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This is great news and one that could save our business. Excellent !!!
Great find and important topic, Art!
Here’s some more info on Wemark:
https://www.wemark.com/whitepaper.pdf
Of course we first have to wait and see how successful Wemark as a company will actually be with their approach before we get our hopes up. But the blockchain technology in itself definitely has great potential and could, in a few years time, do what Wemark proposes:
Decentralize a centralized market and give power back into the hands of creators.
It may be important to add, that Wemark’s aim isn’t ‘total decentralization’. (They also openly say so in their Whitepaper). But how could ‘total decentralization’ work at all in the context of digital marketplaces? I think it’s actually important to have a ‘middleman’ (and that’s what Wemark will still be in a way, though they claim to ‘cut out the middleman’ and give that role to the blockchain). There has to be some central instance that manages and evolves the infrastructure of a marketplace. This can’t all be done by the community.
What’s happening here from my point of view is this: The blockchain technology (with smart contracts) is able to automate a lot of the processes within a digital marketplace, including payment and (with limitations) distribution of content. If companies (agencies, platforms) are now using this technology to lower their costs significantly and are therefore able (and willing) to pay out more to the creators – that’s great news! And if they’re willing to also adopt even more possibilities offered by this (fairly new) technology (like hassle-free sharing of revenue between co-creators) – that’s even better!
But don’t get too hyped up by the marketing blabla of completely decentralized networks where ALL power goes back to the creator. And be aware that this is just one side of the medal. The other side is also mentioned as a sidenote (!) in Wemark’s Whitepaper:
By cutting the middleman, we believe photo licensing prices will decrease by 50% or more, while paying photographers more per download than they receive today.
I think what’s clear is: Changes are coming, though it might take a few more years…
What I try to do now is to stay as flexible as possible, so that I’ll be able to adapt to new, arising market situations by…
1. not binding content (especially if it’s exclusive) in unflexible contracts. (I only stay in contracts that don’t last longer than a year. I want to be able to pull my music out of any contract as fast as possible at any time.) and
2. not signing any copyrights away, ever.
Great info Art, tx
Anyone get an email offering to join ONCHAIN MUSIC? They appear to be affiliated with a standard music library but are offering to distribute via Blockchain. I took a look at some other posts on MLR about Blockchain and when I looked up WeMark, it appears they are done. Just curious is anyone is distributing via BC services and what is coming of it.
Here is an article about several BC music companies
https://builtin.com/blockchain/blockchain-music-Innovation-examples
And this TED talk does a great job explaining how BC might help artists (f/fwd to 15:50 for the music part, but the whole talk is great)
yES, i RECEIVED THE EMAIL from https://www.onchainmusic.com/
It looks like it’s for artists, not libraries. I may do it with my cd music.
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