The need for social distancing has left the majority of the world at home, bored and frustrated. For some, the stay at home orders have meant time to binge every show on the bucket list, rewatch some old favorites and try to find something new that is satisfying to watch.
For others, this has meant a time of finding a new way to connect with their craft. Millions of performers and creators have suddenly found themselves with no outlet for expression, and possibly out of work altogether. Just as all the big screens across the country are dark, so are all the theaters. Some are doing their best to adjust and develop in-person performance opportunities that allow for proper social distancing, but this is not a viable option for most artists or creators.
Many have recognized that it’s time to get to work on a new, virtual stage. Artists are putting out content, hoping it will be noticed in the larger sea of content. Audiences are craving fresh entertainment as well, demonstrated by the growth that streaming media platforms have seen in the last few months. In March 2020, TikTok had 75.5 million new downloads; and YouTube has seen days with a 500 percent increase in viewership since the beginning of the coronavirus quarantines.
The resilience that creators are demonstrating while they adapt to a new way of existing as artists deserves to be supported by an equally resilient platform to support their innovation. Filmio’s Decentralized Platform uses the flexibility of blockchain to provide a robust new foundation for the kinds of artistic creation we took for granted before the pandemic.
Finding the Right Platform
In-person collaboration is not currently feasible, and it may not be for quite some time. Major movie studios are facing enormous challenges in order to reopen and resume production. Some estimates indicate that the new precautions required to produce a movie post-COVID will add more than $1 million to every budget in addition to the cost of extending shooting by two weeks or more. One of the biggest concerns, of course, will be protecting the stars of the production. A single primary actor getting sick can halt filming for weeks.
The complications and costs presented to Hollywood open the door for smaller, more independent productions to wiggle their way into the mainstream. These projects are generally less expensive and faster to complete, and they fill a content gap that has been forming since before the pandemic. People are tired of remakes and franchise movies that all seem the same. Independent creators bring us stories that are more representative of our diverse experiences, and now is their time to break onto the scene. The challenge is finding the right platform.
YouTube and TikTok do not quite offer what creators need in order to find funding and launch their projects. TikTok’s platform only supports short videos, and it doesn’t provide the tools necessary to build an audience. YouTube makes it nearly impossible to monetize content with all of their fees and restrictions.
Creators have very limited access to audience metrics that can help them develop their projects based on what fans want to see, which means that development stops at the end of the creator’s imagination. Platforms like Filmio are needed in order for the entertainment industry to take advantage of the real opportunities presented as we move forward.
What do creators need?
Filmio uses blockchain to create an infrastructure that supports total transparency for all of its users, giving creators, investors and fans an opportunity to directly take part in the creative process. Blockchain keeps everything secure, supporting intellectual property and facilitating peer-to-peer contracts that are nearly impossible to forge or breach.
Blockchain takes each on-chain transaction and assigns it to its own block of data. That block is verified across a whole network of servers then given a timestamp with all the pertinent information, including who participated in the transaction. The information can never be changed or deleted, only amended. When this happens, the new information is given a new block, then it is added to the chain connecting every other related transaction.
Filmio’s blockchain is completely transparent for everyone involved. Fans get to see where the money goes in their favorite projects, investors get to see the meaningful metrics that help them determine the potential success of a project, and most importantly, creators have direct access to all feedback and ratings from their audiences. Unlike with YouTube and TikTok where the platform administrators have complete control over what users get to see, there isn’t a middleman between investors and creators, or between creators and fans. Everyone gets to participate without restriction.
The Future of Entertainment is Now
When everyone has completely transparent access to information and collaboration, creative projects are just more successful. Creators can change their content based on fan feedback to make their story even more powerful, and investors can evaluate the popularity of a project as well as how responsive the creator is to what audiences like.
Filmio provides the framework for all these activities to take place without intermediaries charging fees or making edits to original content. With social distancing being our new reality, the entertainment industry must completely change in order to survive. The infrastructure to support this change can only be found on a platform that allows for total transparency and direct interaction, without face-to-face contact.
Filmio is here to support the resilient creators, investors, and audiences of tomorrow as we find the new normal of a post-COVID entertainment industry.