Would it be possible to build a wide ad network across the whole hive blockchain that shows up on every app that enables it but can generate revenue from one account linked to a larger ad provider?
I know that peakd tried ads and said that they didn't generate enough income to make it worthwhile but they never gave it any time to work or tweak it to try to maximize the potential revenue possible.
My thought process however leads to having one ad setup across multiple hive apps linked to a single account. If we could display ads across a dozen apps catching much more views and clicks with revenue generated going to one place. Buy and burn Hive consistently form the external marketplace.
From chatGpt.
Yes. From a technical perspective, it's very feasible. The harder parts are adoption, abuse prevention, and creating enough value that Hive app developers choose to integrate it.
A possible architecture would look like this:
The core idea
Instead of every Hive frontend trying to sell its own advertising, there is one network.
Any Hive application could install a small SDK:
- PeakD
- Ecency
- games
- NFT marketplaces
- communities
- blogging frontends
- wallets
- video sites
When a page loads, the SDK asks your ad server for an ad.
The server decides:
- which campaign
- which size
- frequency
- targeting (if any)
- payout
The revenue is collected into one account.
Revenue models
Several are possible.
1. Google Ad Manager / AdSense (limited)
This is difficult because Google generally wants the publisher to own the site displaying the ads.
You can't simply proxy Google ads onto dozens of unrelated domains without meeting Google's publisher policies.
2. Independent ad exchanges
Networks like:
- Carbon Ads
- EthicalAds
- BuySellAds
- other RTB exchanges
are often easier to aggregate.
3. Direct advertisers
Probably the strongest long-term model.
A blockchain game pays:
500 HIVE/week
to appear across every participating Hive application.
Now every frontend earns a share.
4. Hive-native advertising
Someone buys ad inventory using:
HIVE
HBD
tokens
Campaigns are stored on-chain.
A central ad network could become infrastructure rather than another app.
SDK
Developers would only need something like:
That's all.
The server handles:
- ad selection
- tracking
- reporting
- billing
- Optional on-chain features
You could store:
- advertiser accounts
- campaign budgets
- payments
- publisher payouts
- campaign hashes
on Hive.
The actual ad images and targeting logic would remain off-chain for speed.
Biggest challenge
The technology is not the difficult part.
The real challenge is convincing enough Hive apps to adopt a common SDK.
To encourage adoption, you would want:
- Zero setup beyond adding the SDK.
- Automatic monthly payouts.
- A dashboard showing impressions, clicks, and earnings.
- The option for apps to block categories of ads they don't want.
- Revenue sharing that is transparent and predictable.
If several major Hive frontends adopted it, the network effect could make the ad inventory much more valuable than any single app could offer on its own.
An even more ambitious approach
Rather than relying on a single external ad provider, you could build a Hive Advertising Protocol. In this model:
- Advertisers buy campaigns with HIVE or HBD.
- External ad exchanges can also bid to fill unsold inventory.
- Every participating app exposes standardized ad placements through the same SDK.
- Revenue is split automatically between the hosting app, the protocol treasury, and any referrers or community funds.
- Campaigns, budgets, and payouts are transparently auditable on-chain, while the real-time ad serving remains off-chain for performance.
That would make advertising a shared piece of Hive infrastructure instead of a feature owned by one frontend, allowing the ecosystem to benefit from pooled traffic while still giving individual apps control over whether and where ads appear.
Would it be better to start with ads from an external company as hive would not be visable enough to attract specific ad buyers on its own?
Yes. In fact, I'd recommend that as a phased strategy. Trying to launch with only Hive advertisers creates a "chicken-and-egg" problem: advertisers won't come without traffic, and developers won't integrate your SDK if there's no revenue.
Revenue comes from:
External ad exchanges
Ethical ad providers
Direct sponsorships from companies outside Hive
Your focus is simply to maximize fill rate and provide a consistent SDK.
For developers, the pitch is straightforward:
*"Install one script and start earning from your traffic."
Phase 1: External ads fund the network
Phase 2: Add Hive-native campaigns
Once the network has regular traffic, you introduce a marketplace where Hive users can advertise.
Phase 3: Hybrid bidding
Eventually, every ad slot becomes an auction.
For example:
External provider offers $0.90 CPM
Hive game offers $1.10 CPM
Community offers $0.75 CPM
The Hive game wins because it pays more.
