NFTs: Μετασχηματίζοντας τις βιομηχανίες των Entertainment & Media.

NFTs have been utilized in digital art, games, and music for a long time and have recently been used in the film and television industry. These NFTs provide an effective solution to piracy and other intellectual property disputes. It is transforming the expansion of the entertainment sector. In addition, production companies can benefit from an additional revenue stream. Additionally, filmmakers can adopt a fresh approach to distributing their creations by allowing viewers to possess fragments of the film. This opportunity strengthens the connection between filmmakers/creators and their audience.

With all the intellectual property and loyal fandoms that underpin the entertainment industry, it’s no surprise Hollywood is turning its spotlight toward the NFT marketplace. In addition to providing new revenue streams for mainstream brands, NFTs could benefit smaller independent filmmakers by supporting a decentralized production cycle powered by the customer.

The non-fungible token is revealing more of its utility beyond art and securing ownership rights. Through NFTs, the entertainment industry is finding innovative ways to raise funds, engage the viewer, and power the fan economy.

Money matters a lot in the entertainment industry. It’s not enough to have a good script or a visionary director. Without funding, there is no film or television pilot. NFTs, however, can open a new avenue for fundraising that would help creators overcome budget constraints. 

Movie NFTs, for example, could allow a filmmaker to distribute ownership of their upcoming film to potential viewers while raising the necessary funds in the process. Purchasing such NFT could even credit the buyer as the film’s “producer.” This relationship would enhance both the fundraising experience and fan experience, allowing consumers to play an active role throughout the film’s production. 

A potential byproduct of NFT fundraising is a collaborative relationship between the viewer and the creator. Movie and television production traditionally happens behind closed doors, with important decisions, such as commissioning sequels or “killing” a major character, often being driven by the bottom line and indirect consumer data. This type of decision-making can often backfire, leading to unfaithful adaptations, box-office failures, and angry, passionate fans venting on social media.

With an NFT-powered community at the helm, these decisions could potentially move away from the studio executives toward the audiences. Think of a DAO, but instead of protocol development decisions, community members here vote on what stories and characters they want to see on the big screen. There’s already been an influx of independent Web3 filmmaking studios financing their production process through NFTs recently. 

Merchandise sales, fan conventions, and film franchises that span decades — it’s no secret a large portion of the entertainment industry’s most lucrative mechanisms are driven by loyal fanbases. 

For a-list studios like Disney and Warner Bros., NFTs could facilitate the creation of mixed-reality storytelling experiences such as theme parks that blend digital elements with real life, or virtual red-carpet premieres that fans from anywhere in the world can attend. 

It could also be something more conventional, a digital twist on memorabilia and merchandise. The options are endless: pages of a film script, classic movie moments, and of course, digital art featuring all your favorite characters.

Many tech giants claim that web3 applications are limitless in their capabilities. In the case of the entertainment industry, it seems to be true. The level of influence web3 has over the entertainment industry is pretty evident, and it will seemingly revolutionize its several key aspects.

Hosting virtual concerts in web3 is now becoming a popular new trend. Many, including big musicians and pop stars, are now jumping on this bandwagon. This is the kind of transformation that no one ever thought would happen. While some still think it is a faint buzz, some already find this application of web3 in entertainment to be outstanding. Let us provide you with an overview of what virtual concerts look like in web3.

The major change one can feel while attending these concerts is the use of digital avatars. Those human-like digital avatars capable of doing all the activities a human can do are truly show stealers. In a virtual concert, the star and the fans are represented by their digital avatars. Fans can move around the stage, dance, clap, cheer, socialize and whatnot with their doppelgangers in the virtual universe. Starting from tickets and merchandise, everything is digital. Interestingly, a lot of assets, even show tickets are available in the form of NFTs. When you buy an NFT-backed show ticket or some other asset, you actually make an investment from which you can earn profits. An important key difference between virtual and regular concerts is the use of advanced effects, animations and sound to enhance the interactiveness of virtual concerts.

There are many amazing benefits of hosting concerts in web3. Here are the two most important benefits:

No front-seat participants’ rule

With web3, the practice of showing up early to secure a prime spot for the stage view is coming to an end. This is because of the live and multi-cameras surrounding the virtual event. The audience will get an even closer look at artists on stage, as the visuals offered are from several different angles. 

