The truth is harsh: artists don’t make money out of streaming. With an average of $5,000 payout a year for 1 million streams, musicians simply cannot sustain a living. Google “what streaming services actually pay artists” and you’ll be shocked by the numbers. Classical musician Zoe Keiting disclosed her streaming payouts a while ago, showing how little money even big artists make on global streaming platforms. But blockchain promises to reverse the trend and put back the pennies into musicians’ pockets. Although still at a very nascent stage, music blockchain applications like imusify can be adopted way earlier than we think. So why the current model of subscription-based services cannot work anymore? How can blockchain provide artists with a better payout? Let’s explore.

The business model of most streaming services is outdated

As stated in a thorough article, fans who pay $10 a month to stream music believe this money reaches out to their favorite artists, song creators, and record producers. However, the music market is out-of-sync and missing royalties or streaming payouts represents a huge value gap today.

The subscription model doesn’t encourage artists to upload their music, as seen in the Taylor Swift case, and furthermore, doesn’t incentivize listeners either. The pay-per-stream model, furthermore, disadvantages artists to engage with their fanbase and connect with their listeners since only the numbers matter: the more listeners, the better; but who are actually these fans? A third issue deals with scams and how unprotected music content is on such platforms. Music Business Worldwide even mentioned a Bulgarian artist who created fake artists profiles to play his songs on repeat just to generate higher payouts from streaming.

In short, the current subscription-based model cannibalizes artists’ payouts, ignores fans’ engagement, and don’t even protect artists from fraud or scams. So why should you keep paying $10 a month when you are aware of this?

Streaming in the blockchain age: a real win for artists

With blockchain, smart contracts enable artists to trace their digital work and receive instant payment whenever their work is used online. Plus, the immutability and transparency of blockchain technology provide great tools for artists to claim ownership of their work. Moreover, as far as fraud is concerned, it’s very unlikely to steal content from blockchain-based platforms since digital content is protected once on the blockchain. Opting for a music platform harnessed by blockchain technology like imusify represents a real win for musicians, and even fans, for several reasons:

The imusify platform enables artists to fund and monetize their work, to track the use of their content, and to be paid for streams and downloads via smart contracts. Under blockchain technology, digital rights management is accurate and transparent, allowing fair and direct payment to artists. imusify has created a new ecosystem — the smart music economy — that benefits artists, fans, labels, and other actors of the business solely without any third party involved. All transactions are all conducted with the issuance of the imusify native cryptocurrency, IMU Tokens.

The IMU reward system covered

Another great promise of blockchain technology deals with the reward pool. In the case of imusify, the reward system encourages healthy, sustainable, and high-quality interactions for each user active on the platform. Listeners can receive micropayments anytime they share, create playlists, or follow artists on imusify. Therefore, fans are incentivized to contribute and discover new music while supporting their favorite artists directly. IMU Tokens circulate within the platform and reach out to both fans and artists according to their active contribution.

The old model — or pay-per-stream, subscription-based model, is out-of-date because it works on volume. The new model based on fans and musicians’ direct interactions — like imusify — is healthier and sustainable, and can create a major shift in global music consumption and distribution.

imusify’s token sale ends April 30.