The DATA Network has crossed a major milestone, reaching more than 100 million data registrations recorded onchain. This achievement aligns with the platform’s expanding revenue model, which is fueled by actual onchain network activity.
Coinciding with this landmark, Upbit, one of South Korea’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges, kicked off a four-day trading competition for $DATA tokens on July 24. The event runs through July 27 and invites participants to trade $DATA, complete quizzes, and climb a leaderboard for rewards. Only users in eligible jurisdictions can join, excluding US persons and residents of OFAC-restricted areas.
The DATA Network was born from a rebranding of Story into The DATA Foundation, focusing entirely on sourcing and authenticating real-world data for AI labs. Its core product, Trace, acts as an audit layer that provides legal proof of data provenance, assuring AI developers that the data they use is verified. This matters because AI training has outpaced publicly available internet data, pushing the need for licensed, trustworthy datasets that live largely outside the open web.
Independent analysts estimate the market for licensed AI training data is already worth billions and will grow exponentially over the next decade. The DATA Network aims to lay the infrastructure for this emerging sector, and its 100 million onchain registrations show that the foundation is being built.
Growing Revenue from Onchain Activity
Network activity now generates thousands of dollars in daily onchain fees, a 200-fold increase compared to just a few weeks ago. This surge has propelled the DATA Network into the top 20 blockchains by daily chain fees. Each data registration creates an immutable onchain record through Trace, capturing details about the data, its contributor, payments made, and terms agreed upon. Because these registrations require fees paid in $DATA, the network’s revenue scales directly with user activity.
