The music industry has undergone a profound transformation in the digital age, shifting from traditional physical media to digital formats and streaming services. This article provides an overview of this evolution, emphasizing key milestones and trends. It begins by exploring the dominance of physical media, such as vinyl records, cassette tapes, and CDs, and the impact of these formats on music distribution and consumption. The digital revolution is then examined, highlighting the emergence of digital music formats like MP3 and AAC, along with pioneering services like Napster and iTunes that facilitated digital music consumption. The subsequent section discusses the rise of streaming services like Spotify and Apple Music, which have redefined how music is accessed and monetized. In the current landscape, several trends are shaping the music industry, including the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) for music recommendation and composition, blockchain technology for transparent royalty tracking, and the use of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) to tokenize music ownership. Finally, the article speculates on the future of the music industry in the digital era, considering possibilities such as virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) experiences for live performances and the evolving role of social media in music trends and fan engagement. As the music industry continues to adapt to technological advancements and changing consumer preferences, it faces both opportunities and challenges. Navigating these shifts requires collaboration, innovation, and a commitment to fairly compensating artists. The journey of the music industry through the digital age is a dynamic narrative that will continue to unfold in fascinating ways.
This study analyzes market reactions to firmsâ âNFTâ or âNon-Fungible Tokenâ disclosures filed with the SEC. The analysis distinguishes âClearâ disclosures, indicating actual NFT engagement, from âVagueâ ones, referring to vague future intentions. Both types exhibit similar non-significant CAAR behavior upon announcement, followed by a significant decline. Positive cash flow firms experience initial positive CAAR, reversing by day 4. Segmenting by traits shows varied CAAR patterns, but overall, the study suggests skepticism toward NFTs. Firms in or entering this space face consistent negative CAAR over 30 days post-publication, indicating market mistrust.
In this work, we create new datasets on mortgage technology and housing finance technology patents to support analysis of, innovation in, and trends in housing technology. We use them to summarize findings of general interest on the volume, location and ownership of different housing technology groups and types of patents over time, innovative trends, and policy approaches across countries. In contrast to housing production, through mortgage finance and associated governmental interventions, we find housing consumption outside of what is rented. We also find a fertility pattern of rapid initial growth, followed by the inevitable bursting of a bubble in most countries globally, and perhaps especially China, is evident in housing finance patenting. We compare how mortgage technology innovation has interacted with housing booms and busts in China and the United States. The two countries differ in that patenting is more concentrated in and driven by government funded or funded and subsidized organizations in China than in the United States, which, through more market plumbing and of higher general design quality over a longer period, has rapid and continuous recovery driven by more decentralized patenting. While we find trends in patenting might help support understanding of future trends, we are cautious about their predictive powers, especially for non-mortgage technologies, because the underlying economic choices that drive patenting activity may differ over time, space, and technology types. Finally, we look to the future for patenting activity by identifying mortgage and housing finance technology classes with few patent observations to guide research and policy support
The self-proclaimed usurper of Web 2.0, Web3 quickly became the center of attention. Not long ago, the public discourse was saturated with projects, promises, and peculiarities of Web3. Now the spotlight has swung around to focus on the many faults, failures, and frauds of Web3. The cycles of technological trends and investment bubbles seem to be accelerating in such a way as to escape any attempt at observing them in motion before they crash, and then everybody moves on to the next thing. Importantly, Web3 was not an anomaly or curiosity in the broader tech industry. It articulates patterns that existed before Web3 and will exist after. Web3 should be understood as a case study of innovation within the dominant model of Silicon Valley venture capitalism. Our focus in this article is on understanding how the movement around Web3 formed through an interplay between (1) normative concepts and contestations related to ideas of âdecentralizationâ and (2) political economic interests and operations related to the dynamics of fictitious capital. By offering a critical analysis of Web3, our goal is also to show how any even potentially progressive (or as we call them âexpansiveâ) forms of Web3 development struggle for success, recognition, and attention due to the wild excesses of hype and investment devoted to âextractiveâ forms of Web3. In the process, they provide us a better view of how different arrangements of technopolitics can exist at the same time, side-by-side, in complicated ways.
NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens) have experienced an explosive growth and their record-breaking prices have been witnessed. Typically, the assets that NFTs represent are stored off-chain with a pointer, e.g., multi-hop URLs, due to the costly on-chain storage. Hence, this paper aims to answer the question: Is the NFT-to-Asset connection fragile? This paper makes a first step towards this end by characterizing NFT-to-Asset connections of 12,353 Ethereum NFT Contracts (6,234,141 NFTs in total) from three perspectives, storage, accessibility and duplication. In order to overcome challenges of affecting the measurement accuracy, e.g., IPFS instability and the changing availability of both IPFS and servers' data, we propose to leverage multiple gateways to enlarge the data coverage and extend a longer measurement period with non-trivial efforts. Results of our extensive study show that such connection is very fragile in practice. The loss, unavailability, or duplication of off-chain assets could render value of NFTs worthless. For instance, we find that assets of 25.24% of Ethereum NFT contracts are not accessible, and 21.48% of Ethereum NFT contracts include duplicated assets. Our work sheds light on the fragility along the NFT-to-Asset connection, which could help the NFT community to better enhance the trust of off-chain assets.
Global trade determines how we live. Technology determines the extent of the market and the ease of trade. The transportation revolution reduced costs and cut travel times. The communication revolution (ICT) improved the quality and quantity of information in the global market and cut the cost of global trade in goods and services, including labor. Global trade has become a B2B market wherein multinational enterprises (MNEs) are major players. While MNEs began as major companies in developed countries, their success in importing labor from the emerging market through production of consumer goods in the developed countries led to emerging MNE markets. In an earlier paper on MNEs in emerging markets, Agmon suggested that blockchains reduce the cost of using the global price mechanism, and both production and consumption decisions can be made by individuals in a global market. In this paper, we discuss the case of the multinational industry of venture capital-supported small start-ups, wherein individuals with ideas for better goods, production processes, and services approach capital markets in major countries for financing their ideas. The accompanying distributed ledger technology (DLT) takes global trade a step further by opening up the possibility of global trade among individuals and loosely organized, task-oriented groups of individuals located in both developed and emerging economies. In a DLT world with decentralized markets, no transaction costs, and perfect information, the key to global trade will lie in the capabilities of the individual, or a specific task-oriented, loosely organized group of individuals. Small countries are finding it increasingly difficult to compete in international markets. We seek to examine whether the conceptual framework of DLT, when implemented in a small country that chooses to export ideas rather than products, thereby eliminating the need for a complex supply chain, can be the first empirical example of the DLT concept as a âgame changerâ. The experience of the Israeli VC industry points to exciting potential through the application of the mindset and the unique legal and financial structures of the âstart-up nationâ, wherein an economy was created that relies on small and frequently changing high-tech firms. In a country where VC investment capital is entirely imported, there is more room for investment in DLT technologies. Such an economy is compatible with the DLT concept and provides a unique empirical example of the DLT technological changeâs effect on the economy of a small country.
Stephen Muathe, Paul Sang, Lucy Kavinda, Sammy Letema ¡ 6 authors
Kenyaâs Startup ecosystem has experienced tremendous growth over the last ten years. Further, Kenyaâs startups have also been among the top-funded in the continent during the same period â attracting financing of between USD 300 million â over USD 3 billion. However, there is currently a lack of granular data guiding policies on the startup ecosystem in Kenya. Hence this Paper traces startup successes and pitfalls of the Ten years (2010-2020) Period in Kenya. The study utilized cross-sectional and longitudinal research designs. The target population was start-ups registered in the 47 Counties in Kenya. A total of 104 startups participated in the study. A mix of sampling techniques was used, namely cluster-stage, systematic, purposive, and snow-balling sampling techniques, to select the respondents for the study. Data were analyzed using Content analysis descriptive statistics were used for data analysis. The findings indicated that startup innovation hubs emerged in Nairobi in 2010 but offer time, which spurred the mushrooming of startups, seats, and co-working spaces with decentralization to significant towns in the country. The Kenyan startup ecosystem has experienced tremendous growth for the last two decades, growing from 10% in the 2000-2010 to 80% in 2010-2020. However, access to financing remains the biggest challenge for startups because of the risk associated with it, especially for early-stage startups. To strengthen the growth of the startup ecosystem, the government, through the statement of Kenya National Innovation Agency, should ensure the development of policies tailored towards startups. The national government should provide matching funds and establish an Inter-county collaboration framework to ensure skills transfer within and among the counties.
