Is this the music streaming platform of the future?

Despite announcing $14.3 billion in profits last year, streaming giant Spotify pays artists a measly $0.004 per stream on average – and it’s only getting worse. With listener prices getting higher each year, the platform has announced yet further reductions in streaming revenue for artists. But what if there was a way for artists to keep 100 per cent of their profits? Well, this is exactly what Nina Protocol’s streaming platform hopes to realise. 

The project was dreamed up in 2021 by experimental musicians Jack Callahan, Mike Pollard and Eric Farber. Discussing the “dismal” state of digital streaming over a few pints in an Irish pub in Lower Manhattan, the trio felt disillusioned by the way the music industry was headed, one that unfairly compensates artists, forcing smaller acts to compete for attention against the algorithm. Seeing a potential solution in the radical yet “misused” NFT (non-fungible token) wave making headlines at the time, they turned their hands to coding, creating what they saw as an “infrastructure for the next 50 years of music”.

The resulting streaming platform, Nina Protocol, is based on Web3 and blockchain technology. Unlike other private streaming platforms like Spotify and YouTube Music, which can delete or demonetise music without artists’ permission, Nina’s use of the peer-to-peer blockchain network to process all purchases on the platform enables artists to retain direct control over their music and revenue. Similarly, because all data is stored publicly, listeners aren’t liable to having their data used or sold without their explicit consent – something which is usually done to extract yet more money from consumers.

In short, the use of blockchain technology allows Nina to cut out the middle man of private profit-oriented companies, while encouraging listeners to actively discover independent artists primarily from the experimental scene – think Surf Gang and Jawnino (as opposed to platforms like Spotify, which promote the passive absorption of music via algorithmically curated playlists).  

Below, we speak to the creators of Nina Protocol about their vision for the streaming platform, preserving online music, and what we can learn from earlier peer-to-peer music platforms like Napster. 

How did the idea for Nina Protocol come about? What sets it apart from more traditional streaming services? 

Eric: We were at [New York Irish pub] McSorelys in 2021, talking about the misuse and misunderstanding of NFT hype. We saw an opportunity to use the same tech to build a public music service, free from the limitations and control of the existing monoliths. The biggest differentiator between Nina and existing tools is that it would become a music service built and shared in public.

You mention that Nina is an “online music ecosystem” that reminds you of the “DIY scenes you came from”. What are your musical backgrounds and how do they inform the way Nina is structured? 

Mike: Everyone who works at Nina met through music. Mike ran a record label called Arbor. Eric played in punk and noise bands in Toronto and Boston areas. Jack has been involved in too many projects to name, from record labels, to event series to mastering services and live sound. Ian has been an NTS DJ for over 7 years, operates a label, puts on shows and was previously Mac Demarco’s tour manager. Cal was previously a DJ / producer on the Brooklyn club scene. Brandon ran a label called Isounderscore.  

Everything about Nina is informed by our experiences in independent music and thinking about what internet-native independent music could look like. Most of the artists that we have worked with do not benefit from the one-size-fits-all models of corporate streaming platforms that only monetarily benefit the top one per cent of artists. So we are exploring alternative models.

“Artists have more independence to find and grow their audiences than they ever have before, but the tech companies continue to control distribution” – Nina Protocol

I’m remembering the MySpace calamity in which millions of songs were accidentally deleted in a server migration. How does the blockchain system prevent this happening to Nina?

Eric: The MySpace fuck up was one of our main points of inspiration. The music on Nina is stored on Arweave, a blockchain designed around permanent data storage. While some deep nerds are always eager to argue about the promise vs expectation of blockchains that require people to run them, this seems like a more promising venue to explore than stacks of private servers. With Nina, we want to bring these useful tools to people in a way where they don’t have to think about any of this, and can just enjoy the music.

You’ve been increasingly featuring editorial content on the platform. How do you see the editorial content feeding into Nina Protocol at large?

Mike: There was some great music happening on Nina that we wanted to put into context. We tried reaching out to traditional music publications and found some limitations, like how coverage is pretty strictly tied to album release cycles. Like most things with Nina, we thought, why not just make it ourselves? Music doesn’t come from nowhere – Editorial helps us understand a bit more about the origins and life of music before it comes through our speakers.

Mike, you mentioned in another interview that you are building “infrastructure for the next 50 years of music”. What sort of changes do you anticipate in the industry? 

Mike: There are many music industries. As we see it, the capital ‘M’ Music Industry is still reacting to the invention of the internet. The big streaming companies and the big record labels’ fates are tied together currently, but their goals are opposed. Record labels care about their talent and streaming platforms care about their users. Daniel Ek [Spotify exec] has made it clear how he values artistic labour when he said that the cost of ‘creating content is close to zero’.

Artists have more independence to find and grow their audiences than they ever have before, but tech companies continue to control distribution. And it seems like money and attention continues to coalesce to the biggest winners. I think we will see more and more discord between big labels and the big tech platforms as they both try to protect their interests. At the same time, we will see artists finding new models out of these legacy industries. I hope this results in a decentralisation of distribution and a widening middle class for music.

You also mentioned that Nina conflicted with the 2021/22 crypto hype because it wasn’t a get-rich-quick scheme. Can you expand on what you meant by that?

Eric: In the 2021 hype cycle, the crypto crowd disliked us because we had low prices and were not shouting about Web3 fixing everything. On the music side, people were wary of us because crypto was involved. Our goal then and goal now is to make a better place for music, not participate in the casino. A better place for music will not just be better because of the tech it’s built on.

Mike: When people think of crypto they think of speculation, the casino, and crazy high prices. We see open, public networks to create resilient peer-to-peer platforms – archives of culture that can withstand platform change, open source data that can be accessed and built on by anyone, and new payment models beyond monthly subscription fees. This is subtler and less sexy, but it’s what we are striving for.

An early working title for the project was ‘Shawn’, referencing the creator of Napster, Shawn Fanning. What are your thoughts on Napster and how does it inform Nina Protocol?

Mike: Napster was an internet-native peer-to-peer music platform that leaned into what the internet does best – connect people who have a shared interest. The problem was that it leaned so heavily into the listener experience at the expense of the artists and labels. Since Napster, music is now ubiquitous. The task becomes thinking about a way to acknowledge this fact, but at the same time build out a network that allows supporting artists, and richer experiences, that connects people who love music.

Eric: Saying I have a ‘thought’ about Napster feels like an injustice to the massive impact it has had on me. Napster was what I was running home from school to use. I think Napster informs much more than Nina. For better or for worse, it shifted the music industry as a whole into what it is today. Ethos aside, if we ever make something where someone has as much fun as I did using Napster, that’s a big win.

Will you ever introduce paid membership?

Mike: There are currently no plans to do so.

Find out more about Nina Protocol here