Drive engagement 

The feature that sets virtual concerts apart from physical concerts is higher engagement. In the virtual world, artists are easily accessible. Artists can also easily interact with their fans. Further, during a virtual live show in web3, the audience can have a direct conversation with the artist and even make requests for songs. Not just that, fans can also interact with their friends. Hence, virtual concerts create endless opportunities for artists and fans to interact with each other.

Did you know that some of the popular films you’ve seen have their own NFTs? 

Warner Bros released NFTs inspired by The Matrix franchise and the film The Matrix: Resurrections. 

Unlike other NFT projects based on Hollywood intellectual property, the Matrix project was instead taking its inspiration from some of the red-hot NFT “avatar” art projects, like CryptoPunks and Bored Ape Yacht Club, where the buyers are buying a unique avatar from those worlds. 

The Matrix NFTs were released in partnership with the social NFT platform Nifty’s, which created 100.000 avatars and sell them for $50 each. The avatars represent characters living in the Matrix. All buyers are able to choose to take a “Blue Pill”, which will keep their avatar in the Matrix, or a “Red Pill”, which will transform it into a resistance fighter. In coming months there will be other challenges and options, letting users upgrade their avatars, or earn new NFTs. 

Warner Bros also created a special edition of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring in NFT form. The NFTs featured the 4K quality of the movie along with never-before-seen footage, immersive audio commentary, an additional camera view, and more. Furthermore, the set included behind-the-scenes footage, augmented reality sets inspired by the film, and a special QR code that could be used as a Snapchat filter. The collection included 10,999 NFTs, with two different tiers available to consumers. The “Epic Edition” cost $100 and included three locations, while the “Mystery Edition” was priced at $30 and offered one location. 

Zero Contact, a Hollywood feature film, became the first full-length film distributed and released as an NFT on Vuele, a direct-to-customer NFT platform. Customers could choose from two bundles: Exclusive Edition and Collector’s Edition. This movie grossed nearly $100,000 as NFT. 

Dune released the digital collectibles for the film featuring sculptures and weaponry. However, more attention was drawn to an art book called Jodorowsky’s Dune, which was auctioned for almost $3 million by an anonymous NFT group named Spice DAO. 

Fox invested $100 million in making NFTs; the network then announced an NFT company, launching with an animated series by the popular show Rick and Morty’s creator Dan Harmon.

Coachella, one of the most famous music festivals in the world, has also started using NFTs in its branding strategies. The brand partnered with now bankrupted FTX US marketplace and launched a collection of NFTs on Solana Network that guarantee advantages and benefits to token owners, such as lifetime access to the event, VIP gifts, redeem physical copies of photo books of the event among others.

The attendees should download the “In Bloom” NFT, a massive psychedelic flower seed that blossoms every Friday morning of the festival and cash in for several benefits at the festival. Items and experiences like a faster entry lane, access to limited-edition merchandise and food and beverage vouchers.

In addition to the strategies being similar to others already presented here, such as exclusivity and community, Coachella went even further. Part of the proceeds from the sale of NFTs will be used for actions with charities. As a result, NFTs are also being used in social impact strategies by brands.

Some Coachella VIP NFTs will blossom into 6 diverse rare flowers and users can redeem them for items at the festivals. Prizes like VIP upgrades, weekend passes for the 2023 festival, Willy Wonka golden tickets and Ferris wheel rides.

Time Magazine released a full magazine issue that is available as an NFT. This latest endeavor from the legacy publication marks the first time any digital or print publication has released an entire issue on the blockchain.

In 2021, Time has grown increasingly involved in the NFT ecosystem. It launched an NFT collection called TIMEPieces, featuring original artwork from more than 40 artists.

In line with TIMEPieces’ digitally native nature, the issue features a cover story on Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin. The NFT was created in partnership with the LITDAO and was airdropped to select TIMEPiece holders and genesis LIT community wallet holders.

To date, TIME’s web3 initiatives have generated more than $10 million in revenue and helped them create a community of over 25.000 artists, collectors and NFT enthusiasts.

