Websites can now earn crypto by embedding Fortnite livestreams

Theta Labs, a blockchain-driven video delivery platform, today announced a new feature that lets anyone with a website earn crypto by serving visitors live, video-game streamers.

The Theta Live Embed lets website owners add video streams from the Theta.tv platform, allowing them to serve up live gameplay of titles like League of Legends and Fortnite, as well as esports competitions. Why bother? Because doing so can earn both the site owners and viewers Theta tokens, called TFUEL, which also benefits the streamers.

Theta’s decentralized video delivery technology utilizes viewers’ spare bandwidth to serve video to other viewers, minimizing the infrastructure and delivery costs for content publishers. As a reward for this system, viewers earn TFUEL, which can be donated to streamers and spent on premium content on the site—or swapped at a crypto exchange, of course. (Theta Fuel tokens are currently worth around $0.00400, according to data from Messari. That’s nearly a 7 percent increase from where the price stood just yesterday.)

Via a smart contract, the Theta Live Embed splits its TFUEL rewards three ways: one-third to the website hosting the embed, one-third to the viewers of the content (who have Theta.tv accounts), and finally one-third to the streamers whose content is featured. It will all be visible on the public blockchain, and according to a release, Theta Labs estimates that sites will see “incremental revenues of $50,000 to over $100,000 per 1 million monthly active users.” Energy drink mix brand G FUEL will be the first company to integrate the embed tool in its website.

“As we engaged with potential Theta partners over the past year, we heard more and more that live 24/7 esports content coupled with a loyalty or rewards program is strategic to their global business and user growth,” said Theta Labs CEO Mitch Liu, in a release. 

“We took Theta Live Embed a step further, where our partners can integrate it in a few hours and immediately start earning new revenues,” Liu said.

Theta.tv looks and acts much like popular video game streaming service Twitch, but doesn’t have nearly the same number of active creators or viewers. The company’s release boasts 300+ creators on the platform, and as of this writing, the peak live channel has about 130 people watching—both a tiny fraction of what’s seen on Twitch.

However, the crypto angle is meant to pull both viewers and creators away from other platforms, plus Theta Labs’ recent partnership with another video game streaming site DLive could help build some collective momentum for the concept.