The bike that earns cryptocurrency as you cycle. Imagine this: you’re cycling along, racking up the miles when suddenly, you’ve just earned £20 worth of cryptocurrency by pedaling.
A company in the UK called 50cycles has made the first e-bike in the world that can earn cryptocurrency. Even though it sounds like something out of Black Mirror, the idea is unique.
The bike, called Toba, will be able to make about £20 worth of LoyalCoin for every 1,000 miles it goes. Once you have enough Toba coins, you can trade them in for Bitcoin, Zen, Litecoin, or Digibytes, or you can spend them in any store that accepts cryptocurrency. With a smartphone app, cyclists can keep track of the tokens that are made.
Every time you turn the Toba’s wheel, you’ll get a token that you can use to buy things from 50cycles at a lower price. It’s an incentive to ride a bike.
“Right now, we’re working with LoyalCoin to reward our customers, but eventually, the Toba bikes will have their digital coin that will become one of the thousands of currencies of the future, and the Toba will let riders be a big part of its growth,” 50cycles founder Scott Snaith told Cycling Industry. “As technology improves, we think our customers will be as excited as we are when they start getting rewards just for using the product they choose to buy.”earns cryptocurrency
There is one big problem, though. Just like with anything else, people will find ways to cheat. I could see someone taking the bike apart and wiring it to a car or figuring out how to keep the wheels turning. Someone will always find a way to take advantage of the system, so security measures must be implemented.
In September, the Toba bike will be available in the UK. It will join several other crypto-based projects that are making waves worldwide right now.
The Bronx Freedom Fund started Bail Block in November. This is a way for people who are “innocent until proven guilty” to get out of jail by mining cryptocurrency. Then there is Mosaic, a token-based system that pays researchers for adding to a database of good research. In a year when cryptocurrency is booming, reward-based crypto schemes will only get bigger.