NEW MONEY: Not the Next Bitcoin, the Next Dollar...

It does not matter what currency community individuals belong to, we’ve all wondered aloud or privately to ourselves how we are going to get blockchain technology past the small crypto bubble and into the mainstream.

In other words, how do we get this technology past ourselves and into the real world of everyday people like your grandma, the mailman or your savvy co-worker who thinks Bitcoin’s a failed video game.

Yes, that world no other cryptocurrency is influencing right now. The New Money project just might be that answer. Started by founder Solomon Adekale, [Bitshares investor and filmmaker] the project plans to build killer apps and platforms around the digital currency aiming to provide a solid alternative for mainstream Americans. That digital currency is Sollars and $ense: Smart Money... or New Money.

Mainstream people (particularly Americans) represent $3 Trillion a year in spending. To add to that, Millennials are the only generation currently seeking a replacement to the high inefficiencies of the old banking system. That is why the founder says the project was started. To take advantage of these facts.

“When it comes to the crypto-world we appeal to the third and most important leg of what the larger crypto community has longed for since the beginning of Bitcoin. A mainstream coin that can appeal to mainstream consumer today. Not tomorrow TODAY. Ethereum fulfilled the Turing complete leg of which Bitcoin has not achieved. And this project will do the final, or the iTunes of blockchain technology” says Solomon.

Mainstream Utility out the Gate: Hollywood

If history is to be our guide, it shows for technology to be adopted in mass it must cater to and provide an extremely useful solution to a specific demographic right away. That’s the long way to say; utility. That is why Facebook started with colleges, and Amazon started with books and most recently Uber with taxis.

Each platform has built out from their initial starting point to acquire their entire market and other markets consumers never even thought were possible to enter. And we are seeing this in real time with Uber. New Money will follow this road that is less traveled by currency communities and have one specific starting point. This starting point promises great utility for mainstream consumers if done right. This is because they plan to enter Hollywood and Cable’s $200 Billion content creator market and disrupt its ridiculous pricing system.

New Money: Hollywood Sollywood Beginnings

As mentioned Solomon is not only a crypto-founder but also a prolific filmmaker. Interestingly enough it is this filmmaking background that first brought him to the realm of technology and digital currency. It has also shaped his understanding of how blockchain can reach a mainstream audience today. “Oh it can. Its no secret Americans hate Cable and want an ultimate replacement to it. And New Money can be the key for that if it conveys the right message.” Solomon first recognized the Hollywood pricing problem when he was studying in film school.

‘Back in film school, I realized the pricing non$ense of Hollywood didn’t actually start at the top, it started at the very bottom with us; student filmmakers. ‘From the very first day we start shelling out thousands of dollars for that education not once are we taught that our films are worth anything but the fee we have to pay to have them shown at someone else’s film festival. We should have had enough of Hollywood telling us our content was worthless,’ he explains. It wasn’t “Premium”? So there was no money to be made at all? Hogwash! Basic economics says otherwise. We spent money to make our product (film). It should be worth something. Right? Not even 3 $ense? And that’s sort of how it hit me…’

His answer was Sollywood TV: a free market where any content creator or provider could sell their content at a price that a majority of viewers would actually be prepared to pay. Whether that was $7.99 for Netflix or 0.07 $ense for your film— or even way less (think The Room). The platform would take a 10–20% fee, and the rest would go to the creator or provider. It’s the same for all content partners across the board in the market. That’s unheard of in the Hollywood/Cable industry. Money simply doesn’t work that way for that good of a split to content creators. But that’s why New Money is starting there…

New Money: Sollars and $ense

So the platform will include Sollars and $ense — digital equivalents to Dollars and Cents, but with the advantage that digital money is ideally suited to; micro-transactions. It’s not possible to pay $0.07 with a credit card, but with New Money sending just a few $ense (or 1/5th of that) is as efficient as sending thousands of Sollars. The creation of a digital currency as an integral part of Sollywood TV means it can operate at the kind of scale required to be viable and competitive. This is in relation to legacy dinosaur platforms like Cable TV but also newer platforms like Netflix, YouTube, and other players in the market.

But it must be noted not only are these platforms potential competitors but they can turn out to be potential clients too.

“Hey everyone needs to price. And as long as you have a content experience, a price point and can work with our revenue split, we can technically work with you”.

But Solomon says they will be strategically working with the bottom to mid-market content creators first. They would need a solution like this the most and disruption never happens from the top.

Kickstarting New Money

Rather than look to VCs or traditional investors to raise a seed round, the New Money project will be funding itself by an ICO and a strategic Kickstarter campaign. The New Money KickStarter campaign which will follow the upcoming ICO will be aimed at mobilizing grassroots support from those it is designed to serve. The KickStarter is largely an effort being undertaken by members of the Bitshares crypto-currency community the community Solomon hails from. They will use it as the first route to reaching and acquiring an audience of mainstream consumers.

The New Money project will be partnering with Cryptonomex, OpenLedger, ShareBits and the Muse project for the upcoming Kickstarter and technical development. The combined teams represent Bitshares’ community of expert programmers, developers and industry professionals who understand the intricacies of building new payment systems and working with content. They are set to begin production on the KickStarter video in late April. They will also be debuting elements of the system’s features through this Kickstarter — showing how New Money with its functions will challenge and disrupt Cable’s $200 billion business model.

New Money: Pre-Sale Success and Upcoming ICO

As typical of most crypto-currency projects, Solomon and his partners launched a pre-sale token to help reach their short and long term New Money goals. That token was called SOLCERTS (pro-nounced soul-certs). Essentially each token represents a future Sollar or 100 $ense today. The token will be redeemable 1:1 for Sollars when it eventually switches to its own autonomous blockchain down the road.

The token was created as a way to garner donations from top crypto-currencies like Bitcoin, Bitshares and Ether. Their pre sale was a wild success helping the project to raise close to $65000 in less than two weeks. Now they’re ramping up for the official ICO which will begin April 14th 2016 at 12pm noon CST (Chicago). It will be held for 28 days with special bonuses happening the first few days.

You can find out more about the pre-sale and upcoming ICO from the new announcement thread HERE: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1433069.0

100% of all funds raised from the SOLCERT auction will go towards the project’s seed round and achieving a wildly successful Kickstarter.

“We believe a KickStarter is the starting point to catapult us straight into the mainstream. No more playing in the crypto-world. Lets go to the real world.”

For more details, sign up for their newsletter on the launch site http://launch.sollars.com/ or check out the blog http://newmoney.sollars.com/ to get the latest information on their Kickstarter and everything going on with the project.