There’s a buzz right now about a music streaming platform called Audius. No, this isn’t a paid article, just listen. If you’re producing music, you’ll wanna hear about a type of streaming platform which only works when the producers are square in the middle. Sound good? Welcome to the world of decentralized royalty splits. Welcome to blockchain for music.
Blockchain means business
Audius uses a blockchain to store its audio data, which makes it impossible for someone to claim a piece of intellectual property if someone else published it first. Permanent timestamping. Normally, you’d be able to change the date in a file. With blockchain, you can only update it, but the original record remains. In the same way that torrenting movies has been tempered by the affordability of Netflix, blatant sampling, lawsuit fears and track rips could be similarly subdued by the affordability of blockchain-based music platforms.
One platform to rule them all
We’re all used to new platforms coming along, making promises and then vanishing (or being bought out) with your data and hopes. There’s no reason to trust Audius - yet. But it does seem inevitable that sooner or later, a leading DJ-centric platform will come along which uses our current tech to enable direct fan-to-artist crypto payments. We’ll have to wait and see whether or not it’s Audius. Pretty advanced stuff, but not as advanced as this Advanced DJ Techniques & Tips III course.
User-facing
Blockchain platforms tend to resemble house parties. Someone owns the house, but nobody’s really in control of everything that’s going on. Platforms like Audius are built to serve the user base, not merely trade with them. The open-source feel of the platform holds all the promise of Web 3.0 and a much-needed overhaul of the current content distribution methods. The Audius white paper outlines most of what they stand for.
How much of this is of value to DJs is yet to be seen. But if you’re producing your own tracks, you’ll want to take notice of the way blockchain is affecting copyright (in your favor!). Yet again, times are changing. But thankfully, learning to DJ like a boss is here to stay.