Everyone knows that live shows and tours are important to most musicians’ ability to make a living. Up to 80% of streaming profits go to centralized web2 platforms, while the other 20% go to record labels and artist management. This makes it hard for musicians to make much money from online streaming. Web services that let you stream mp3 music come in handy here. The new generation of Web 3 music streaming services is different from the ones that came before it because it is decentralized and gives artists more control.
People who use the Web3 streaming platform and music NFTs early on will get a lot out of it. So, it makes sense for working producers, musicians, and singers to look into these options now, even though it’s still unclear if these Web3 streaming platforms and NFTs will be better than Spotify or Apple Music.
By reading this article, you should learn about some of the Web3 streaming services you should know about.
Audius Music
When Audius came out at the end of 2019, its only goal was to give creators back control over their work and make it the best place to stream and share Web3 files. The platform’s core is a public, decentralized protocol for streaming music based on the blockchain. This is meant to give musicians more control over how their music is shared and more information about who is listening to it.
The group says that musicians will never have to pay to let the world hear their music. Also, unlike most other music streaming services, Audius does not take a cut of the money that the artists who make the music make. In a whitepaper, the group explained how Audius works. This package comes with the following:
- The Audius platform token ($AUDIO), third-party stablecoins, and artist tokens will power a token economy.
- A database and file-sharing system for music and its metadata that is spread out over the Internet.
- A protocol lets users ask for metadata quickly, and an encryption scheme for tracks allows users to choose their proxy re-encryption keys.
- A protocol for decentralized governance in which creators, node operators, and fans all have an equal and direct say in any changes to the system.
- If an artist can move up the Audius charts, the platform will give them $AUDIO as a reward. The artists can keep 90% of the money they make from AUDIO, and the other 10% goes to the network’s stakers. Setting up an account is free, and you can start adding music as soon as you do.
Audius is a popular streaming service among Web3 and NFT users, but musicians can’t use it to mint music NFTs. Also, when you have more than $100 in $AUDIO, you can show off that you own NFT.
Emanate Web3 Music Streaming
Like Audius, Emanate is a decentralized, blockchain-based music streaming service. It is based on EOSIO and takes $EMT tokens as payment. The EOS mainnet has both the EMT token and the stable internal token. Anyone can watch EOS mainnet transactions with block explorers like Bloks.io and EOSX.io.
Looking at Emanate and Audius side by side, you can see that Emanate uses a rewards system to help artists make crypto, while Audius only uses its token. For $6 per month, you can join the Emanate Music Lovers group. The company and the artists each get half of what the business makes. For every $6 the business makes, the artists get $5.
In the music business, artists can upload and promote their music using Emanate Distro or doing it themselves (DIY). Artists who host their music on Emanate can use Emanate Distro to get their music on streaming services like Spotify and Soundcloud. The ecosystem of Emanate is closed-loop, which means that all money is put back into the system and that all transactions, including payments, are recorded there. Members of the team have said they want artists to have full creative control over the Emanate platform and plan to get rid of Emanate Distro in the future. As the move to Web3 streaming services picks up speed, the company offers this service because it is impossible to eliminate the existing middlemen all at once.
Emanate also plans to offer a full set of products and services. The website for the platform says that “soon, any label will be able to create a profile and start managing their artists.” It lists current partnerships with labels like Mau5trap, Black Book Records, World Famous HQ, and more.
Tamago
Tamago is a web 3 music streaming service that says, “Bittorrent meets SoundCloud for the next generation of artist accountability.” It wants to start a new direct-to-artist income stream using NFT and web3 technologies.
Web3 is a music streaming service that lets artists and listeners choose what they want to hear. It encourages liquidity pools that put artists first, fan-curated playlists, no ads, and peer-to-peer interaction. Because of this way of thinking, Web2 streaming services don’t have things like curated playlists. The site promises that “artists will always own their music,” and that “users will always own their data and privacy.”
OPUS
OPUS is a service that lets people share and find music without a central server. The platform uses blockchain technology from Ethereum, and music is kept in the IFS (IPFS). Because the platform uses the IPFS, it can send out thousands of tracks per second in a distributed way. The company says that the decryption keys and file hashes are stored in smart contracts, which users then use to listen to music. Smart contracts also make it possible for listeners to pay musicians fairly for their work.
The company says that artists can keep 90% of their earnings with OPUS. “There is no central server because the OPUS Player is built on the Ethereum blockchain, and all the tracks are stored on IPFS, which cuts storage costs by a huge amount,” they said. “Now, for the first time, the artist can get a bigger share of the money in a safe and clear way.”
Fans can also use the platform to make money off of their interests. How? Users get a cut of the platform’s royalties in exchange for spreading music, which helps the platform grow.
BitSong
BitSong is a web3 service that lets musicians, music fans, and advertisers stream music. It makes money through a system of ads. The ads are attached to the songs that artists upload to the platform. When a listener hears a song and an ad, up to 90% of the money made from the ad goes to the artist and the listener.
Users can use $BTSG, BitSong’s native token, to buy songs and support their favorite independent musician. Its goal is to “simplify bureaucracy as much as possible to give artists a merit-based, transparent, fast, and no-middleman way to make money” and to give users a new way to listen to music and get paid.
BPM
BPM is SongCamp’s NFT Discord bot that helps people talk about music. The bot can be installed on a Discord server and used to stream NFTs of music made with Catalog, Zora, Sound, and other services.
BPM isn’t your typical streaming service because a track has to be minted as an NFT before it can be streamed, but it can help get your music in front of the right people. If you want to learn more about how to add BPM to your favorite Discord server, you should talk to the server’s moderators. Here is a list of the things you will need to set it up.
