Audius：The Largest Web 3.0 Streaming Music Platform

2022-03-07, 03:28

Abstract

1. As a decentralized streaming music platform with the largest number of users in the world, Audius allows users to listen to and download all music for free on it, or upload music to the platform themselves.
2. Audius transfers most of the revenue to music creators, and a small part of the revenue to network node operators, returning the decision-making power of music creation to the professional musicians and users.
3. The music and picture data on Audius are stored on a decentralized network built based on the IPFS technology, which helps make Audius’ management decentralized and transparent.
4. The token $AUDIO was created for three purposes: maintaining the security of network nodes, being used as governing tokens, and providing economic incentives.
5. In addition to the AUDIO-related token economic system, Audius also supports the NFT collection function.

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The Introduction of Audius

Audius is built on Ethereum and Solana. It released the project white paper in 2018. And its mainnet and token $AUDIO went live in October 2020. At present, users' basic information is stored on Ethereum and Solana, but there are plans for it to be moved to Solana.

As a decentralized streaming music platform with the largest number of users in the world, Audius allows users to listen to and download all music for free, or upload music to the platform themselves. Audius has attracted many renowned musicians, providing rich music resources. Besides, its interface is clean and refreshing without advertisements, offering an excellent user experience. With the core philosophy of putting music creators at the center of the industry and focusing on making the industry decentralized and transparent, Audius, instead of becoming a middleman, wants to act as an aggregator, bringing music creators and fans together in one place by using decentralized technology.

Although the crypto industry has been developing in full swing in recent years, the market threshold is still high at this stage. As a non-typical blockchain project, Audius is aware of its market positioning and target customers. In terms of product design, Audius, instead of abusing blockchain technology by applying it to the music industry crudely and following the bandwagon of self proclaimed web3 startups, starts from the development logic of the music industry itself and seeks to solve the problems of the traditional music industry. Then, Audius adopts the blockchain technology and solutions that need to be used to solve these nagging problems.

Streaming Mode + Decentralization

The traditional music platforms mainly adopt the streaming music model. Musicians publish music works on Web2.0 platforms such as Spotify, Apple Music, and QQ Music, where they can get a fixed amount of income when the work is played on the platform.

For Audius, no substantial changes were made in this regard, that’s, Audius continued with the streaming model, and amplified its advantages for music makers and music lovers. Record companies, musicians, and ordinary users recognized this model which helped Audius quickly attract a large number of musicians. The number of users and monthly active users also multiplied daily.

In the meantime, Audius also made a very remarkable breakthrough. The traditional music industry was almost monopolized by large record companies and music platforms. Dependent on companies and platforms, musicians and users were at a disadvantage in both revenues and copyright issues. However, Audius broke this tradition and transferred most of the revenue to music creators, and a small part of the revenue to network node operators, returning the decision-making power of music creation to the professional musicians and users.

The music and picture data on Audius are basically stored on a decentralized network built based on the IPFS technology, which helps make Audius’ management decentralized and transparent. Thus, music creators and ordinary users are truly connected, allowing musicians to directly have their great music works appreciated by users.

Token Economy Based on $AUDIO

Blockchain technology will greatly change the traditional music industry. Decentralization and confirmation of rights, the most important features of the crypto industry, require the token economy to achieve. Its native token AUDIO may reshape the pattern of the music industry and establish a more efficient and reasonable industry model, promoting the music industry in a sound way.

The governance token $AUDIO was launched in October 2020, with an initial offering of 1 billion pieces. Among them, 5.5% was allocated to the community, 17.8% to platform funds, 40.6% to project teams and 36% to investment institutions. They will be released gradually until it reaches a maximum of 1 billion in July 2026. In addition to the world-record total amount, AUDIO will issue an additional 7% every year.

The token $AUDIO plays a role in the Audius platform in three aspects.

The first is to maintain the security of network nodes. As mentioned above, the content data of Audius is stored on the distributed decentralized network based on IPFS. Meanwhile, All Audius node operators must stake $AUDIO tokens to obtain operation qualifications. This strengthens the control over the operation of nodes, thus maintaining the node operation mechanism and effectively ensuring security.

The second is being used as a governance token. For those major resolutions involving the bottom layer of the platform, such as modifying the blockchain network code, etc., the nodes need to initiate proposals and pass formal votes. If more than 5% of the total staked AUDIO tokens participate in the vote and the support rate is above 50%, the proposal will be approved.

The third is to provide economic incentives to influence user behavior. In terms of token staking, AUDIO will issue an additional 7% of its total amount every year, and these new tokens will be used as staking income for nodes; Regarding user participation, if users verify their social media accounts and release a song, they can get a certain amount of token rewards. Besides, top users and songs of the platform will also receive a reward. Users will get rank titles and be offered different degrees of privileges based on the amount of AUDIO held. Users with over 10 AUDIO are defined as Bronze, and those with over 100 AUDIO are defined as Silver.

Except for the AUDIO-related token economic system, Audius also supports the NFT collection function. Silver-level users with more than 100 AUDIO tokens can display all NFTs they own on the platform. Moreover, to be compatible with NFT collections on the platform, Audius also plans to cooperate with other NFT platforms such as OpenSea and SuperRare.

Conclusion

Web 3.0 is transforming every industry in the Web 2.0 era. Audius is a leader in the Web 3.0 music industry. It’s no easy task to change the way a generation listens to music. However, a decentralized platform like Audius is leading us to a future with equal and creative music environment, which is something to look forward to.

Author: Ashley. H, Gate.io Researcher; Translator: Cedar. W
* This article represents only the views of the observers and does not constitute any investment suggestions.
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