TikTok Partners With Crypto-Powered Music Platform Audius

Many of today’s young social media consumers are finding new music via TikTok. This week, the leading social media platform paired up with Audius, a streaming platform that is quickly becoming one of the largest decentralized consumer applications.

TikTok’s Unlikely Match

The pairing is especially interesting considering that around a month ago, TikTok took further steps to restrict crypto content from influencers and creators on the platform. The sharing feature on TikTok went into effect today and will look to give upcoming artists exposure on the platform by enabling them to upload music straight from Audius to TikTok. Move over Spotify, Apple Music, and crew; there’s apparently a new player in town.

Audius has a roster of over 100,000 artists, including major EDM exposure, with artists such as Skrillex and deadmau5. The platform was established in 2018 and launched in 2019, and utilizes Ethereum and Solana blockchains. Audius surpassed five million monthly users in recent weeks as well; that number was below a million as recently as January, according to a Rolling Stone report.

Audius boasts an open network, governance on the platform, and security around artist’s work. The Audius protocol even allows users to stake the platform’s native token on hosted services to earn revenue.

The new partnership opens the door for a new “TikTok Sounds” library on the social media app.

More About Audius

The deal with TikTok is the first major consumer-facing partnership for Audius and could very well open the door for an influx of new music artists that flock to the platform given the streamlined ability to dish out content on TikTok.

Where does crypto really come into play? Unlike traditional streaming players like Spotify, creators aren’t paid on a per-stream basis. Audius instead provides the foundational infrastructure for artists to monetize their work, including through NFT sales.

Creators on the Audius platform can also be rewarded with the platform’s native token, $AUDIO.

Audius also offers Hedgehog, which is an “open-source, client-side Ethereum wallet” that allows users to streamline dApp interaction.

Can Audius’ model of decentralization and incentive-alignment impact TikTok’s perspective on creators? TikTok has generally been slated as a creator-friendly platform, by way of tools like the TikTok Creator Marketplace – which allows creators and influencers a streamlined process to connect with brands and other partners for paid content opportunities.

In last weekend’s ‘NFTs In A Nutshell,’ we suggested that Twitter and Reddit have been two of the most aggressive mainstream social media platforms to engage with crypto (both by way of NFTs primarily). Could TikTok emerge as a player in the space as well?

Audius' native platform token, $AUDIO, has found new life with a new partnership with TikTok. | Source: AUDIO-USD on TradingView.com