Indie musician sells original song as NFT for Rs 1.5 crore
When Tamil artist Kaber Vasuki came to know about blockchain, he decided to learn more about it. The singer understood that the underlying technology implies a lot more than digital currency.
Recently, the young singer sold one of his original song demos Vasanam as an NFT (non-fungible token in cryptocurrency) for 50 ETH, valued at approximately Rs 1.5 crore at the time of sale. This is the world’s first reported sale of an NFT by a Tamil artist. “Being an independent musician, I need money to make music. If you are a Tamil songwriter, you have to work in the film industry to make a good amount of money. Though I have worked in a couple of Tamil films, with the kind of songs I write, I don’t have much space in the film industry. My music is not commercial enough to appeal to a large audience, but it is good for a niche audience. So, how do I raise money to make music? This thought led me to blockchain technology and it fascinated me. When I realised its value, I was able to auction an NFT of one of my songs, which was eventually bought by Metakovan, a Singapore-based founder of Metapurse Fund, who bought the famous $69 million Beeple NFT,” Kaber says.
According to the singer’s opinion, all the financial institutions across the world have proved that they are not infallible. That is one of the main reasons why the singer invested in cryptocurrency. “Instead of one government body controlling the ledger, in blockchain, the ledger is distributed among thousands of computers in the world and it will be encrypted so that nobody can edit it. But at the same time, all transactions are transparent and the entire process is automated. In places where fiat money is not dependable, people have started using cryptocurrency. For the first time in history, we have a technology that is capable of allowing us to run an international financial system that has the frictionless transfer of value across borders and is not controlled by any government or corporate entity. This makes blockchain very powerful,” he explains.
A non-fungible token (NFT) in cryptocurrency is a digital certificate of ownership that is stored on a distributed ledger. “It is a unique digital certificate. What I sold is the phone recording of the song Vasanam. I have created an NFT — it is a digital record stating that the music file was created by me. The buyer has bought the music file and the record stating that the file has been transferred to them,” the composer adds.
