Advertising on Seldeo: how we think about it

Status note (10 September 2026). No advertising runs on Seldeo today. The mobile app has not launched, and seldeo.com carries no advertising. This post describes the advertising model we have committed to and will apply when the app ships — not a system that is currently serving anyone. We will update this note when that changes.

Why we advertise

Seldeo is a private company with a small team and a large ambition — a calmer social network that persists for decades, not one that flips in three years. Getting to that future means having a durable revenue model that doesn't require selling out the reasons the product exists.

Advertising is one part of that revenue model. We chose it over the two main alternatives — a paid subscription and data-brokerage — for pragmatic reasons:

• A paid subscription works well for a small, technical audience but fails as a growth strategy for a mass-market social product. The people we most want on Seldeo are the ones least likely to pay a monthly fee.
• Data-brokerage is the fastest way to lose your users' trust and, in most jurisdictions where we care about our legal footing, is not actually available to us. Selling personal data was never on the table.

Ads it is. The rest of this post is how we make sure ads work on Seldeo without turning Seldeo into the thing we're trying not to be.

Where ads appear

Ads on Seldeo will appear in exactly three places, all inside the mobile app:

• Native feed cards. Between organic posts in the friend feed. Six per 21-post scroll segment, at fixed indices. Every one is labelled "Sponsored" with an AdChoices control.
• Story ad slides. Between story bundles in the story viewer. No more than one per eight organic slides. Shaped like organic slides — full-screen, portrait, tap to advance — with a persistent "Sponsored" chrome.
• In-stream video ads. Before video posts longer than 60 seconds. Skippable after a clearly displayed interval. Pre-roll only; no mid-roll ads on user-generated video. Companion end cards when the advertiser provides one.

That is the whole list.

Where ads do not appear

• On the corporate website. seldeo.com is ad-free. The advertising described in this post is only inside the mobile app.
• On memorial pages. No ads render on any page associated with a memorialised account. Ever.
• In direct messages. No ads in the DM UI. Not a banner, not a card, not a promoted contact suggestion.
• No promotional messages without opt-in. Optional promotional notifications and emails require you to enable the categories you want in Settings → Marketing updates. You can turn them off without turning off transactional or security messages. See Notifications, restrained.
• On the login screen or the sign-up flow. No prompt for a product recommendation before the user is even signed in.
• As "recommended posts" that blend into the feed. No algorithmic surfacing of sponsored content dressed up as organic.

Consent, region, and identifiers

Advertising practices and available choices can vary by location and settings. The service providers that process advertising data are identified in our Privacy Policy.

• In the EEA, UK, and Switzerland, a consent prompt runs before personalised advertising is allowed. If consent is denied, any eligible ads remain non-personalised.
• In the US, the "Do Not Sell or Share" (California) and equivalent state signals are honoured.
• On iOS, the operating system's tracking-permission choice applies. Declining it removes cross-app tracking identifiers from advertising requests.
• In every region, review the advertising choices shown in the app and the applicable details in our Privacy Policy.

Full detail lives in Regional privacy and the Privacy Policy.

Frequency capping

Ad frequency on Seldeo is capped by account-level rules:

• Feed native cards. No more than 6 per 21 organic posts. The limit applies regardless of ad availability.
• Story ad slides. No more than 1 per 8 organic story slides.
• In-stream video ads. No more than 2 pre-roll ads per 30 minutes per account.
• Bumper ads. Non-skippable video ads (≤6 seconds) are used sparingly, no more than 1 per 60 minutes per account.

These caps are not the maximum we could serve. They're the maximum we're willing to serve. They can be tightened at any time if the numbers stop making sense.

Operational pause controls

Every ad surface can be paused globally or individually within about a minute. Feed cards, story slides, and video pre-rolls each have an independent operational control.

We don't advertise this as a "you can turn ads off" feature. It's an operational backstop for the moment when we need to pull the whole thing down quickly — a compliance incident, a policy failure, or a wave of unusual inventory.

What happens when no ad is eligible

Seldeo considers ads only at the fixed positions described above. If no ad is available, consent is missing, or the surface is paused, the position disappears and organic content closes the gap. The feed and story viewer never show an empty or indefinitely loading ad card.

Attribution to creators

Currently, revenue accrues 100% to Seldeo Inc. There is no creator monetization layer on Seldeo yet. When we add one, the numbers will be reported publicly (in the Transparency Report or its ads-specific equivalent) and the payout mechanics will be documented before the first payout runs. Creator reporting is being designed to support item-level attribution so that payouts, when they arrive, are explainable and auditable.

The line we don't cross

Ads on Seldeo have a specific shape and stay in it. If we ever cross a line — a full-screen interstitial, an ad in the DM UI, a promoted post that blends into organic, personalised inventory in a way that conflicts with the applicable in-app choices — that would be a bug, and advertising@seldeo.com is the right address to report it.

The Help Center will document advertising controls and eligibility before any material change ships.