99% of people listen to music. The other 1% are liars.
It is profound how big an impact music has on our personal wellbeing and societies at large. When Gangnam Style came out and broke the internet, people around the world were shocked at how different but surprisingly good Psy's music was, despite the fact that most of us couldn't understand it.
The business/politics of Justin Bieber, Drake, Taylor Swift, Red Hot Chili Peppers evades most people because it's not sexy nor relevant to most people. We turn a blind eye to the business while gladly consuming the content from the radio, iTunes, Spotify, Pandora and a million other services. This is a problem. A huge problem. Let me explain.
The music industry is undergoing a dramatic revolution. The advent of wide scale music streaming is disrupting the traditional business model of music. Less and less money is being spent on CDs (shout out to the millennial who've touched a CD before), vinyls (how old are we getting). Streaming music is a quarter as profitable for record labels and artists simply because of this new medium. And now artists are complaining.
Back in 2014, Taylor Swift mades waves when she publicly criticized Spotify's revenue model for skimping artists like her. Here's a perfect quote from Swift:
Music is art, and art is important and rare. Important, rare things are valuable. Valuable things should be paid for. It’s my opinion that music should not be free, and my prediction is that individual artists and their labels will someday decide what an album’s price point is. I hope they don’t underestimate themselves or undervalue their art.
Indeed, Spotify pays creators/artists percentages of pennies per stream. And we wonder why artists get pissed? Advertiser's and Spotify Premium users pay for the service. Currently there isn't a better way out.
So What Are You Saying Gavin?
Today, I want to share with the Steemit community and community at large about an idea I've had for a long time, but only recently brought into the possibility of existence through Steem and its revolutionary platform.
See, everything about Steemit is centered around the creators/users. Everything. In fact, Steemit doesn't even charge fees for its platform. And it doesn't have to. Blockchain technology has enabled this.
Steemit has the capability to enable content creators to create great content AND get paid for it. Currently, the platform only hosts text content capitalization. However, it isn't so far fetched to suggest other media platforms such as audio and video files. Given a robust platform like Steemit, it's only a matter of executing on this idea and potentially changing the one of the core fundamental economies of the world: the business of music.
How Would This Work In Reality?
Great question. So it's very simple. You play a song found on SteemMusic. If you like it, upvote/comment on the song. The artist gets paid in relation to the total amount of upvotes just like on Steemit. In return, we all get better music and a better world. Also without all the bullshit pop music marketing that only 13 year old girls like.
But there is still a market for that on SteemMusic. ;)
Arigato - Gavin
If you like this article and think the idea is good, would love an upvote! I'd love to hear your thoughts and/or experience on this subject so please leave them in the comment section below.
Additional background: I worked on a startup related to this idea in the hopes of really changing the music field. However, I found after 6 months of work that it was near impossible to do it while building a centralized organization. The best and most efficient way to achieve this is through a decentralized process.