This article presents the results of a cross-disciplinary applied study exploring investors’ protections in the context of distributed ledger technology (DLT) smart contracts. Fusing legal, business, and technical perspectives, we developed a framework for protection from non-commercial risks for stablecoins, taking advantage of DLT and AI. A key concept we propose is the monitoring of disinformation and fake news to prevent malicious parties from abusing our solution. Based on the similarities between central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) and stablecoins, we propose scaling up our results to all future internet investments performed without face-to-face contact between the investor and the company.
Abrar Rahman, Victor Shi, Matthew Ding, Elliot H. Choi
Synthetic assets are decentralized finance (DeFi) analogues of derivatives in the traditional finance (TradFi) world - financial arrangements which derive value from and are directly pegged to fluctuations in the value of an underlying asset (ex: futures and options). Synthetic assets occupy a unique niche, serving to facilitate currency exchange, giving traders a means to speculate on the value of crypto assets without directly holding them, and powering more complex financial tools such as yield optimizers and portfolio management suites. Unfortunately, the academic literature on this topic is highly disparate and struggles to keep up with rapid changes in the space. We present the first Systematization of Knowledge (SoK) in this area, focusing on presenting the key mechanisms, protocols, and issues in an accessible fashion to highlight risks for participants as well as areas of research interest. This paper takes a broad perspective in establishing a general framework for synthetic assets, from the ideological origins of crypto to legal barriers for firms in this space, encapsulating the basic mechanisms underpinning derivatives markets as well as presenting data-driven analyses of major protocols.
The application of blockchain technology1 in the corporate finance sphere has created many new innovations2 such as asset-backed tokens,3 debt and equity security tokens4 and decentralized finance (DeFi).5 These innovations have the potential to greatly facilitate the raising of capital by businesses. They can make the process more efficient by automating certain parts of the process with smart contracts,6 matching available capital to businesses more quickly and boosting liquidity.7 Crucially, they can also facilitate access to new capital markets by lowering the barriers to entry, both on the part of businesses seeking to raise capital and investors seeking returns on their capital. Much of the DeFi movement focuses on enabling smaller players to seek and offer financing,8 where it might have previously been uneconomical for them to do so through traditional capital markets.9 As such, the use of digital tokens in corporate finance can both boost the efficiency of the process of raising capital and open up access to new capital markets.
Open-source software has made a breakthrough in the traditional intellectual property theory from the aspects of Copyright, patent right, and trademark right, and it has created a new property rights form in the form of license. Taking blockchain as an example, this paper analyzes bitcoin and Ethereum and their open-source licensing strategies. At the same time, it explores the problems encountered in the property rights of open-source blockchain and three possible solutions to this dilemma: The industry-standard licensing plan, blockchain open-source licensing scheme, and open patent scheme. This research will be significant for expanding and enriching the theoretical and practical analysis of blockchain open source in the field of intellectual property.
Stephen Muathe, Paul Sang, George Kosimbei, Sammy Letema ¡ 10 authors
Over the last 10 years, maturity of the business landscape has unlocked new opportunities in Africa, especially the entry of accelerators, incubators, and other start-up ecosystem players. These organizations are constantly adapting their models to respond to the ever-changing needs of the ventures they support. Therefore, there is need for existing literature to keep abreast with this vitality to strengthen the ecosystems in Kenya. The paper analyses the drivers, challenges and opportunities within the start-up ecosystem in Kenya. The paper is based on cross-sectional and longitudinal designs. Human-centred purposive and proportionate stratified random sampling techniques were used to select a sample of 74 respondents who filled an electronic survey; coupled with interview of 50 start-ups ecosystem players. Descriptive statistics and content analysis was used in data analysis. The study reveals that Kenya has made significant strides in the start-up scene, however, there is a heavy concentration of activity in Nairobi the capital city, leading to disparity within the country. Opportunities for collaboration are bypassed in favour of duplication of programs and consequently funds that should ultimately support entrepreneurs are spread thin. a number of challenges bedevilled start-ups, access to financing and risk capital, lack of sector coordination, weak start-up culture, me too businesses, insufficient policies and guidelines on incubation and commercialization, and lack of a robust monitoring, evaluation and learning system. The study recommends that the national government should provide matching funds for venture capital, standardization and decentralization of innovation and incubation centres countrywide, central database for start-ups and sensitization and awareness-building programs on intellectual property rights among start-ups.
