Introduction

As the world’s data slowly decentralizes, many industries have been shown to have a more fair and transparent decentralized alternative. Finance, insurance, ticketing, social media, file storage and computing are all examples where a decentralized future looks bright. Yet, digital advertising continues to be an industry in which centralization is the predominant model without an open alternative.

Centralized advertising is marked by the concentration of power in the hands of a few giants. These platforms have amassed vast amounts of user data, granting them significant control over the advertising ecosystem. This concentration leads to limited competition, reduced innovation, and challenges to advertisers, publishers and consumers. Lack of transparency, ad fraud, user experience challenges, and limited user control of their data highlight the shortcomings of this model.

We’re proposing The Open Ads Protocol. An open, permissionless and decentralized advertising protocol to create transparent and fair advertising experiences. It will serve as a decentralized advertising layer that can be built upon to create a robust advertising ecosystem that facilitates a more fair, user-centric, attention economy.