What I learned from 1 year of music NFTs

There’s no arguing that the web3 bear market is still in full effect. From crypto prices to silent Discord communities, not much is happening in our beloved web3. At least not from the consumer side (builders are always building 🛠️). This won’t last forever though.

I’ve been involved in music NFTs and the web3 music space for more than a year now and it’s time to share some key takeaways from my experience. This should serve as an insight for people interested in the space and hopefully as guidance for artists trying to launch their web3 careers.

There’s so much innovation and creativity left to explore

I’ve been involved in this space as an investor, a collector, and a professional through my work with anotherblock. This has allowed me to see several sides of the coin (no pun intended!) and has opened my eyes to how early we are. As a community, we’ve only just scratched the surface of what’s possible at the intersection of web3 and music. From companies using the technology to innovate new use cases, to artists creating new types of collections and rewards, there’s plenty of growth left for this revolutionized music industry.

I see new infrastructure emerge every other week to help facilitate new ways of distributing and selling music and I don’t expect that to slow down anytime soon. Particularly as the next bull run could be right around the corner. Bull runs tend to act as jet fuel for expansion in the crypto market.

Artists should focus on the listeners experience

I’ve met many different musicians in web3 who are coming up with their own new solutions to sell their music and reward their audience. The level of creativity coming from these artists is absolutely staggering. But there’s a catch. The more creative they get with their NFTs, the more complex the user experience seems to get. It’s not clear what collectors get, how to redeem the rewards they are promised, or how the collections are valued.

These are problems we’re going to need to solve as a collective. In the meantime, however, we need to move away from the complexity. Music exists to tell a story and for people to listen to and enjoy. We need to keep the focus there and elevate the listening experience. Not detract from it. I believe artists are inadvertently detracting from the listening experience by trying to be “too creative” with their music NFTs. Let’s bring it back to basics.

There needs to be incentive to collect

Bear or bull market, most music NFTs nowadays sell due to some level of hype. The value proposition hasn’t been properly ironed out and yet they still sell. Don’t expect this hype to last forever though. When the hype dies, so will music NFTs unless we’ve made the value proposition extremely clear for customers. In the end, this is a business like any other

In time, NFTs will be nothing more than another tool, just like the internet, or perhaps more specifically, like a crowdfunding platform. If you’re an artist and you want people to fund your work, you need to figure out the value proposition and make it abundantly clear for collectors what they’re getting. WHY should people collect your music NFTs? What’s in it for them?

Unless you can explain it to me like I’m 5, it’s too complicated and won’t sustain your career over time.

Disproportionate focus on the art, not NFTs!

Artists put too much emphasis on the tech and mechanisms behind their collections and not enough on the art itself. Similar to one of my earlier points, artists get “too creative” and use the tech “too much”. I’ve seen several artists who put out average quality music while focusing extremely hard on making the NFT collection desirable, and the promotion around it is exquisite. This is the wrong way around.

We listen to music for a reason. And it’s not so we can “collect” it (whatever that means). Artists should start applying the 80/20 rule to the creative vs financial side of their careers. 80% of the time should be focused on making the music great. 20% of their time on the promotion (which includes but is not limited to NFTs). If they find success, they might be fortunate enough to employ someone to handle the promotion so they can focus 100% on the creative craft. That should be the goal of every serious musician. If it’s not, it might be worth questioning their agenda.

It makes sense that it would happen this way. Most corners of web3 come with financial opportunities. If you‘re an artist and you realize the more time you spend on creating cool collectibles the more money you make, of course you’re going to lean towards doing more of that. It’s benefitting you. But if you’re a serious artist that wants to sustain a long career in music, you need to think deeply about that decision and be honest with yourself.

Change the lingo

Let’s face it, nobody cares about NFTs or blockchain tech. Same way nobody cares about https encryption. They care about being able to access a website without having their personal data stolen or getting scammed.

Similarly with music, nobody really cares where how the smart contract is set up or what network the music is minted on. They care about the music itself.

We’ve become so caught up in using web3 lingo because we believe it adds some form of credibility to our brand. This might be true for a web3 native audience. But for everyone else, it does nothing but confuse them. Let’s bring it back to basics. If you want to talk about music NFTs as part of your artist brand, here’s a great explanation I heard that contains ZERO web3 lingo:

“Music NFTs allow you to directly support artists you love, giving you verified super-fan status and the ability to trade that engagement, potentially making money on your love of music.”

Simple and to the point. Explain it to me like I’m 5.

Convenience can’t change

Web3 is complicated. Like really complicated. Wallets, network protocols, smart contracts, bridges, centralized exchanges, layer 2’s. It’s all too much for a consumer.

In web3 music this becomes a problem because we’re used to the convenience of Spotify. Anything harder than that user experience won’t fly. Web3 natives will respond with something along the lines of:

“well they’re two completely different things, how can you possibly compare the two?”

The reason I can compare the two is because music exists primarily for one reason. To listen to. That experience has become incredibly easy with DSP’s and that’s now the new baseline for all things music. Why should people make it harder for themselves than it needs to be?

They won’t.

All that is to say, if we want the music NFT space to extend to the masses, it needs to be as easy as Spotify. We need to be able to listen to our favorite artists, collect their songs, and invest in master recording ownership all in one place with great ease. This will require a whole lot of new infrastructure upgrades to make possible.

In the meantime, however, artists should use this as a guiding light. Anything they do in web3 needs to be SUPER convenient, easy, and accessible if they want to attract people’s attention and sell more NFTs.

Entertainment will change forever

So far, I’ve painted things in quite a negative light. I hope you’ve been able to see past that and take it for what it is. Opportunity.

Despite all the challenges we face, the web3 music space has made me realize one key thing. Entertainment will change forever.

This isn’t exclusive to music. It’s music, movies, games, short films, creative writing, artwork, podcasts, and anything else you can imagine. We now have the early stages of tools required to bring power back into the hands of the creators while sharing the rewards with the consumers. This is decentralized media. Artists and creators have already got a taste of it, they’ll never let it go.

In the coming years, we’re going to see some of the biggest industries in the world shift their business model completely. As a result, we’ll get more creative work out in the world. And as this work won’t be restricted by the opinions of record labels, production companies, or publishers, it will start to take on a new shape. I believe that web3 technology will allow the level of creativity to skyrocket and we’ll enjoy new forms of media we never knew we wanted.

What can you do as an artist to make the most of this shift?

Learn.

If you want to ask any questions, drop a comment or connect with me on Twitter (X)