The Metaverse refers to a shared vision among technology entrepreneurs of a three-dimensional virtual world, an embodied internet with humans and the physical world in it. As such, the Metaverse is thought to expand the domain of human activity by overcoming spatial, temporal, and resource-related constraints imposed by nature. The technological infrastructure of the Metaverse, i.e., Web3, consists of blockchain technology, smart contracts, and Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), which reduce transaction and agency costs, and enable trustless social and economic interactions thanks to decentralized consensus mechanisms. The emerging Metaverse may give rise to new products and services, new job profiles, and new business models. In this brief note, I assess the promises and challenges of the Metaverse, offer a first empirical glimpse at the emerging Metaverse economy, and discuss some simple Metaverse economics that revolve around building and operating the Metaverse.
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The popularity of the Non-Fungible Token (NFT) has risen rapidly since 2020, becoming one of the most popular applications in the Fintech field. However, there has so far been no attempt to perform a systematic review in this new area. Considering the items of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA), this paper conducts a systematic review of the research work on NFT, published in journals indexed at the Web of Science and ScienceDirect until April 2022. The results reveal that there are 13 published articles in the targeted journals and they are mainly focused on the asset pricing area. The research gaps identified in the literature also can be the opportunity for future study. Thus, we lay down the research agenda for the future in several important but unanswered fields related to asset pricing, tokenomics, and risk and regulation.
Many implementations of smart contracts available in NFT marketplaces today allow the modification of NFT token attributes, without any specific mechanism to control the consistency with off-chain metadata. We believe this is a weakness in overall design of NFTs today. We propose a computation model called the Asset Proxy NFT that guarantees the consistency between the NFT token (on-chain) and its corresponding asset metadata (off-chain). In general, the proposed model can be applied to any type of NFT that requires immutability or controlled mutability of metadata. A second contribution of this paper is the notion of the NFT design patterns which recognizes that a coherent framework for dealing with hybrid assets is required, and that for specific hybrid-asset deployments, suitable technological components must be utilized under the framework.
Ămit Cali, D. Jonathan Sebastian-Cardenas, Shammya Shananda Saha, Shawn Chandler ¡ 10 authors
This work presents a formal review of smart contracts, including definitions, technical requirements, and potential power and energy-related use cases. This includes in-depth discussions covering cybersecurity, legality and interoperability goals that must be taken into consideration by potential end-users. The paper presents a first attempt towards the standardization of smart contracts (SCs) within the field of power and energy as a work in progress activity under the IEEE Standards Association (IEEE SA) P2418.5 Working Group. This work also proposes a holistic, language-agnostic reference model that is intended to accelerate the adoption of Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) by industry stakeholders by providing standardized processes. Finally, the paper discusses key takeaways that must continue to be developed to increase SC usage within the energy industry.
Blockchain - the decentralized global ledger technology provides a potentially attractive alternate to organize modern finance. Organizations use ERP software to integrate the management of all major business processes. Instead, blockchain can provide single version of the truth, in real time, regardless of constraints, to all participants across the organizational boundaries.
The purpose of this work is to study the investment capital markets by analysing the IPO and ICO procedures, identifying the main trends, leading sectors and comparing their volumes. The methodological basis was a retrospective analysis of the development of various forms of investment attraction (IPO and ICO). The main research methods were deduction, induction, synthesis and logical analysis. This article examined the main trends taking place in the IPO and ICO markets; key types of used blockchain platforms were identified; the leading countries and sectors in terms of the amount of funds raised are presented. The ICO market showed high growth rates in 2013â2018, but did not reach volumes comparable to the IPO market. Most of the projects that used the ICO (digital token issuance) procedures chose the Ethereum blockchain system as a platform, implemented projects in the fintech and IT industries, infrastructure development and decentralized applications (DApps). The leading states, residents, which have carried out the largest number of ICO procedures, are the USA, Singapore, United Kingdom and Hong Kong. In the IPO market, the largest volume of funds was attracted by projects from such sectors as finance, consumer services, oil and gas, industry and healthcare. The US remains the main platform chosen by companies for IPOs. The US is followed by the UK, China and Hong Kong