American artist Snoop Dogg is a big NFT collector, hiding under the pseudonym Cozomo de’ Medici. In 2021, Snoop Dogg and artist Chris Cold released his first NFT “Decentral Eyes Dogg” on the SuperRare platform. The art component of the token is a 3D collage of ten different portraits of the musician depicting various stages of his life. An exclusive soundtrack he wrote especially for this project was attached as a bonus.

In 2022, the artist teamed up with Billy Ray Cyrus for the single “A Hard-Working Man.” The musical release was accompanied by the launch of the NFT project of the same name, which included a great deal of everything: from exclusive content to concert tickets and all sorts of discounts. The tokens were scheduled to be released at the end of February 2023, so the actual results of the minting aren’t available yet, however, the collection has already caused a stir. 

In the same year, the artist also launched “The Doggies”, an NFT collection comprised of 10.000 programmatically generated Snoop Doggs, playable in The Sandbox metaverse platform. Each Snoop is completely unique, hand crafted from over 150 traits.

Snoop Dogg actively promotes NFTs in other ways as well. For example, he releases tokenized NFT marijuana in the MOBLAND Metaverse or physical NFT desserts at the Bored & Hungry diner in Los Angeles.

What’s more, the musician had a music video for a joint track with Eminem in the summer of 2022. The clip was created in collaboration with Bored Ape Yacht Club and is half-animated, making the performers turn into monkeys from the BAYC collection. 

Snoop Dogg has launched an NFT collectible series that will evolve in utility as he goes on 2023 tour. The Snoop Dogg Passport Series is akin to a "tour poster that evolves with each place Snoop stops on tour." The NFT will grant holders access to behind-the-scenes content, exclusive merch, art and experiences from the music icon.

The GRAMMY-nominated music producer Steve Aoki has been leading the way in NFT collaborations and generated over $4 million with his first NFT launch, the Dream Catcher series. Additionally, Aoki co-created the first blockchain-based episodic series with Dominion X and collaborated with Sotheby’s on their Contemporary Curated series.

Furthermore, In August 2022, Steve Aoki teamed up with actor and filmmaker Seth Green to create the first-ever community-driven animated NFT TV series. The project is the next chapter in Aoki’s NFT mascot, Character X’s, journey.

Over time, Steve Aoki has seen significant success with its NFT community, A0K1VERSE. The project has formed several high-profile partnerships. For example, A0K1VERSE has secured collaborations with renowned brands like Time Magazine, Gala Games, Snoop Dogg, Deadfellaz, Goblintown, The Sandbox, and several others. The community was also the host of unforgettable events like NFT LA, Veecon, and NFT.NYC.

Versus Entertainment has partnered with Decentraland and Lumiere to develop NFT and metaverse angles for an upcoming NFT film, “Infinite Machine”. Adapted from Camilla Russo’s book of the same name, the film tells the story of Ethereum co-founder, Vitalik Buterin. In the run-up to its release, the film released several NFTs, making it the first NFT-financed film. 

Firstly, Versus will produce the film in collaboration with director Ridley Scott’s production company, Scott Free. Then, Lumiere, a Hong Kong-and Singapore-based entertainment specialist and Decentraland will develop crypto and NFT-focused plots. To explain, Lumiere will build and integrate the experience of the film into Decentraland. 

The film has a total budget of $16 million. To meet this, it will soon issue the third set of its NFTs in the coming months. Reportedly, the film is offering 10.499 unique NFTs designed by 36 artists. As expected, the majority of the funds from the NFT sales will go into the movie’s budget. Parts of the proceeds will also go to the artists and the Infinite Machine DAO.

Conclusion

The usage of NFTs in the entertainment and media industry as depicted in the aforementioned cases is only the tip of the iceberg. As technology and consumer habits continue to evolve, numerous other examples have emerged across this sector, showcasing how NFTs are transforming the way we interact with media content.

From facilitating direct fan engagement to introducing new revenue streams, these examples illustrate the potential of NFTs to reshape the media and entertainment landscape. They demonstrate how NFTs can offer a new level of interaction and ownership for consumers, as well as innovative business models for content creators and distributors. This pioneering use of NFTs, moving beyond art and into broader content distribution, signals a revolution in the industry and paves the way for a new era of digital media consumption.