In one line: Audius is a rapidly growing blockchain streaming platform that appears to be better aligning incentives for creators; the potential to disrupt giants like Spotify & Apple Music is conceivable in the years ahead; a big hill to climb & lots of wood to chop.
Symbol: AUDIO
Price: $1.60
Market Cap: $820MM
Consensus Mechanism: Formerly Proof of Autonomy; now on Solana Staking/Earning Link: https://docs.audius.org/token/staking (~22%) Token Cap: 1B
Nakamoto Coefficient (Measure of Decentralization): Not Available
EVM Compatible: Yes
Easiest Place to Purchase: Gemini
Founder/Noteworthy Contributors: Roneil Rumburg & Forrest Browning (2018) Developer Metrics & Rank (see CryptoMiso): Not Available Website: https://audius.co/
The Founders:
- Roneil co-founded Kleiner Perkins, an early-stage seed fund investing in Blockchain & AI companies
- Forrest is co-founder of StacksWare, an enterprise data center management platform
What is Audius:
- Decentralized music streaming protocol (Alternative to SoundCloud or Spotify)
- Aims to align interests of artists, fans, & node operators through platform incentives
- Launched to remedy some of the inefficiencies of the music industry like the opaque music rights ownership & intermediaries between artists & fans (only 12% of $43B of music industry revenue goes to artists)
- Artists have very limited to no control over their content distribution, selling & consumption
- Music is streamed for free & at 320kbps (comparable to Spotify & Google Play)
- Artists can upload & store music that fans can listen to for free (IOS & Android Apps)
- Content Nodes store & relay creators’ streamed audio content on IPFS (Interplanetary File System)
- Discovery Nodes – index and hash data like user profiles, playlists, & followers
- Staking & Governance on Ethereum; Everything else on Solana
Token Function & Value Accrual:
- Staking – tokens locked up to secure the network and earn interest
- Governance – participate in decisions about protocol changes & upgrades
- Perks – unlock access to new features; artists can unlock artist tokens, receive voting power from fans who want to share in their success
- Drawback: 7% annual inflationary supply
Future Optimization:
- Facilitate further monetization for artists by integrating stablecoins for artists to offer paid content, as well as artist tokens that give fans the ability to access exclusive content, merch, events & experiences
- Possible integrations with projects like Rally
- Rewarding top artists with airdrops & revenue sharing from the platform
- Allowing fans to participate in the growth of the artists career
In the News/Promising Developments:
- Investors: Coinbase, Blockchange, Lightspeed Ventures, Pantera, Multicoin Capital, Binance
- ‘Katy Perry, Nas, and Jason Derulo are Investing Big in a Spotify Rival’ https://www.rollingstone.com/pro/news/audius-blockchain-nft-crypto-streaming-platform-1226559/
- ‘Audius Building Radio Station in the Metaverse’ https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2021/12/10/audius-is-building-a-radio-station-in-the-metaverse/
- ‘Audius Lands TikTok Partnership’ https://www.cnbc.com/2021/08/17/audius-lands-tiktok-partnership-and-its-token-audio-market-cap-surged.html
- Audius introduced Embeddable NFT Galleries on platform on 11/23/21 (NFTs are one of the most revolutionary technologies on the planet right now so these integrations are critical)
Sources:
https://messari.io/asset/audius/profile
https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/audius/
https://docs.audius.org/welcome
https://coinbureau.com/review/audius-audio/
https://whitepaper.audius.co/AudiusWhitepaper.pdf
This is not investment advice nor is it an endorsement or solicitation of any kind. I do NOT recommend you invest in Audius or buy the AUDIO token. This is for entertainment and informational purposes ONLY. Investing in cryptoassets is extremely risky, volatile, and may result in significant or permanent loss of capital. Those risks should be evaluated independently or with a professional before taking any action. For the sake of disclosure, you can assume I invest in everything I write about and am not recommending you do the same. The links for Gemini, Voyager, Coinbase, & Crypto.com for “where to buy” also contain referral links of which I receive a “referral fee” contingent on the platform’s terms & conditions. Please do not use this information as a foundation for making investments in Web 3 projects. Do your own research (DYOR)!!
Philoso-Feed 
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