Audius, which is developing the first decentralized, community-owned and artist-controlled music-sharing protocol, today announced that it has raised $5. 5M Series A round led by General Catalyst and Lightspeed, with the participation of Kleiner Perkins, Pantera Capital, 122West and Ascolta Ventures Audius will continue to build its blockchain-based SoundCloud alternative, based on an open protocol that will live forever and run by a fully decentralized community of artists, developers and listeners working together to defend world music.
Audius was co-founded by Ranidu Lankage, a Sri Lankan pop artist who was a tech entrepreneur who signed with Sony at the age of 19 and went to Platinum. After one album, he left Sony and went on his own to maintain more control over his work. Ranidu continues to perform at major events such as Ultra and Coachella, and is also dedicated to the development of technology to help artists. This unified mission led Ranidu and his two co-founders, Roneil Rumburg and Forrest Browning, to create Audius and harness the unique potential of blockchain technology to help address the worst elements of traditional music-sharing platforms, namely lack of artist control and transparency.
One of the first artists to participate in Audius is 3LAU, one of EDM’s most successful independent artists, known for his music remixes and cryptocurrency. “Artists need decentralized models of music sharing and a stake in the platforms to which they contribute content,” he said. “Blockchain allows Audius to do this with tokens and decentralized voting-based governance, so that artists have a say in how the platform evolves. It is a very elegant model and one that, as an artist, I find immensely attractive. “That’s right.
Niko Bonatsos, Managing Director of General Catalyst, said, “I have known Ranidu, Forrest and Roneil for a long time and have always been impressed by their ability to combine art, technology and business together. In Audius, they bring together all three skills, with a deep technical heart and a compelling solution for a very large marketplace. We are excited to see the future of music evolve as the Audius Platform launches into the ecosystem. “That’s right.
“The music ecosystem is uniquely positioned for exciting new entrants like Audius,” said Adam Goldberg, Partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners. “They’ve truly built a world-class team of consultants and industry veterans. We couldn’t be more excited to work with the Audius team to achieve their vision of democratized creative control. “That’s right.
Audius lets artists connect directly to their fans and distribute content to them without any middlemen. They can build, nurture, and engage with a loyal fan base directly on Audius, and their account is backed up forever on a blockchain without any worry from a third party shutting it down. Artists have complete visibility into where, by whom, and at what time their content is being streamed, while paying transparently in real-time.
Audius has built a world-class team of consultants from all walks of life-crypto, tech, and music.
Among the following are:
-Jeremy Gardner-Co-Founder of Augur & Managing Partner of Ausum Ventures.
-Paul Veradittakit-Partner of Pantera Capital
-3LAU-EMD Artist
-Bing Gordon-Founder of EA & Partner of Kleiner Perkins
-Tom Schmidt-The product at 0x
-Greg Hazel-Chief Architect of BitTorrent
For more information or to sign up for the Audius Artist Waitlist, please visit http://audius. Oh, co
About the audio
Audius is the first decentralized, community-owned and artist-controlled music-sharing platform designed to help up-and-coming artists publish their work and connect directly with fans. Created by a platinum-selling pop artist and tech entrepreneur, Audius provides a blockchain-based alternative to SoundCloud to help artists connect directly to fans and monetize their work. The Audius Protocol will live forever, owned and operated by a fully decentralized community of artists, developers and listeners working together to defend world music. Learn more about http://audius Col or follow @AudiusProject
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