The Wall Street Journal does their daily media roundup with a touch of humour. CMO Today, their newsletter, consists of marketing, advertising, and industry news sprinkled with jokes and sarcastic quips.

With little innovation happening in their industry, they must rely on jokes and humour to jazz up their news. There is only so much you can write about Facebook’s newest scandal, or Instagram’s latest algorithm adjustment. Their readers need that joking tone to keep them engaged, because without it, the Wall Street Journal would simply be repeating the same topics and tone day after day after day.

Is the industry really that monotonous? I don’t think so. New advertising platforms, marketing methods and innovative media are being released daily. So why isn’t the Wall Street Journal talking about them?

Because the news has become so saturated with big names like Facebook, YouTube, and Google it is hard for emerging and disruptive platforms to break into the cycle. But they should be recognized— because platforms like Verasity are ready to redefine the future of digital advertising.

Verasity calls itself “a disruptive new video sharing platform that rewards the entire community for their activity in the platform.” What does that mean? Basically, the platform uses its own cryptocurrency called VERA to reward viewers for watching and sharing videos, content creators for hosting ads on their videos, viewers for watching ads and more. VERA is the only currency exchanged through the platform, so even advertisers and sponsors use it to interact with content creators and viewers.

While the idea of a video sharing platform is not new, their methodology is. Self-described as an ecosystem, Verasity will focus on value-driven results for all platform users – from viewers, to advertisers and beyond. To do this, they’ve created a patent-pending Proof of View (PoV™) blockchain protocol that could be a solution to the ever-prominent digital ad fraud. PoV™provides accurate watcher metrics for better value-based payments between content creators, viewers, advertisers and sponsors.

By focusing on value, rather than the overall number or some other vanity metric, Verasity aims to provide more return on investment for digital advertisers. By providing accurate and value-based returns, Verasity is offering a service to advertisers that remains absent from platforms like Youtube and Facebook— and everyone should take notice.

Verasity’s PoV™ technology works to prevent bots and other fraudulent automated software systems from counting towards advertising and video views. Currently, content creators can easily buy fake views from bots online, but with the PoV™ system, views are only counted from signed-in viewers, therefore preventing bots from contributing to overall views. The system also disallows viewers from creating multiple views at the same time, meaning it won’t count videos playing in multiple windows simultaneously – each user can only make one view at a time.

For an added layer of transparency, Verasity saves all “true views” (or views that pass their PoV™ technology) into a publically accessible document. This information is saved anonymously, so that users’ privacy cannot be breached.

Further, Verasity will share open-source tools for interested third parties (“Verafiers”) to review the collected data. This will ensure sponsors and advertisers that the numbers provided are not falsified, helping to solidify trust between the platform and its third-parties. It’s not uncommon for advertisers to be majorly concerned about ad fraud: billions of dollars in losses happen year after year in the digital marketing sphere. This year alone, ad fraud could cost advertisers up to $16 billion.

But it’s not just advertisers who are looking for something new. Users need a platform they can rely on. Recently, both Facebook and YouTube were wrapped up in scandals involving users’ data, causing many to look for new alternatives on decentralized platforms. These new sites often run on blockchain technology, allowing users to pay creators and commenters in digital tokens rather than traditional methods. This disruptive method could create safer spaces for users’ data, and more valuable monetization methods for creators and advertisers, something Verasity is trying to capitalize on with their platform.

With money on the line and users leaving major platforms, it is clear Verasity’s disruptive thinking could change the advertising industry for the better, making digital marketing a trustworthy pursuit once again. Whether or not CMO Today covers it in the future, an idea this innovative is not something to joke about.