Bittunes

Blockchain: Music Without the Middlemen?

May 13, 2016By rightstech

Music Ally’s ‘Blockchain: Music Without the Middlemen?’ event tonight tried to get beyond the hype to understand what blockchain technology really means for musicians and the music industry.

Our panel comprised: Simon Edhouse, MD of one of the world’s first bitcoin music platforms, Bittunes; Maria Forte, an independent consultant who’s worked on everything from EMI’s sampling department to Radiohead’s In Rainbows campaign; Benji Rogers, founder and chief strategy officer at PledgeMusic; Alex Amsel, blockchain consultant and co-founder of Ownage; Mark Douglas, CTO of music-licensing body PPL.

Source: Blockchain: Music Without the Middlemen?

Three Startups Trying to Transform the Music Industry Using the Blockchain

February 22, 2016By admin

A gang of computer programmers – united by the Bitcoin technology – are trying to revolutionize an industry after 15 years of disruption which began with Napster and was cemented by BitTorrent.

Bitcoin’s blockchain – a decentralized system powered by a network of computers – serves as the transparent backbone of the Bitcoin network. The blockchain, which functions as a public ledger, maintains the accounting of the Bitcoin network, timestamping each transaction and assigning a unique ID.

Numerous individuals and companies are excited about the future of the blockchain and the music industry. Three companies, PeerTracks, Bittunes and Ujo Music, each claim their business model will liberate musicians from being under the thumbs of overbearing music labels and streaming services.

Source: Bitcoin Magazine

RightsTech Extra

AI Companies Get the Picture

By Paul Sweeting

One of the biggest challenges facing copyright owners in grappling with the rapid development of generative AI technology, apart from a murky legal status, has been market failure, as discussed here in previous posts. The amount of existing material needed to train gen-AI models is so great, and so varied, that gauging the value of any one piece of it to establish a market price for it for licensing purposes is often effectively impossible. One group of rights owners is finding willing buyers among AI companies, however. An active, albeit for various reasons mostly sotto voce market has begun to emerge for the use of images held in large photo archives and by photo agencies and social media platforms, complete with per-unit industry and at least a nod toward creator attribution... Read More >>