Music streaming service Tidal is focused on exploring non-fungible tokens (NFTs), probably as a brand new method to compensate artists. That is in accordance with Jack Dorsey, CEO of social media platform Twitter and fintech agency Sq., which acquired a majority stake in Tidal earlier this yr.
The comment got here throughout a live-streamed dialog Monday between Dorsey and Shawn Carter, the rapper also referred to as Jay-Z, who bought Tidal in 2015 and now sits on Sq.’s board of administrators.
Early within the dialog, Carter talked about assist for blockchain know-how. He referred to a visible artist he knew who had offered a portray for $2,500 in 1983, which was resold for over $100 million lately.
“His household or nobody concerned [in the art’s creation] had seen any type of revenue from that. I simply don’t assume that’s proper. With these blockchains and these good contracts, you possibly can write the contract right this moment to say ‘any sale that occurs, I wish to obtain 10% or 30%, or it may 50% on the primary one or 40% on the subsequent,’” Carter stated. “And it’s recorded there so it’s very clear.”
He added that the NFT’s skill to forgo attorneys or labels additionally appeals to him. “I’m pro-artist,” Carter added. “Something that advantages the individuals who eat and love artwork and the people who find themselves making it, that’s what I’m focused on.”
Then Dorsey weighed in.
“You take a look at Bitcoin and the way it allows folks anyplace on this planet to contribute and to change into artists themselves and in addition to obtain suggestions or grants or donations with out having to undergo any third-parties, there’s lots of energy in that,” he stated. “And I believe the spirit of what NFTs characterize, the spirit of simply wanting critically at how artists are compensated and bettering that’s one thing that we would like to spend so much of time and lots of our focus going ahead to be sure that we’re simply wanting deeply at totally new methods to present artists the proper instruments to assist them and to construct.”