Touching content can penetrate everything and reach the future of Mass Adoption
Recently, a number of short dramas with cryptocurrency as the theme have been launched, which have attracted heated attention and discussion in the crypto community. This is probably the fastest-spreading topic in the community, except for the MEME token, which won people over by its rising price. Many industry leaders and KOLs have spontaneously discussed and promoted it.
Indeed, in the face of any new paradigm of the network, content has the best chance of being the first to achieve a breakthrough. Hollywood blockbusters are actually the core means for American values to quickly penetrate the world. So, in the process of Web3 achieving Mass Adoption, what challenges and opportunities does the content industry face? Today we are fortunate to invite Chari, the founder of Metale Protocol, to share his views on the content industry, hoping to help everyone have a new understanding of the Web3 content industry.
Decentralized, autonomous and open content ecosystem
“Today, the internet is disintermediated. The web went from permissionless to permissioned. Creators and startups need permission from centralized gatekeepers and incumbents to exit and add new products.” — Chris Dixon, Read Write Own
Whether someone is reviewing the content is the essential difference between centralized and decentralized content platforms. If there is a centralized arbitrator reviewing the content, a series of problems will arise, such as value selection, adult content classification, political dissent blocking, copyright over-protection, and so on.
Today, behind the seemingly free release of major online content communities, there is already a mature content review mechanism hidden. These huge centralized platforms actively or passively decide what content can be disseminated, what content is banned, and what content is restricted.
In the film and television content industry, this censorship mechanism is even more serious and is further advanced. During the entire fundraising stage of the play, it must be screened by film and television production companies and publishing and distribution channels. If someone does not believe in the evil and invests in a so-called independent film, they will often lose all their money after a lot of setbacks.
This mechanism is the result of a long-term game between multiple parties. Even Musk, who controls X (Twitter), and former US President Trump are unable to shake it. Decentralization is the only way to crack it. Decentralization was impossible before the emergence of blockchain technology, which has become the logical origin of our creation of the Web3 content distribution platform today.
As a new generation of decentralized network, Web3s core concept is to give users full control and ownership. Web3 has no central agency or authority to manage or regulate data. This means that data confirmation does not rely on centralized institutions or platforms, but is verified and recorded through distributed nodes on the network. This helps to protect the human rights of freedom of speech, privacy, and the free flow of information.
Of course, it is different from Web3 content applications such as Warpcast that focus on publishing text and speech. We focus on the field of commercial consumer content. We see that there is a lot of content today that someone is willing to create and someone is willing to pay to watch, but it cannot get the support of the centralized content community. For example: AO 3 is the worlds largest fan literature website, with more than 300 million monthly visits, which is 2.5 times that of the second-ranked Wattpad (the worlds largest online literature group). But AO 3 cannot obtain any income for the creators on its platform.
We want to use decentralized infrastructure to meet these needs. As a new form of content, short plays have the same dissemination and monetization capabilities as traditional film and television dramas, but with very low production costs and barriers to entry. It is very likely to become the first choice for individuals or small groups to create content after literature.
Protect the rights of creators and encourage the production of high-quality content
“While most technology tends to automate workers on the periphery doing simple tasks, blockchain automates the center. Instead of putting taxi drivers out of work, blockchain puts Uber out of work and lets taxi drivers work directly with customers.” — Vitalik Buterin
The difference between a decentralized and centralized network doesn’t just mean no content censorship, it also means your negotiating power over your revenue. This also has huge implications for content that can get past censorship.
First of all, we need a decentralized infrastructure protocol with “no subjective opinions” to help creators store and manage content and identify the copyright holders of the content.
Subsequently, developers can develop specific applications based on this protocol, such as paid playback applications, copyright governance NFT issuance and trading applications, etc. These applications can be forked and can exist in parallel.
This layered approach to data and applications significantly lowers the threshold and cost of switching, meaning creators can shop around. If creators don’t like the way an algorithm works, the fees charged by a transaction protocol, or an application tracking their data, they can switch at any time.
Of course, this also means that the viewing revenue collected from consumers will flow as much as possible to the creators rather than network intermediaries, which will incentivize them to further create content that consumers like.
Focus on the real needs of each participant, not the platform
A city is able to serve everyone if and only if it is created by everyone. – Jane Jacobs
The core of the content ecosystem consists of only three types of people: creators, businessmen (including investors, distributors, speculators, KOLs, etc.) and consumers.
In the Web2 era, every platform succeeded by serving these three parties well, but was eliminated because its own interests conflicted with these three parties. The platforms in the middle wanted too much, wanting to bind creators without taking risks, wanting to maximize user retention while maximizing profits… This led to the deformation of various actions.
In the Metale ecosystem, we process the underlying protocols and applications in layers, allowing content data to be freely selected without the application. At the same time, any new application scenario can provide services for content in a modular way without the permission of any application. This is a mechanism with the lowest friction cost and the highest cooperation efficiency. It avoids the phenomenon in the traditional business model where the platform becomes too powerful and infringes on the interests of the above three groups of people.
Creators can obtain true creative freedom, investors can freely trade copyright governance NFTs, distributors can freely choose content for dissemination and distribution, and consumers can see whatever they want. Metale is like the HTTP protocol, anyone can build a website on this protocol without worrying about listing issues. As long as there is demand, there will be supply, and no intermediary application can hold users or creators hostage.
Generative AI will bring about an explosion of short drama content
“Generative AI will democratize content creation just as social networks democratized content distribution.” —Chris Dixon, Read Write Own
For a long time, our actual freedom of speech has only remained at the stage of text and pictures, and the most influential film and television content has always been controlled by a very small number of people. This is because the production cost of film and television content is high, and freedom without sustainable cash flow is not true freedom.
