Accept Bitcoin payment, publish songs on Ethereum, when music meets blockchain
Grammy-winning sound mixer André Allen Anjos (RAC) and Los Angeles-based producer and DJ Josh Legg (Goldroom) announced on May 1 that they have launched a new record label, Minerva Music. Leveraging Ethereum to distribute his music products and interact with his users.
This is not the first time André has used Ethereum to distribute music products. As early as 2017, André released a full album on Ethereum.
Many singers have expressed their willingness to accept cryptocurrency payments.
Spotify, a streaming music service platform, is also trying to use blockchain technology to bypass cooperation between major record companies and artists.
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[Deep Chain Original]
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singers and cryptocurrencies
In 2017, the cryptocurrency Monero (Monero) announced that 45 musicians and 5 online stores accepted cryptocurrency payments during the Christmas holidays and offered discounts to those who paid with cryptocurrencies.
The list of participants in the project includes various big-name musicians of different types, such as rock band Weezer, rapper G-Eazy, metal band Slayer, old band B-52s, country music queen Dolly Parton, singer-songwriter Morrissey, etc. .
Monero is an open-source cryptocurrency created in April 2014 with a focus on privacy, decentralization, and scalability. As of press time, its market value is 9.071 billion yuan, and the market price is about 535 yuan per unit, making it the twelfth largest cryptocurrency in terms of market value.
Rapper G-Eazy once said: "With the increasing popularity of cryptocurrencies, my fans have another choice when they are struggling with how to purchase my works."
Such cases are not rare.
In 2014, well-known singers such as 50 Cent and Mastodon announced that they supported Bitcoin payment.
In October 2015, British female singer Imogen Heap released her new song "Tiny Human" on the Ethereum blockchain. Users only need to deposit ETH into their accounts to get MP3 Access to files.
In 2017, Björk's new album "Utopia" by Icelandic singer accepted payment in cryptocurrencies. Pre-ordering the album through the official website will also give you 100 AudioCoins in cryptocurrencies as a reward.
AudioCoin was established in 2013, and its tokens were issued in 2015. Since its release, although the issue price has fallen sharply, it has been cooperating with music-related industries.
Not only accepting virtual currency payments, musicians also issue tokens themselves.
In 2017, musician Gramatik launched the GRMTK cryptocurrency in Zurich. The currency is provided directly to Gramatik by fans, allowing brands and distributors to take a cut of the profits.
After GRMTK was released, 1/4 of GRMTK tokens were sold to fans within the first 24 hours.
"Embedded in GRMTK tokens are not only the rights and royalties of my creations, but also the freedom and ideals and philosophies of all artists and all people." Gramatik said that this is not only a movement of art, but also a movement of heart and spirit.
At the same time, the music platform is also researching and launching the application of blockchain technology.
These include IBM's music copyright involvement in the blockchain system, genuine streaming music service platform Spotify, and PanDoRa music radio station that provides online music services.
There is an inextricable relationship between popular music and cryptocurrencies, including the creation of related songs and the involvement of blockchain concepts.
A-list celebrities like Kanye West, Kim Kardashian, and Katy Perry have all mentioned Bitcoin.
Including, in the new album "Kamikaze" released by American rap king Eminem (Eminem) in 2018, a new song called "Not Alike" is also associated with Bitcoin.
“Remember everybody used to bite Nickel”
“Now everybody doing bitcoin”
— from "Not Alike"
Why does the music industry fall in love with blockchain?
Imogen Heap, a Grammy Award-winning British singer, said that blockchain can give artists greater control over their music and what they want to express.
So, why does the music industry love virtual currency and blockchain so much?
For musicians, the architecture envisioned by Bitcoin shows many advantages, including: 1. Eliminate complex intermediate links; 2. Regulate excessive concentration of rights; 3. Track asset flows to avoid problems caused by trust mechanisms.
The above technologies can solve the fund allocation and copyright issues in the music industry. But let’s start with the problems in the music industry itself:
1) Earnings
The music industry is a "superstar economy" where a small percentage of people make up a disproportionately large proportion of the total revenue for a production. It involves record companies, musicians, gig managers, entertainment companies, and more.
Musicians are divided into independent musicians and musicians signed by record companies.
"Independent musicians basically have high investment and low return, while artists signed to a company rely on packaging. After they become popular, they will make more money by holding concerts. Musicians who play with emotions don't make money, only musicians who go into business can make money. "Zhang Jinzhu is still on the road to becoming a musician, she told Shenlian Finance and Economics.
According to Netease Cloud Music’s 2016 data, the income of independent musicians mainly comes from offline performances, tours and special performances. These tickets are calculated at an average of 80 yuan per person, even if the average number of people per game is 200. and travel and other expenses, the performance income may only be a few thousand yuan.