This means Hive advertisers don't need to replace external ads—they only need to outbid them when they value the exposure more.
One thing I'd avoid
I wouldn't build the system around a single ad provider.
Instead, think of your platform as an ad mediation layer.
The real long-term asset
The most valuable thing isn't the ad server—it's the network of participating apps.
Imagine you eventually have:
30 Hive applications
2 million page views per month
One SDK
One dashboard
One payment system
At that point, you have something advertisers can buy with a single campaign instead of negotiating with dozens of independent sites. That's a much stronger value proposition.
I also think there's an opportunity to leverage Hive itself in a way that most ad networks can't. Since users have persistent blockchain identities, participating apps could optionally share anonymous interest signals (with user consent) based on on-chain activity rather than invasive third-party tracking. That could enable relevant advertising while respecting privacy, giving your network a distinctive advantage over traditional cookie-based ad platforms.
We can't keep going the way that we have been going for the past few years. unfortunately it's only going to end one way if nothing changes. Printing hive and people selling Hive indefinitely can only kill the chain bit by bit as the whole eco-system continues to bleed value. Yes we might hit another bull run and see the price rise but again it's unsustainable without something to prop up the token value. And you can say what you like about people not caring about the price and for me it's not about the price. It's about survival. If hive drops under 1c and it could.......... How many more users will we lose and then developers, witnesses ect..... We all love this place but it needs positive momentum and incentive for people to stay involved and work towards growing the whole place. We can all see how much quieter it has been getting as the price drops and keeps dropping more and more.
Unless there is a change in how we operate or how we act then the outlook is not good for the future. This might be one way to improve that outlook and get all our functioning apps to get involved and help to generate income. Unfortunately I am not a developer or a witness but it's worth talking about.
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It's nice that HIVE has zero transaction fees, that users can earn tokens from inflation, that the project can get funding, etc. But, on the other side, all these things are a big distraction! While you get DHF funding, or you get nice author rewards, you don't come up with such great ideas like you explained in your post... As the price went down, no money to satisfy big appetites, we will come up with more and more ideas like this... Hopefully, people will start developing, and we will find ways to limit our token supply growth, and get more attention...
Even bigger chains are struggling with token supply, and they are thinking about burning... Only our whales think that rising token supply isn't a problem... 😐
Keep those ideas coming!!!
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I appreciate the thought, the time, and the huge amount of effort that you've put into this. But the whole point of Hive is that it is decentralised. So I can't see the point of trying to centralise advertising revenue.
Those of us that see the benefits of advertising can easily add it to our own frontends. The majority of Hive people seem to dislike advertising (that's a feeling rather than proven fact) and so they are free to avoid it.
And though I'm in the pro-ad camp, my belief in Proof Of Brain far outweighs any monetization strategies.
!BBH
Absolutely.
Hive the blockchain and the underlying tech should be decentralized even if it isn't in all reality.
But the apps and projects built on the tech stack are not decentralized and shouldn't be either. They are all centralized and while we are all working on our own little projects here should be aware of the overall health of the chain and be willing to help strengthen it as users.
A lot of Hive people dislike ads and hate being tracked but as we all know, everything that you post here is being tracked and is giving data away for free. Why not try to monetize that for our own benefit? The alternative as it stands to my eyes is that we keep doing what we have been doing for a few more years until the chain fades away to nothing and then we are in a far worse position that by suffering through a few discreet ads.
I wish that other front ends would integrate ads even for themselves and generate some money rather than relying on inflation and the dhf but so far none of them have done it in any meaningful way. We are working on it for my frontend but ran into issues with google ads and have had to push it down the list of work for now.
Decentralization is vital for the chain but not for the community.
I don't think it would be too hard to build a Hive ad network. We have alot of talented devs here.
Peakd ads was only shown for people without hive accounts from what I remember.
You did wrote alot and honestly I didn't read it all buddy xD
They trialed it as an opt out feature but it didn't last very long and they never fully explored the concept. I think they got some push back from the community which is sad as it was a concept worth putting some time into.
Ye, they could have run it for longer. But maybe in the crypto community uses brave browser, which doesn't help with paying the bills for ads :D
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It would be great if we can build better revenue generation models across HIVE.
!vote
Or any revenue models at all would be a start. Something for devs to think about.
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