Monetization

Early Draft

This specification is at an early draft stage. Ideas are open for change and debate. A lot of the content was developed with the help of Claude AI.

Monetization

Wallet Integration

The wallet provider handles cross-publisher subscription management and pay-per-read for human Vera users. It runs as a privileged background service in the browser. Subscription status and wallet balance are cached locally (15-minute TTL).

Pay-per-Read Flow

# Vera browser (pseudocode)
async def handle_ppr_payment(article_id: str, price: float, publisher: str):
    wallet = await wallet.get_wallet()
    if wallet.balance < price:
        show_topup_dialog(required=price, current=wallet.balance)
        return
    confirmed = await show_ppr_confirm_dialog(
        publisher=publisher, price=price,
        article_preview=current_page_title()
    )
    if confirmed:
        tx = await wallet.debit(
            amount=price, publisher=publisher, article_id=article_id
        )
        await sso.refresh_token(include_ppr_receipt=tx.receipt_id)
        await browser.reload()

OpenRTB: Programmatic Advertising Integration

The ad-supported tier is not tied to a single ad network. Vera integrates with the programmatic advertising ecosystem via the OpenRTB 2.x standard, giving publishers full control over their demand stack.

When a Vera user visits an ad-supported page, the browser assembles an OpenRTB bid request and forwards it to the publisher's configured endpoint: an SSP, a DSP, or a self-hosted Prebid Server instance. Any OpenRTB-compliant auction endpoint works without modification.

The key difference from a standard browser: the bid request is assembled by the browser itself. Vera's central consent store (the same store used for the identity layer) supplies a TCF 2.x consent string that goes directly into user.ext.consent. The signal comes from a verified, one-time user action, not from page-level JavaScript.

Vera Browser
  │
  ├─ Ad-supported page requested
  ├─ Reads consent store → TCF 2.x string
  ├─ Constructs OpenRTB BidRequest
  │    regs.gdpr = 1
  │    user.ext.consent = <TCF string>
  │    imp[0].secure = 1
  └─ POST → publisher's OpenRTB endpoint (SSP / DSP / Prebid Server)

Publishers declare their endpoint in the integration manifest:

{
  "monetization": {
    "ad_supported": {
      "openrtb_endpoint": "https://prebid.publisher.news/openrtb2/auction",
      "tmax_ms": 150,
      "floor_price_cpm": 0.50
    }
  }
}

Access Decision Matrix (Human Traffic)

Model	Token	Subscription	PPR balance	Result
Subscription	✅	✅	—	200, full article
Subscription	✅	❌	—	402, subscription dialog
PPR	✅	—	>= price	200 after debit
PPR	✅	—	< price	402, top-up dialog
Ad-supported	any	—	—	200, ads via Ströer
Free	any	—	—	200, no dialog