The digital transformation of the music industry through applications of blockchain technology

Sammanfattning: Since its introduction in 2008, the blockchain technology has been hailed as the one that could revolutionise many different industries. The music industry underwent several changes in the last 20 years as a consequence of phenomena such as music piracy, digital music and music streaming. Many considered the blockchain technology the solution to the many issues the music industry is facing. However, while the technology has been around for more than 10 years, and despite the enthusiasm of scholars and experts, little has been done to actually implement blockchains in the industry, especially by its biggest players. The resulting question is if and how the technology could change the music industry. This research starts by looking into previous studies on the blockchain technology, on the music industry and on the possible intersections of the two: from there the most popular suggested applications of the blockchain technology are extracted and presented in interviews to people working in the music industry. The goal of the interviews is to understand if the issues that the suggestions aimed to solve are real, and if the suggested applications are thought to be actually useful. The results are also compared with considerations from previously analysed papers, and showed a general interest in the blockchain technology and in the belief that it could help solve some issues of the music industry. At the same time, it was found that the technology is considered too young to be employed at the present time, with most people reckoning it is a technology that could have an impact in 10-15 year time.