It appears that the romance between pornography and cryptocurrency industries is just getting started.
Popular adult film star Stormy Daniels today announced a cryptocurrency-based reward program on her website stormydaniels.com (warning: NSFW).
Darkreach Communications, the company which manages Daniels’ website, has partnered with Vice Industry Token (VIT), a blockchain startup that allows adult film producers to monetize their content by rewarding viewers with VIT tokens just for watching content.
The VIT token will also be integrated with 20-plus other pornography websites managed by Darkreach Communications.
It is worth noting that this is not the first time a cryptocurrency is being integrated with porn websites.
Pornhub announced a partnership with privacy-oriented cryptocurrency Verge in April.
The association was mired in controversy, especially because of Verge’s bizarre appeal to its users to donate $3 million to reveal the potential partnership. Critics also raised concerns over the choice of partner for Pornhub — given the well-documented technical shortcomings of the cryptocurrency. Verge has suffered two 51 percent attacks, with nearly $3 million hacked.
Many businesses claim cryptocurrencies make it easier for them to incentivize their users to participate on their platforms.
I mean, not that people need reasons to watch porn, but getting paid to do so is definitely an incentive to stay a little longer.
But we all know there’s no such thing as a free lunch. The price you’ll pay for your “freebie” comes in the form of your personal data, which VIT is more than happy to profit off of.
These get-paid schemes might seem alluring — but as Apple CEO Tim Cook once noted — if it’s free, that’s because you are the product.
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