Even such income, many musicians cannot achieve, and more independent musicians are still struggling to break even.
So most musicians will eventually choose to sign with a record company.
But for a record company, investing in an artist is a huge risk. Therefore, the record company will formulate extremely harsh terms to ensure the company's own interests,
Statistics show that musicians earn an average of about 20% of the industry's total income. But one study has shown that musicians actually earn 1% of 77% of music revenues.
"Basically, you won't get any income from signing in at the early stage, because the company will spend money to package you, and the release of albums by slightly famous musicians is basically divided between the platform and the musicians." Zhang Jinzhu said, of course, it also depends on the company. specific plan.
After the artist signs in early, the record company also needs to pay the artist an advance payment based on the artist's future investment value. If the contract is breached, most artists need to repay the advance payment, and many artists cannot repay their own advance payment.
Therefore, the advance payment makes the artist a "money machine". Only by continuously generating income for the record company signed can they maintain their own creative career.
At the same time, artists are also facing the company's allocation of funds to musicians with more "potential", while themselves being put on hold. After all, the probability of "success" is extremely small.
The artist does not have any income until the advance payment is paid. After paying the advance payment, you can only get about 20% of your own income.
According to the "Research Report on Musicians' Survival Status and Copyright Awareness" by Communication University of China, nearly 30% of musicians have never made a penny from music, and 70% of musicians must engage in part-time jobs.
The role of the blockchain in this is to transfer the relevant links in music production to the blockchain, reducing the time and economic costs brought by intermediate agency links such as numerous social media and integrated systems. Reduce the phenomenon of intermediary sharing, so that the contributors to music creation will be the main beneficiaries, thus ensuring the adequacy of funds for musicians.
At the same time, it can realize the new possibility of maximizing the fan economy, give fans and lovers the right to make decisions, democratize the process of discovering new talent, and allow artists to have more opportunities to emerge.
2) Royalty issues
The royalties lie in the "credits" issue. Almost all song recordings are a collaborative effort between lyricists, singers, musicians, producers, sound engineers, and others.
But in the end creators often sell their rights to record labels and publishing companies. This right entitles all contributors to the song to be paid royalties when the song is played, performed live.
But many producers or songwriters don't get royalties at all. There is nothing they can do when faced with infringements.
Zhang Zhang is now an independent musician. Fifteen years ago, as an original singer, he sued the record company many times for not paying him the most basic royalties.
"I fought several lawsuits, and although I won in the end, I only won a pitiful amount, not even enough for the lawyer's travel expenses." Zhang Zhang said almost desperately.
It took more than two years of going back and forth, and although I finally won the lawsuit, the compensation I received was pitifully small.
While not getting royalties, artists are also completely unable to control their own income.
The acquisition of artist royalties will go through multiple intermediaries, and each intermediary has its own accounting process, fee structure and reporting standards.
"After the song was released by the record company, I basically only got 2,000 yuan in the end." For the original singer Zhang Zhang, he felt that the royalties he got were mocking. In addition, Zhang Zhang will also experience song traffic being falsely reported, or sales supervision without credibility.
In the music industry, blockchain can change the distribution and monetization of music, allowing artists to have a stronger connection with their fans.
"Only the blockchain can allow musicians and fans to truly be the masters." Zhang Zhang said.
The transparent system created by blockchain can track song ownership, digital assets, etc. If someone doesn't get paid, it's known and automatically distributed to everyone who contributed to the album.
The layout of large companies
"I believe that the blockchain is no problem." Zhang Zhang very much agrees with the concept of the blockchain.
Blockchain technology is not the best solution for all the problems the music industry is facing. But at least the technology can level the playing field somewhat.
However, not everyone welcomes this, especially those in the music industry who profit from the lack of transparency, or monopolies, etc.
According to information reports, for example: Universal, Sony, and Warner, the three giants account for about 80% of the entire music industry.
In 2018, when the streaming music company Spotify reached a direct licensing agreement with independent singers to allow singers to bypass major record companies completely, the major record companies stated that they did not support Spotify's "underground activities" in various ways.
Not only that, as early as 2017, Spotify had acquired the blockchain startup Mediachain Labs.
Relevant information shows that what Mediachain wants to solve is a problem that was once almost impossible to solve on the Internet-to help people who create digital media associate their identities with their works.
However, after the relatively high-profile acquisition, Mediachain did not disclose much about its technical progress.
Of course, the blockchain has always faced difficulties in its application. For example, the instability of Token value, technical breakthroughs, difficulties in landing operations, and difficulties in achieving compliance...
This article is original for Deepchain (ID: deepchainvip). Unauthorized reprinting is prohibited.
This article is original for Deepchain (ID: deepchainvip). Unauthorized reprinting is prohibited.
