Tuned Global, the leader in B2B streaming media services, has partnered with Sona, a new artist-centric streaming platform, to help launch the company’s innovative streaming music service and marketplace, sona.stream. Tuned Global will provide content delivery, tools, and reporting services for Sona, as it rethinks the streaming music model to benefit artists and fans worldwide.
“We are always working to find and support innovative models that accomplish our customers’ goals, which in this case are to offer more ways to support artists directly, not just through the usual streaming royalty payouts,” explains Con Raso, Managing Director of Tuned Global. ”Sona offers a particularly exciting opportunity, combining blockchain and traditional music streaming on a single platform. It’s a first, and it’s brought together some of Tuned Global’s most exciting technical capabilities.”
Co-founded by GRAMMY-nominated artist and producer TOKIMONSTA (Jennifer Lee), Sona allows fans to stream music for free without subscriptions or ads, but also to buy SONAs, digital twins of specific songs that share future streaming rewards with their owners. Artists can choose which songs to auction as SONAs, giving them a new way to capitalize on their creativity, while superfans can purchase their favorite songs as SONAs to earn 70% of that song’s future streaming rewards on Sona.. Designed to maximize social discovery of new, thrilling music by encouraging emerging artists and curators, SONA’s intriguing hybrid approach puts artists at the center, culturally and economically.
“We’re tilting broken streaming economics in favor of artists and making the industry more fair, equitable and rewarding for both artists and fans,” says Sona co-founder and CEO, technologist and decentralized community expert Laura Jaramillo. “We’re redesigning the system by which music is created, collected and consumed so that artists can own what they do and create without compromise.”
While forging a new path, Sona operates alongside the existing models, allowing both labels and independent artists to opt in. Thanks to help from Tuned Global’s content delivery and APIs, music lovers can create playlists and launch radio stations based on their favorite artists (planned for 2024). Tuned Global will also ensure Sona can report its usage to rights holders while creating a new market that promises to change the game for signed and independent artists.
“Though they are pioneering a new model, Sona knew they needed to harmonize with the existing music industry and its needs,” Raso notes. “We were here to make sure they could accomplish this efficiently and cost-effectively, so that they could bring Sona to market faster.”
© 2023, Seth "Digital Crates" Barmash. All rights reserved.
