Here’s how Viberate plans to tokenize live performances

You might remember Viberate as the music tech startup with an incredibly successful 2017 ICO when they sold out their VIB tokens (available on Binance, Bittrex, OKEx, and Uniswap) in under five minutes. Today, they’ve grown into full blockchain-based music research and analytics platform and have just announced another ambitious project: launching the first-ever live performance NFT.

With World’s first “live gig NFT”, Viberate will explore new ways for music artists to trade their work.

Teaming up with the Blockparty marketplace, Viberate plans to drop special NFTs featuring exclusive content by one of the company’s co-founders, world-renowned Techno DJ, and producer UMEK. Besides three original remixes of his track “Lanicor”, bidding will also be open on his live performance.

If the concept proves to be successful and gains traction in the industry, Viberate plans on providing the option of gig token minting to nearly half a million music artists in its database, along with minting artist ID NFTs through a secure verification process. These ID NFTs will then act as a certificate of authenticity, reassuring the buyer that the contents indeed come from a verified artist.

Matej Gregorcic, Viberate co-founder and CEO, explains their plan: “What we’re testing out is quite straightforward. Any artist in the Viberate database will have the chance to offer the right to their live performance in the form of an NFT. People, be it organizers or fans, then bid on that token. The highest bidder will be able to decide between cashing in the token, meaning that the artist will play at their event, or reselling the token.

The collected funds are held in escrow until the day of the show. Once the event starts and the artist goes on stage, the token holder burns the token. This way, with the help of blockchain, both parties are secured and payments can be handled safely and transparently. We believe that the opportunity to handle bookings through NFTs comes at a great time, as the live music industry was hit extremely hard during the pandemic, so all the artists out there are looking for new ways to make sure there’s a gig waiting for them once live events return.”

To mint their own gig NFT or create a verified ID NFT, a music artist will first need to create and claim their profile on Viberate. For each NFT minted, they will need to lock VIB tokens into a smart contract and set the terms of the performance together with the initial price. Once the NFT is sold, the VIBs will be burned. Should an artist burn their NFT themselves, their VIBs will be returned to them.

Viberate and UMEK’s NFT drop will launch on Blockparty on Thursday, April 29, 2021, at 8:00 pm GMT+1 (3:00 pm EST).

Disclaimer: This is a paid post and should not be treated as news/advice.