First impressions last, and several failed initial coin offerings (ICOs) have tarnished blockchain’s reputation in the entertainment industry.

Tradition is still held in high regard here. The major studios have offshoots, but for the most part remain the same studios that existed during Hollywood’s golden years. The town still maintains attitudes about the casting couch that are straight out of the 1940s. Here’s an example: ‘An overcrowded brothel: Hollywood’s infamous casting couch’.

So why would blockchain — a trendy new craze — stand a chance of making it big in Hollywood?

If it does, overcoming Hollywood and the rest of entertainment’s aversion to change will be step number one. In order to crack the technological glass ceiling, blockchain implementations need to be flawless.

Which brings another challenge: finding entertainment-minded techies that can implement practical, easy-to-use solutions that solve a real problem. Good luck with that.

Nobody said breaking into the entertainment industry in a substantial capacity would be easy for blockchain. We just said it’s possible.

Getting the likes of Universal, Warner Brothers, and Sony to take the blockchain pitch seriously will be a tall task. “Challenge” may even be too understated to describe just how tall a task it is.

1. Adrián Garelik, CEO and Co-founder of Flixxo

“[The challenge is] to build awesome user journeys. We need platforms in which blockchain is just a technology and not the main sales point of the product. By improving user experience, which is key on mainstream entertainment platforms, and focusing on content strategies (there is a huge lack of content strategy on blockchain based video platforms) we can build tools for huge audiences. And we should not force them to learn about cryptocurrencies, we should build intuitive interfaces for them to start using crypto without even knowing they are using crypto.”

2. Marc Urselli, 3-Time Grammy Award Winning Engineer and Producer

“In order for widespread adoption we will need the major players like Spotify, Apple and Google to adopt the technology since the user base is largely split between and influenced by those three players.”

3. Piotr Kocel, CEO of BOMBAY SOUR

“We desperately need to wipe off the stigma that has been caused by early day ICOs and the 2017 token valuations. Throughout 2018, it has been hard to discuss blockchain-related endeavors with mainstream media corporates, and we need to move on from that.”

4. Chris Gale, Co-founder of Verasity

“For me, the number one challenge is if a non-tech-savvy business person cannot understand the practical value of a blockchain use case, then you run the risk of blockchain developers looking to solve problems with blockchain that do not fit into the current business ecosystem and cost structure, and thus never get adopted.”

5. Mike Raab, VP at Sinai Ventures

“The biggest challenge to adopting blockchain technology in the entertainment industry is aligning incentives of the legacy players. Processes and systems that exist today have been built over decades, and often rely on informational advantages that one entity has over another. Incentivizing all parties (artists, agents, labels, etc.) to collaborate and share information is a significant hurdle.”

6. Mike Esola, CEO and Founder of Fiction Riot

“Blockchain technology is still so new that many companies don’t understand the technology and how it could impact their business. Another challenge is actually integrating it into the business, which could mean replacing current technology in many cases – and that takes time. Understanding how blockchain factors into a company’s broader strategy, what the company’s priorities are and if the business model can be considerably impacted will be essential to adoption and important to start thinking about now.”

7. Chris Richardson, CEO of Linius Technologies

“The roadblock to blockchain’s potential to prevent video piracy is file size. Blockchain does not support the file size, or the picture and sound data, of traditional digital video. This has prevented blockchain from being used as a method / distribution system for controlling and protecting digital video.”