetising its value.

People share their data to earn while retaining their privacy. Businesses access high-quality, zero-party data in a sustainable and compliant way. Developers set up and build systems within a collaborative development framework with ease.

Swash is reimagining data ownership by enabling all actors of the data economy to earn, access, build and collaborate in a liquid digital ecosystem for data.

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Originally published at https://swashapp.io on September 11, 2021.