As finance, security, and privacy dominate the web3 zeitgeist, we are seeing an emerging space coming to life: creator economies.
A New Reality
Creator economies have been emerging in the web3 space as we’ve seen with the rise of NFT collections on marketplaces like OpenSea, SuperRare, and Rarible. The advent of this NFT boom has enabled creators to take digital ownership of their work, allowing for online provenance to be established.
The most famous of these collections, BAYC and CryptoPunks, demonstrate the sheer impact community-led projects can have in the greater web3 space. These collections have brought big names into their networks, such as Stephen Curry, Serena Williams, and Post Malone, through community backing.
Web2 → Web3
Existing traditional tech and media companies are aware of this shift in creator content to web3 and have been accommodating such changes. Companies like Facebook, Twitter, Nike, and most recently YouTube, have all been transitioning into web3 spaces to leverage existing technology for web3 creators.
Nike’s purchasing of NFT collectibles marketplace RTFKT has propelled much of the growth in the nascent digital collectibles industry. Though the platform has yet to reach creators publicly, only listing Nike-partnered designers and artists, they have ambitions to break into digital fashion and expand the creator economy into a new medium.
Ironically enough, many of these platforms have been previously criticized for providing insufficient compensation for the creators that build up their platforms. YouTube, for example, often faces criticism from creators regarding the lack of video monetization, leading many creators to lose out on ad revenue while YouTube profits off of their content.
However, as goes with the ethos of web3, equitable distribution of revenue to creators is the ultimate vision.
Criticisms
Many have begun to criticize the benefits that web3 adds to creators, citing the semi-frequent hacks that major marketplaces experience and the lack of enforcement for copyrighted content.
Critics like Anthony Fantano have recently expressed opinions about the perceived detriments that NFTs bring to creators, especially considering the unregulated nature of the industry which could cause oblivious consumers to fall victim to rug pulls and prevalent scams.
These concerns are entirely valid, especially considering the nascent and rapidly growing state of the NFT space. Though, because of the nascent and volatile state of the space, there are active efforts to mitigate scams and increase consumer protection. Similarly in the web2 era, the internet was riddled with phishing scams and other forms of user manipulation that led many to lose trust in the growing industry. As a result, software was developed to mitigate these scams and as adoption increased, users became more accustomed with identifying potential scams.
Overall, as we continue to see adoption of these emerging technologies by creators, there will be a revolution in the way creators publish and own content.
