OwnStream

Empowering creators to own, track, and earn from their content effortlessly.

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Inspiration

We were inspired by the struggles that content creators face in owning their intellectual property, tracking remixes, and receiving fair compensation. Current platforms often monetize creators’ work without transparent tracking, making it difficult to earn royalties or control reuse.

We wanted to empower creators by combining blockchain, AI, and cloud technologies to give them full control over their content and earnings.

What it does

OwnStream allows creators to:

Register content as NFTs on the blockchain for proof of ownership

Generate AI fingerprints to detect reuse or remixes of their work

Automatically distribute royalties via smart contracts

View a dashboard with uploaded content, reuse statistics, and earnings

Demo flow:

Upload content

Store content on IPFS and generate AI fingerprint

Mint NFT on Sepolia testnet

Detect reuse/remixes

Trigger royalty payouts automatically

Display updated earnings on the dashboard

How we built it

Component Tech Stack / Frameworks Frontend React + Vite + MetaMask + Stripe (Windows) Backend Node.js + Express + Firebase + Axios (Windows) AI Fingerprinting Python + Flask + librosa / OpenAI CLIP (Windows) Smart Contracts Solidity + Foundry + OpenZeppelin + Sepolia testnet (WSL) Storage IPFS (Web3.Storage SDK) Payments / Royalties Stripe (simulate payouts) Demo Deployment Frontend → Vercel, Backend/AI → Render

Challenges we ran into

Integrating AI fingerprinting to reliably detect remixes

Connecting smart contracts to backend APIs for automatic payouts

Managing asynchronous workflows between file uploads, NFT minting, and royalty distribution

Deploying multiple components (frontend, backend, AI microservice) and keeping them in sync

Ensuring fast and intuitive dashboard updates for creators

Accomplishments that we're proud of

Successfully minted NFTs for uploaded content on Sepolia testnet

Implemented AI-powered reuse detection for audio/video content

Built a dashboard showing content status, earnings, and reuse analytics

Automated royalty payouts via smart contracts, simulating real-world monetization

Demonstrated end-to-end workflow in a hackathon-ready prototype

What we learned

How to integrate React frontend, Node.js backend, and Python AI microservices

Working with blockchain and NFTs using Solidity, Foundry, and OpenZeppelin

Handling IPFS storage and linking content to on-chain assets

Designing a scalable dashboard to visualize reuse, payouts, and analytics

Coordinating multiple technologies for a full-stack Web3 application

What's next for OwnStream

Support multiple media types beyond audio/video

Integrate cross-platform reuse detection across social media and streaming platforms

Enable fractional ownership and marketplace features for NFTs

Improve AI fingerprinting accuracy and speed

Launch on mainnet with real payouts for creators

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