How the Music Industry Is Evolving into a Creators’ Economy — A New World Order For Musicians
The Creative Economy Manifesto
More and more people will pursue their creative interests in the new imagination society. Also known as Society 5.0. Technologies such as blockchain and artificial intelligence (AI) will free mankind from meaningless and labour-intensive jobs. Here are 5 things that I learned from talking with NFT artists last week.
1. In the Web 2.0 era Music Streaming Services Got Very Fat, whilst most Indy Artists had to Wait Tables for a living.
I am not going to name names we all know which ones we are talking about. Some of the most popular music streaming services pay musicians as little as a third of a cent per stream, whilst they go on to make billions of dollars in revenue. Does this seem fair? The musician puts their heart and soul into their work, whilst others make all of the money?
Not just in music streaming services either, in the entire centralised Web 2.0 setup there are fees involved, with subscription services and payment services. If you paid your favourite content creator $10 per month with a subscription, it is likely that he or she will only receive $7.20 in return. There were so many middlemen and agents everyone had to get a piece of the pie. And the artist suffered as a result.
2. In Web 3.0, Blockchain Technology Will Cut Out The Middlemen.
BeatiFy, a blockchain-based music streaming platform is currently one of my favourite projects right now. In their setup, the artist is guaranteed a fair price per stream, and they get paid in real-time, every time someone listens to their song.
By allowing the blockchain to do the work of the middlemen, the whole process is streamlined and decentralised. In a gamified way if you love a content creator, every play, viewing or stream awards them with a crypto token. This token will then can be exchanged into hard currency. Making it possible for the artist to start making a living doing what they love.
3. With NFTs, You Do Not Need A Huge Audience To Make A Comfortable Living.
Making a comfortable living for creatives will no longer be the exclusive domain of A-Listers and other celebrities. For example, in the Web 3.0 world, you can have a creative project with only 100–200 fans and still make a comfortable living, as long as you are putting out quality content and they recognise the value in your creation.
The key is to have the appropriate pricing strategy in place for your NFTs. The other exciting aspect of smart contracts is that you can set the royalty rate for the artwork before you mint it, which is very exciting. Set it to 10 per cent, and every time the artwork changes hands for the rest of its life, you will receive an automatic 10 per cent of the value.
4. You Can Become Your Own Record Label.
Take notice, record executives around the world: your positions are on the line! Independent artists can use NFTs to mint tokens and release their music directly to the public, reaping the benefits of all of the aforementioned advantages. After that, the ball is in the court of the artist, and they have the final say on where and how their music will be distributed.
This newfound freedom can empower the artists to create engaging and immersive fan experiences. As the NFT is not just an MP3 file, it can be programmed in with hangout spaces and tickets to intimate concerts inside the metaverse.
Pre-pandemic, the largest sources for revenue for musicians were touring. Now they can perform online immersive live gigs at scale, without needing a passport.
5. Greater Creative Control.
Becoming their own record label means that the creative control lies back with the artist. How many times have you felt that your favourite band has sold out or mainstreamed with a “radio-friendly” album? So often the case the record label had put pressure on the artist to tone down their sound for a mass appeal. Have you ever noticed most pop songs last 3 minutes 30 seconds?
Without this restraint, musicians are now left free to experiment with their sound. A case of quality over quantity, meaning that they can stay cool without selling out. If this is the case then a new classic era of artist expression is nearly upon us, empowered in part by the metaverse and other Web 3.0 technologies.
Viva la revolution!
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How the Music Industry Is Evolving into a Creators’ Economy — A New World Order For Musicians was originally published in CryptoStars on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.