But today, we see a different future, both from the perspective of cost and commercial benefits. On the one hand, we have already seen some products that use AI technology to automatically generate anime dramas. As the technology of generating videos with AI matures, I believe that there will be a big explosion in short drama content. This will also be the biggest impact that generative AI will bring to the entire content industry.
We provide AIGC engines that assist in novel creation and help novels adapt into scripts, and are developing AIGC engines that use scripts to automatically generate anime dramas. In terms of translation, we provide text translation, subtitle translation, and dubbing translation tools to help content spread internationally quickly.
At the same time, the explosive short drama content will also gain commercial opportunities through the Metale ecosystem. Get rid of the channel monopoly, copyright restrictions, and content censorship of the traditional film and television industry. Countless investors/distributors/community leaders will lead a new decentralized investment, distribution, and communication mechanism. Present the content that different consumers like to watch to them accurately.
Entering the differentiated market and creating a new track
Weakness and ignorance are not obstacles to survival, but arrogance is. – Liu Cixin, The Three-Body Problem
As a decentralized content distribution platform, we are very optimistic about content that has real user needs but is excluded by centralized distribution platforms. For example, fan fiction and other bold content, we are very much looking forward to the appearance of AO 3 in the field of short dramas on Metale. The other side of the arrogant denial of centralized platforms is the vast blue ocean of decentralized platforms.
After building a certain amount of content thickness, user base, and platform influence, we believe that Web3, an architectural design that focuses more on participants rather than platforms, will also attract content creators from other fields. Ultimately, Metale will become the first choice for all content creators.
Web2/3 are all waiters, content is always king
Your profit, my opportunity. – Jeff Bezos
Content, funds, and participants. Whether it is Web2 or Web3, any content distribution ecosystem is just coordinating the production relationship between these three.
Metale provides funding and monetization sources for all drama teams through the distribution and trading application of copyright NFT. Through the paid playback application of content, it helps each drama get its own clear paid income. Through the commission distribution of paid content, it gathers global word-of-mouth recommendations. These are the simplest and most direct services.
After purchasing copyright governance NFT, investors can obtain revenue sharing from smart contracts in real time, eliminating manual operations and intermediary fees, and using the automation of blockchain networks to achieve transparent, open and traceable efficient copyright value distribution. Instead of just throwing money into a black hole and passively expecting the mercy of the platforms data black box. They can also trade freely and transfer the right to income to the buyer anytime and anywhere without anyones permission.
Distributors, especially community leaders in various language regions, can freely select the content they want to distribute and easily display it on their social media. When users pay to watch the content based on their recommendations, the commission income will be instantly credited to their accounts. Without the need for logistics, the global coverage of paid content live streaming e-commerce will facilitate the rapid cross-border dissemination of content. Lengthy negotiations for multilingual copyrights will be a thing of the past.
The issuance and trading of NFTs are crucial to restoring the value of the content itself. Through content NFTization and NFT trading, content creators can clearly understand the value of content copyright, thereby protecting their creative achievements and obtaining corresponding economic returns. This value protection encourages creators to create more high-quality content, thereby improving the quality and value of the entire content ecosystem.
For consumers, not only can they see a lot of content that they couldn’t see in the past, but they can also easily switch their identities to become investors or distributors. While consuming, they can also become builders, creators, and owners.
The most important thing is that all of the above is not the gift of a centralized giant and does not require permission. This relationship is far superior to the traditional Web2 centralized distribution platform. Technology should be an accelerator of human creativity, not a constraint.
We keep thinking about what we should do, not what we can do.
If you want to build a ship, dont encourage people to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to long for the vast sea. – Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Freedom of speech is an old topic, and it is difficult for people who have not worked in publishing to understand how heavy these four words are. After we learned about the freedom of capital flow brought by blockchain, the first thing we thought about was whether blockchain could play a role in the freedom of content circulation.
Whenever I think about the opportunity to build a decentralized distribution network like Bitcoin, so that all creators can create content freely, and all content can get the audience it deserves, thus creating a prosperous and free ecosystem, I cant help but feel excited.
This is not only because the content industry is full of hatred, but also because this topic is not convenient to talk about. It is also because the penetration of content is extremely strong, especially the penetration of film and television works. Content can break through national barriers, technical barriers, and language barriers, and is definitely a powerful tool for achieving Mass Adoption. Today, only one hit content is needed to have the opportunity to bring hundreds of millions of new users to Web3. Content is definitely a killer scenario for blockchain networks.
I believe everyone is very impressed by Rebirth of the Bitcoin King. However, this drama has only set off a viewing craze in the Chinese cryptocurrency circle. Metalale has also reached a cooperation in broadcasting and NFT issuance. We look forward to more and better dramas born on the soil of Web3.
Web3 content distribution platform Metale Protocol recently announced the completion of a $2 million seed round extension financing, bringing its total seed round financing to $4 million. The investment was completed in the first quarter of this year, led by Waterdrip Capital, Aipollo Capital, and Ultiverse DAO, and participated by a number of senior entrepreneurs.
Metale Protocol is building a decentralized content distribution platform. It aims to build a decentralized content storage and rights confirmation protocol through blockchain, and build an application ecosystem on the network to provide decentralized paid broadcast, crowdfunding governance, traffic purchase, data analysis and other services for the content industry. It can also provide highly customized smart contracts for single content. Creators in the content industry are no longer restricted by the content review and high fees of centralized distribution platforms, and have complete autonomy and the greatest benefits. It is reported that Metale Protocol completed a $2 million seed round of financing in March 2023.
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