You may remember that I reported three weeks ago that Microsoft was stopping its first party ad network, the system that provides ads for UWP applications and games, and which directly lets developers monetise their titles. OK, so I hate, and you probably hate, in-game ads and we do everything we can to avoid them, usually by paying a small amount to remove them officially. But most people (normobs) live with ads in their games, it seems, and developers make a pretty penny from the impressions. Faced with Microsoft's network going away, a prominent developer/publisher has stepped in to create his own (i.e. third party) ad network - and he has enough clout that it should all be up and running and included in app/game updates by Microsoft's deadline of June 2020. Phew!

The new network is called Pubfinity and any developers reading this will want to check this out and get it integrated as soon as they're approved.

CNBC reports that Sam Kaufmann, CEO of Random Salad Games (which publishes, among other titles, Simple Mahjong, Hearts Deluxe, and Dice King, offering more than 2 billion ad impressions per month between them) has created an ad network called Pubfinity:

"Created by Windows developers for Windows developers, our end-to-end platform provides a plug and play SDK that allows publishers to easily add Banner, Native, and Video ad units to their apps.".

"My immediate need was to monetize my own apps", said Kaufmann. "The ultimate goal is to position Pubfinity as a replacement for the Microsoft SDK going away."

Kaufmann is now looking to open up Pubfinity to other developers, but initially he plans to work with only a few high-quality developers until the ad network is ready for a full rollout.

"We’ll have a very strict review process. We want it to be an improvement and make it a place where developers can make money but not sacrifice the quality of their offerings".