Jay Z & Jack Dorsey's Music Revolution
Hip-Hop Billionaire Jay Z caught up with the Co-Founder and CEO of Twitter and Square- Jack Dorsey, as they discussed the future of the Music Industry and their latest collaboration
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What’s good everyone?
Last night, billionaire hip-hop legend Jay Z, who recently sold his stake in the streaming service Tidal for a mouth-watering $297 Million, had a live audio conversation with the co-founder and CEO of Twitter and Square- Jack Dorsey, on the future of the music industry and their roadmap for integrating the platforms 🔄
But why are Square and Tidal integrating? 🤔
Back in March this year, Square- the $100 Billion worth Fintech company which provides payment solutions for Small Businesses around the world and is the parent company of wildly popular ‘Cash💲App’, announced that they were buying a majority stake in the streaming service ‘Tidal’ in a multi-million dollar deal.
While the logic of the same might have been unclear at the time: why would a fintech company buy a holding stake in a music streaming service; Jay and Jack spoke at length, explaining the same last night on Twitter’s live audio conversations platform- Twitter Spaces.
So why has Square zeroed down on Tidal for the acquisition?
Tidal, which Jay-Z bought in partnership with multiple artists in 2015 for $56 million, provides members access to music, music videos, and exclusive content from artists, in an industry crowded with players such as Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music.
One of the earliest platforms to launch High-Fidelity audio streaming, and with a long-term focus on giving ownership back to artists, Tidal has had a very clear set of goals ever since it was acquired by Jay Z.
Talking about the recent acquisition by Square and the future roadmap of integrating the two platforms, Jay kicked off the conversation on Twitter Spaces last night by retracing the history of Music and its roots from Vinyl- Cassette tapes- CDs, and eventually digital streaming; and why he feels that despite the adoption of technology by every industry, music has been slow to get off the blocks.
Early in the conversation, Jay also spoke about his support for blockchain technology. He referred to a visual artist he knew who had sold a painting for $2,500 in 1983, which was resold for over $100 million recently.
“His family or no one involved [in the art’s creation] had seen any sort of profit from that. I just don’t think that’s right. With these blockchains and these smart contracts, you can write the contract today to say ‘any sale that happens, I want to receive 10% or 30%, or it could 50% on the first one or 40% on the next, And it’s recorded there so it’s very transparent.”
Jay was also excited by Blockchain’s ability to forgo lawyers or record labels-
“I’m pro-artist, anything that benefits the people who consume and love art and the people who are making it, that’s what I’m interested in.”
Adding onto that, Jack Dorsey backed it up with his long time support for Cryptocurrencies and Blockchain technology:
“You look at Bitcoin and how it enables people anywhere in the world to contribute and to become artists themselves and also to receive tips or grants or donations without having to go through any third-parties, there's a lot of power in that,"
And I think the spirit of what NFTs represent, the spirit of just looking critically at how artists are compensated and improving that is something that we want to spend a lot of time and a lot of our focus going forward to make sure that we're just looking deeply at entirely new ways to give artists the right tools to help them and to build.”
So while they clearly have similar visions in replicating what Square has done for millions of small businesses around the world, for artists, how exactly will Square and Tidal co-exist?
Jack spoke of a 100-day plan that Square is targeting for enabling artists on Tidal to receive payments via the Cash App of Square and possibly build on top of that to let artists have their own transparent data-rich dashboards 📈 and enable them to make informed decisions when it comes to growing and building an audience on streaming platforms 🎧
As far as the long-term roadmap is concerned, both Jay and Jack are super bullish on Crypto and leveraging blockchain technology to cut out middlemen in the music industry, giving power back to artists and creators 💪🏻
How soon will that actually be done? That is something which remains to be seen
Our take on this?
Jay Z and Jack are both revolutionary entrepreneurs.
Whether it is building a micro-blogging social media app, disrupting Finance, or pushing the boundaries of Music, their partnership and a genuine commitment to solving some of the teething issues of artists is a positive step forward for the future of the industry.
We at Incentify also are working towards building in the same domain, and our first product which enables users to share playlists in an easy manner across streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple Music is going to be launched very soon 👀
DM us on Twitter or Instagram, and get exclusive access to the beta testing list of our app, along with the latest development updates at our end now!
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