Last month I looked at how my beloved gaming industry could really use a kick in the a$$ and how exhilarating it is to see startup cryptos like @gamecredits take on the task of revamping the highly centralized corporate system and empowering the gamers and developers.
This time, I want to tackle an industry that I have unfortunately been a part of for a number of years and may stand as one of the most opaque and unregulated industries – the commercial art world.
While skimming through all the new “baby” coins on Coinmarketcap, one in particular caught my eye – CreativeCoin. After checking out their website and whitepaper, I was motivated to explain what mainstream aspects of the commercial art economy could stand to benefit or be completely crushed under the momentum of the blockchain and a dedicated crypto.
DISCLAIMER: I know no one on the CreativeChain team (hopefully that will change). I will only describe the crypto succinctly as the real discussion is how these emerging blockchain systems can transform the workings of a current industry. From what is written (and designed) on their website so far, this team seems very precise in tackling one the biggest needs of the art community.
CreativeChain and a New Creative Economic Network
To put it simply, CreativeChain and its crypto CreativeCoin aim to decentralize content registration and distribution on a secure blockchain network. Through built-in smart contracts and a robust peer-to-peer transaction offering, the network will hopefully revamp the way we pursue creative copywriting and give more power and control back to the artists/makers.
CreativeChain isn't tackling the art world per se but there is incredible potential to use their momentum to carve out a new path for the professional creative world. I've worked as a professional artist since 2009, showing my art and pursuing artist residency programs across a dozen countries. From first-hand experience and listening to the rising voice of disenfranchised professionals, here are some of the main problems with the art industry that could be completely transformed by blockchain tech.
1 - SMART CONTRACTS for Stupid Exchanges.
I don't know personally of a single industry that needs smart contracts more than the art world. As it stands now, galleries and collectors use a simply archaic A-to-B system of “I pay X amount, I own your work.” The artist then no longer has physical control of the work, but also how that work will be used or even how to track where it is. Smart contracts would allow them to develop more personal and specific ways of distributing their work while also maintaining awareness of what is happening with it.
There have been so many times where I've made a simple deal with a gallery, only to find later that instead of putting their energies to showing and selling it, they use my work to stretch their own profits through loans and private dealings.
2 - Determining Authenticity in a World of Forgery.
As the art industry becomes more diversified and global at the same time, it's easier to replicate works of art and simultaneously more difficult to track down where authentic pieces are distributed. The need for autonomous timestamps, which as they exist now are so easily manipulated, on a secure blockchain has never been more real. Even on Steemit, when someone looks up @natureofbeing or @fairytalelife 's work from month's back, no one can reconfigure the past block and those images stand as proof that their work is their own.
3 - Generating Value through effort and distribution, not simply the pockets of collectors.
The art of art exchange has remained stale for centuries. I make something, you buy it. A simple economy of patrons has exploded into an ecosystem of international galleries, museum franchises, and increasingly opaque constructs that implicitly force aspiring artists to compete against each other for economic representation. Until now, artists have had few other options in monetizing their progress and effort.
Furthermore, the methods in which artists attempt to distribute their work has relatively very little impact on their economic progress. Instagram and Facebook groups help promote the artist but are not highly engageable ways to distribute content.
Empowering the Creative
Even in the 21st century, the age of the internet and infinite creativity, the artist still remains at the losing end of the art world. This boils down to two main factors – artists have little grasp of economic industry that supports them and they are unable to take control of any part of that mechanism.
- Be a smarter artist! Source: CorranFett
Blockchain and hopefully CreativeChain can achieve something different; establish an economy that empowers the artist to keep making meaningful work and make broader impact such as public education. I look forward to what this team and other creativity-based cryptos will do in the coming years!
Previous Innovating Industry with the Blockchain Posts
1 - GAMECREDITS
2 - EduDAO and Educational Philanthropy
design collective @hitheryon
