OpenSea is the largest NFT Marketplace by volume and users in the entire crypto space. On September 29, the Warner Music Group (WMG) partnered with OpenSea to give artists a chance to reach a new fanbase in the Web3 space.
What does this mean for the music and NFT Industries?
The Warner Music Group (WMG)
The Warner Music Group is a large multi-billion multinational music conglomerate headquartered in the United States. According to WMG, select artists that get signed by the label will be required to create profiles on OpenSea. This will allow them to offer their NFTs to their fans.
This partnership further cements the legitimacy of NFTs. A while back, Chris Brown released his NFTs during an album launch. Unfortunately, the NFT drop wasn’t successful. The pop singer had decided to launch his NFT on Instagram. Most people on the platform have little to no knowledge about NFTs or their importance. This largely contributed to the failure of the NFT drop.
With the partnership now complete, it will be much easier for artists to conduct successful NFT drops via the OpenSea platform.
While many have taken this news with all the positivity it brings, others seem to think it does not augur good news for musicians.
A partnership between two humongous centralized entities cements them as gatekeepers between musicians and audiences, effectively controlling how big an artist can get. Music NFTs enable artists to sell their intellectual property to their fans. But with WMG as a gatekeeper, the entity will take a share of the music sales and effectively gatekeep interaction between the audience and artists. This partnership’s status quo has nothing to do with benefiting artists but WMG and OpenSea lining their pockets.
Do you think the WMG x OpenSea partnership is good for musicians and crypto? Let us hear your thoughts on Twitter.
Vincent Munene is a freelance writer and a great blockchain enthusiast. Blockchain has changed his life in terms of financial freedom and in return, he likes to educate people and keep them up to date on everything blockchain. He is a Biochemist by profession and also loves to play the piano.
