Usability of Tokens for End Consumers

[cyber-i]

In case of utility tokens where they are supposed to be used for paying certain services (e.g., buying music online or tickets for concerts - as according to some recent ICO's) - does it mean that the end users will be able to pay the service only with the token or is there a way they can pay seamlessly by fiat?

If the end user can pay by token only, wouldn't that be a huge disadvantage for sales, especially with regard to attracting mainstream consumers? What would possibly motivate an average consumer to deal with all this crypto shit, wallets, exchanges, scammers, etc., in order to buy some tokens for a service they can get elsewhere for $ or € ?

Or can a company adapt the system in the way that the consumer pays seamlessly with $ or €, and the transaction is done via tokens at back-end only? But in such a case, what is then the inherent need of the token?


On a separate note - with the volatility of the tokens' prices, how can the prices of services/products be set in any coherent manner?

[cenicsoft]

We are enabling website merchants to accept both tokens, coins, etc. alongside traditional payment methods like credit cards with the BannerCoin ICO project - bannercoin.com

It's a benefit for the merchant to accept tokens for payment since there's little risk of chargebacks. However, to incentivize people to pay with tokens, the price of goods may need to be discounted or lowered. Since fees and no chargebacks are benefits for merchants, they can begin to pass those savings onto customers encouraging further use of digital currencies for payment.

[MakaveliTheDon]

A lot of this platforms/projects offers both. If you pay with a well-known crypto, like BTC or ETH, or even fiat (they usually use different provider to convert this, cuz otherwise you need to keep fiat liquidity, which is not easy by itself, especially if you are a decentralized project), they have either a smart contract converting this funds to their tokens (like Gnosis or Delphi) in the background with some kind of a burn mechanism or exchanging this funds for their tokens via regular exchanges. The point of having a token at all is to have an internal currency/store of value which appreciates in value with the use of the platform. So this is done purely because of  the investors in the pre-ICO/ICO stage which invest into the platform and want to see their investment go up with the higher usage of the platform - and I believe this is a good mechanism.
Some other projects use their own blockchain system (and are not based on existing ones like Ethereum), so they actually need their own token to function at all.

[cyber-i]

they have either a smart contract converting this funds to their tokens (like Gnosis or Delphi) in the background with some kind of a burn mechanism

Could you explain this in more detail? How exactly does this work?

[rjefferson]

A good example of this would be the esports betting platform Unikrn. Their ico UnikoinGold is meant to be used in their already existing platform. However, since they have acquired licenses in Australia and most of europe, people are able to use real money in their platform. When you purchase the token, you can convert it to unikoinsilver on their platform to participate in certain activities that consumers want such as tournaments.

You'll see a lot of gamers that aren't too familiar with icos, wallets, etc begin to get into this because they want what the platform offers and the means of facilitating what they want.