Whoa, time flies! Last week we discussed a whole bunch of updates on the product side as we’re continually gearing up for token distribution later this quarter. This week is no different and have more great news to share, so lets dive in!

Marketing & Growth 🗞😃📈

User Acquisition 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦

This week was spent finalizing dates and details for the start of our next round of user acquisition campaigns. We’re taking everything we learned from our previous test campaigns, which acquired over 80,000 installs, and rolling it over to the next one which is expected to yield a much higher result. This next round will be split across multiple campaigns, beginning Sunday, May 20th. As they’re in progress, we’ll be announcing figures every few days via Telegram.

Product 👨🏻‍💻📲

Protocol (Progress Update!) 📱

Last week, we touched on a variety of the protocol components we were testing, such as determining “legitimate streams/plays,” allowing the the system to accurately pay tokens for each users time spent streaming — did we mention that the avg. user on Current streams about 10 tracks per session? 🤗

While running a simulation that replicates real-world conditions, we discovered a few anomalies in the sample data.These anomalies appeared to be someone, or a bot, streaming for unordinary amounts of time. When discovered, the team was ecstatic to see the protocol act as it should, and in this case disabled the ability for that user to earn tokens. We will continue testing over the next few weeks, transitioning the tests from simulations to using real-time data.

Wallet Sign up & Waitlist (Coming Soon!)💰🤑

In the next iOS app release, coming in the next few days, we’ll be including the option to sign up and claim a wallet. When you sign up, you’ll be placed in a queue, giving you the option to share with your friends. The more sign up referrals you have, the more you will jump the queue and the quicker you will get access to the feature — but remember, if we suspect you’re using a bot or using fake referral accounts, you’ll be disqualified 🙃.

Once the protocol and wallet are live in the app, both features will first be made available to users that have already signed up, and progressively released in batches to ensure everything is working smoothly.

Media Player Update (Coming Soon!) 🎶 📹

The media player in the iOS app has received multiple performance updates as well as an updated user interface to make it easier to search and play suggested media. On the performance side, we’ve made improvements to how media and radio is loaded, making the process much more efficient and faster. We’ve also improved formatting to account for a variety of new screen sizes.

This release is being submitted to the Apple App Store later this week!

User Research (Round 1: Nearing Completion) 🔎👨🏼

Our Product team has been busy conducting a round of user research based around consumption behaviors over the last few weeks and will be wrapping up next week. This type of research was done to provide insights into how users perceive value from a variety of different streaming products, and the effect incentives have on content consumption. User Studies and research like this help guide the product forward and are integral components in early feature development.

Our next round of research will be focused around usability testing of the wallet interface design, and include a study on reward systems that exist, such as in the restaurant, airline and credit card industry.

Design System Kick Off 🖌🎨💻

Our team has begun an 8-week process of building out a full design system from scratch. Current’s Design System will be an evolving set of design principles, patterns, and elements that together form a unique and functional design language.

If you’re new to design systems, we included a great article that explains their benefits in detail which you can still read here, however, here are some other great examples from Airbnb, or Googles infamous Material Design.

Community 🌏

Event Update & Recap🎉 📅

A couple of weeks ago, on May 4th, our CEO, Dan Novaes kicked off the world’s largest Virtual Crypto Summit to over 2,400 attendees. Thank you to everyone that attended and were a part of the Q&A.

We love the live Q&A / AMA format and can’t wait to do more of them for the community on a regular basis. Stay tuned for announcements in our Telegram announcements channel!

On Tuesday of this week, the team set off for Blockchain Week in New York City. Last night, Current hosted an invite only event at Haven Rooftop along with sponsors BlockchainIL, Loci.io and Tradingene. RSVP’s totaled four times the amount than we were able to accommodate. Guests were lined up an hour early; the line went out the door and around the corner before we opened. First, we would like to thank all of our Sponsors, and everyone that was able to join us for such a memorable evening. Also, we would like to thank everyone for their patience as we worked through the line to get everyone upstairs as quickly and efficiently as possible.

Tarot Card Reader, providing insights into the future of Blockchain!

The Mime was extremely entertaining!

Afterparty at Marquee

Current’s Curated Content 📚 🎥 🎶

What We Are Reading, Watching, and Listening To?

Video: Cut the Cord: Current, CEO, Dan Novaes talks on Goldman embracing Bitcoin (TD Ameritrade Network)

Article: Report Alleges Tidal Faked Streaming Numbers for Beyoncé and Kanye West Albums by David Turner

Article: One of the greatest collections of blockchain related resources we’ve ever seen, Crypto Canon by Sonal Chokshi, Chris Dixon, Denis Nazarov, Jesse Walden, and Ali Yahya of Andreessen Horowitz

It’s organized from building blocks and basics; foundations (& history); and key concepts — followed by specific topics such as governance; privacy and security; scaling; consensus and governance; cryptoeconomics and investing; fundraising and token distribution; decentralized exchanges; stablecoins; and cryptoeconomic primitives (crytocollectibles, curation markets, games). We also included a section with developer tutorials, practical guides, and maker stories — as well as other resources, such as newsletters/updates and courses, at the end.

Article: YouTube Rolls Out New Tools To Help You Stop Watching (TechCrunch) by Sarah Perez

Article: I’m Not Black, I’m Kanye (The Atlantic) by Ta-Nehisi Coates

Video: Towkio’s (Twitter/Facebook) new video dropped this week, produced by our very own Head of Curation, Seamus Doheny. See below!

Article: Facebook ‘Exploring’ Making Its Own Cryptocurrency, Media Report (Cointelegraph) by William Suberg

We’re still ironing out the best format for publishing these weekly updates on a regularly scheduled cadence, but you can expect them every week from here on out on Wednesdays or Thursdays, with other announcements sprinkled throughout the week as things come up.

See you all next week! ✌️

Dan Novaes — CEO Current Media