In order to incentivize and attract more users Chinese internet search engine giant ‘Baidu’ has recently launched a proprietary token for a whole new blockchain-based photo sharing and validating service.
The search engine giant Baidu in Beijing made an announcement about its photo sharing platform “Totem” during a press conference. According to a local news report, the photo-sharing platform features a dedicated token called as “Totem Point”. With the launch, Baidu’s private XuperChain network achieved a new milestone for releasing the first blockchain-based application on its network.
During the conference, the company mentioned that it aims to generate Totem tokens worth 4 billion initially with a 4.5 percent annual inflation rate so as to motivate institutions as well as individuals for the submission of original photographs on the platform.
The number of tokens to be awarded will depend upon a validation process that will cover quality and quantity of images that the user will submit, according to a white paper that was released on Wednesday, 18th July.
The Totem token’s ability to be accepted by other cryptocurrencies or in cash is yet to be disclosed by the company. Similarly, the company not even spelled out the platform’s full use case scenarios though it revealed that the usage of the tokens can be done across different applications which are built on top of XuperChain Network.
It was in April 2018 when Baidu made an announcement for the Totem initiative for the first time. The company at that time without specifying the token – portrayed it as a distributed platform that makes a traceable chain of sealed information to ensure photograph sharers’ protected innovation.
Once an account on the platform is created users will upload their images through a mobile application where the blockchain’s participating clients such as copyright protection organizations, different third-party photo stock agents are also invited to the platform in order to check the originality of the images. In case of the approval of the images, the images are time-stamped and stored on Baidu’s blockchain, creating genuine data that could be beneficial for later copyright issues.
Moving forward, Baidu aims to work upon the blockchain rights protection system and to also include different types of digital media asset such as videos. This addition can be made into the platform in the first quarter of the next year.
Earlier in the month of January this year, China’s Google Baidu made an announcement related to the blockchain technology and mentioned that it has launched the blockchain as a service platform that will improve the overall security.
In the same year, Kodak an American technology company dealing in photography announced a blockchain-based photography platform “KodakOne” to offer a completely secure method of digital rights management for photographers.
