Roadmap Update (August 2022)
Here’s our current thinking about the product roadmap, covering changes in how we’re developing the RCRDSHP platform and our integration with SOUND token. It takes into account adjustments to expectations based on current market conditions, namely “crypto winter” and what appears to be the start of a global recession that diminishes the availability of growth capital to startups.
What hasn’t changed an iota is our mission to use blockchain technology as a means to make music valuable for artists and their fans. Our understanding of how to to do that continues to evolve, but is fundamentally the same as it was when we launched a year ago: Music should be marketed and distributed as a limited-edition good. The gross commodification of all music (other than pop, perhaps) must be reversed, so that talented working artists across the world have a chance to thrive and earn their living by making music.
Expanding Genres
The first big change that’s in progress is moving beyond our strong focus on electronic dance music. We started with electronic music because we come from that world and the publishing rights landscape is easier there. But it was never our intention to stay pigeonholed in one style.
This summer, we’re happy to be opening the doors to talented artists from many different genres. As opposed to dampening enthusiasm for the project, we think that broadening our artistic horizons will actually re-energize a huge segment of our existing player base.
Opening Up
Our main software development initiative at the moment is referred to internally as self-service. It’s the ability for a new artist (or group of artists, such as a record label) to register themselves for RCRDSHP and begin minting new collectibles. This is a big change!
Until now, new content partners had to be referred to us personally and go through a manual registration process with our partnerships team that includes contract negotiations and signing non-disclosure agreements and stuff like that. Once self-service is in place, the process to sign up will be as easy as it is with other music platforms such as Soundcloud or Distrokid.
While self-service represents an opening of the RCRDSHP platform, we do not intend to let that openness dilute the quality of the music collectibles that we offer. In the coming months we’ll share details about how we will empower our player community to control who gets to mint (and not). Hint: it involves the long-awaited utility for coins, our in-game currency.
SOUND Token
We wanted to launch SOUND in the Spring, but the crypto crash and onset of winter admittedly created a huge distraction for the team involved. The many regulatory hurdles involved are also taking a lot longer to clear than we initially expected. At this point it feels like we’re near the finish line, which means we should be doing the first round of airdrops soon.
The expected utility for SOUND token has not changed; we will use it as the economic backing for our in-game currency (coins), and we will use the exchange rate between SOUND and coins to exercise a measure of control over supply and demand in the RCRDSHP marketplace.
SOUND will not be marketed to the general public, nor should it be considered a speculative vehicle. As we’ve mentioned in the past, it’s possible that SOUND will take on a secondary use as a governance token for certain aspects of the platform, but we are deferring decisions on that use case until 2023 or beyond.
Staking and Stakeholder Rewards
We’re still in love with the idea of players locking cards to their showcase (“stake them”) in order to generate rewards for their favorite artists. The software for the feature is over half done. Work on it got derailed for no good reason other than distractions caused by the market crash and onset of crypto winter. As we adjusted to the new market realities, other features (mostly related to self-service registration and minting) took precedence. That said, I’ve been working on it personally and we’re still committed to rolling out both staking and stakeholder rewards sometime in the next few months.
Redeemables
We will soon be adding the ability to enhance collectibles with redeemable QR codes. Content partners can add these codes as individual faces inside of music collectibles to act as tickets for entry to events, VIP access, drink tickets, even merchandise. Players will be able to flash the QR code to staff at events in order to redeem. Once used, redeemables, especially those that grant access to events function as proof-of-attendance and souvenirs, kind of like ticket stubs.
The first event to use RCRDSHP redeemable NFT-backed tickets for entry will be the debut of Anjunadeep’s Marsh in Mexico City on August 22, 2022.
Time to Refactor
If you work in tech you might be familiar with the term refactoring, which means changing (hopefully improving!) the implementation of a software system without changing its behavior. One of the main motivations for refactoring at this moment in time, after a year of breakneck development pace, is to pay back technical debt. When building software systems rapidly, teams tend to accumulate suboptimal and/or dead code. The more of that you allow to remain in your system, the more it slows down further development.
One of the important changes we made recently is to change our collectible rendering system. This is the code that composes the front of collectibles, merging the rarity-dependent frame and cover image with serial number and coin values. The new system is not only faster and more resilient, it also gives us a stable technical platform for further innovation. For instance, we may finally be able to make our early ideas about player-applied stickers and badges a reality.
Further Updates
Planning to update the roadmap via this channel at the start of October, with the outlook through the rest of the year.
