Traditional video sharing platforms rely on quantifying views to determine advertising pay-out. Among the many issues with this, some creators are still using bots to generate fake views. When advertising companies can’t trust if a view is real or not, they can’t trust the number of adverts claimed to be shown. As a result, brands and advertising companies are finding it hard to provide the payment that was agreed upon or simply need to pay less for slippage. Engagement data such as thumbs up, thumbs down, comments, and subscribes run recommendation engines, but these metrics are easily manipulated.

Verasity’s platform will be built on a high-performance blockchain ledger that transparently displays all the transactions and anonymized video views on the platform. We’ll also verify those views as legitimate using our new Proof-of-View (PoV™) technology.

Verasity also removes the intermediaries that exist between the viewer and creator/publisher on existing video sharing platforms. This enables a direct exchange of value between viewers and creators using VERA cryptocurrency.

Why are we building a video blockchain infrastructure rather than simply a DApp strategy?

Verasity requires a stable and scalable solution for such a large potential market.

There are many reasons why standard DApp capable blockchains would not meet Verasity’s needs including:

Technical inability to deliver the required transactions per second required

Speed of verifying transactions offered through Proof-of-Work systems

High miner fees — which would leave the Verasity economy

Risk of future network changes and incompatibility

Future risk of disrepute with regulators, legislators, developers, DApps

Network congestion through growth in DApp usage

Relying on a third-party blockchain would potentially restrict the Verasity roadmap based on feature priority. Verasity requires long-term stability and the ability to be safe from external threats due to the large scale of online video and third-party use of our vDaf offering.

The Verasity Blockchain

After much R&D, Verasity settled up the Open Source C++ Graphene blockchain Framework.

At its peak in December 2017, the Bitcoin blockchain handled 497,349 transactions (tx) in one day. The Bitcoin network was at capacity and struggled with the number of transactions. In fact, there was around 182,317 tx pending that day and an estimated $5,760,245,260 fees paid. Steem runs on the Graphene Framework and manages around 1,561,103 tx on an average day — using 0.13% of its capacity.

Graphene’s modular fashion makes it perfect for many different use cases including Verasity’s. Graphene can scale to over 100,000 transactions per second. Major credit card providers currently process around 2,000 transactions per second. The technology can also confirm transactions in three seconds or less. This makes it efficient compared to many other blockchains.

Verasity needs to be able to accommodate billions of video watching internet users both on our own video sharing platform, but also to power third-party video platforms that utilize vDaf. Graphene will ensure that all transactions are successfully recorded during average and peak volumes. Transactions also need to be fast. If it takes hours to confirm transactions (like on Bitcoin or Ethereum chains) then users won’t be able to unlock content in real time which is not the level of user experience required to get user adoption of our platform.

The Verasity blockchain is well optimised for resource usage. For example, where possible, the software will store data in RAM. This cuts down on time-consuming database queries. It also ensures we can process hundreds of thousands of transactions per second. Additionally, the Verasity blockchain uses non-conflicting, globally assigned unique IDs rather than hashes. This means we can decrease the number of CPU and memory required.

How the Verasity Blockchain works

The Graphene framework runs on a Delegated Proof-of-Stake (DPoS) consensus algorithm. Representatives from the Verasity community verify/sign a new block every three seconds. On Verasity, these representatives are ‘Verafiers’. Each block can hold up to 10,000 tx, so the tx speeds can run at over 3,000 tx per second. This is faster than Proof-of-Work consensus algorithms currently used by Bitcoin and Ethereum. As an added bonus it also consumes less energy and thus more efficient.

Users who hold VERA elect Verafiers. The more VERA you hold the more influence you have to decide upon the elected Verafiers.

To incentivise block creation, Verafiers get paid for their services to the network. If a Verafier doesn’t produce blocks they are not paid and get voted out by other VERA holders.

Verifying the unverifiable

Like most other blockchains, the blocks on Verasity’s will contain transaction data. However, on 7th February 2018, Verasity filed a US Provisional Patent for a system called Proof-of-View (PoV™). This mechanism publically and unalterably determines the trustworthiness of a video view. These auditable logs contain all the views and content recommendations on the platform. Alongside anonymized viewer information.

Multiple video views get hashed and combined until a final top hash is created. The database is in chunks and each top hash represents all the data stored in a specific chunk of the database. The top hash of the current chunk is what gets added to each new block. This is then signed by the Verafiers on the Verasity blockchain. As this data held in a decentralized manner, third-parties will be able to prove that each top hash is accurate and unaltered.

Proof-of-Work cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum already work as a secure and decentralized means of sending money. But, Proof-of-Work blockchains take power away from the average user and can result in large fees. Delegated Proof-of-Stake blockchain projects like Verasity have the added benefit of fast and free transactions.

By allowing the community to elect Verafiers and having nodes all around the world Verasity is decentralized and secure. Our blockchain is fast and doesn’t result in exorbitant energy costs.

A Blockchain for the future

Verasity’s platform is set to power video distribution and digital media distribution for decades to come. Graphene provides the speed, efficiency, and scalability required to make Verasity the destination for online video. Likewise, Verasity’s Proof-of-View (PoV™) technology ensures our video views are trusted, and verifiable.

The Verasity team will have lots more to talk about over the coming weeks and months. In the meantime, please take a look at our official website (and bookmark it), follow our Medium blog, and discuss the project on our official accounts.

Join our community:

If you want to join the conversation about Verasity then please follow our various accounts below!

Website: https://verasity.io

Telegram: http://t.me/verasitychat

Twitter: https://twitter.com/verasitytech

Facebook: https://facebook.com/verasitytech

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/verasity

Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/verasity