As the world is advancing towards a more decentralized web infrastructure, storage solutions such as Lighthouse Storage are becoming increasingly popular. Lighthouse Storage is a Web3 Storage Solution that allows users to store their files perpetually on Web3 using Filecoin. Lighthouse Storage can be utilized for creating a pay-to-view model, using custom contracts and NFT-based access control.

The concept of pay-to-view is not new, but with the rise of blockchain technology, it has become more feasible and secure. With Lighthouse Storage, users can upload their files with encryption, and apply access conditions to them. These access conditions can be defined using NFTs, custom contracts, time-based, or native token-based conditions. In this example, we will consider NFT-based access control.

Step 1: Upload the encrypted file to the Lighthouse IPFS node. Users can choose to upload their files either using NodeJS Encryption Upload or ReactJS Browser Encryption Upload code example. Once the file is uploaded, Lighthouse node returns an IPFS CID/Hash for the encrypted file.

Step 2: Apply access control to the encrypted file. Let's consider the example of NFT-based access control. The file owner can specify that only users who own NFTs from a particular collection can access the file. To do this, the owner needs to apply the access condition to the encrypted file. After applying the access condition, only the user who owns NFTs from that particular collection can access the file.

Step 3: Once the access conditions have been defined, the Lighthouse view URL can be used to view the encrypted file, or the user can build a custom decryption view page using the provided code example. The user who has access to the file can pay using NFT or custom contracts. If the NFT is made a soul-bound token (SBT), the owner will not be able to transfer it to any other address, ensuring that the access is limited to the intended user.