22HERTZ is the First Band to Store Music Copyrights on the Blockchain

| Updated
by Eugenia Romanenko · 4 min read
22HERTZ is the First Band to Store Music Copyrights on the Blockchain
Photo: 22HERTZ/YouTube

Toronto’s Industrial Rock band 22HERTZ is going to keep music copyrights on the bitcoin blockchain.

Updated: The below mentioned song Get The Hell Out produced by Ralf Muller, mixed and mastered by Yoad Nevo at Nevo Sound Studios, London, has been released and is now available to stream.  Get The Hell Out is the first song ever copyrighted into the bitcoin blockchain.

The technology behind Bitcoin, blockchain, broadens its capabilities becoming incredibly popular and attracting lots of Bitcoin enthusiasts, developers and startups. Actually, the blockchain stores lots of surprises and keeps drawing attention of different users from all over the world.

Ralf Muller and his industrial rock band 22HERTZ are those who are going to copyright a song into the bitcoin blockchain. The song is currently being mixed by Yoad Nevo and will be released as a single in the very near future, says Mr. Muller. He adds that when the final version is ready, the file will be hashed and attached into an OP_RETURN function i.e. will be sent to the Bitcoin blockchain through a standardized feature.

“Other databases might be more efficient to store non-currency data but are not as secure as the Bitcoin blockchain with all the petahash of power the network has.  Once you encode a hash in the OP_RETURN and block upon blocks get written on top, it is impossible to go back and change anything.  This, to me, is incredible.”

The band creator also says that at this point they will never use the Canadian/US copyright service ever again. CoinSpeaker asked him some questions regarding the blockchain and the copyright.

CoinSpeaker: When did you first hear about Bitcoin and Blockchain?

22HERTZ: I heard about bitcoin in 2011 while writing the first album. I didn’t understand it so I said to myself, if this is something special I’ll hear about it again. In early 2013 I saw it on TV, decided to put more time into learning and when I fully understood it I couldn’t sleep for a week…

CoinSpeaker:  How did you find out that the blockchain can be used to store data?

22HERTZ: I knew vaguely about something like that but then there was a story a few months back about the first person to copyright a book into the blockchain. I thought that was cool.

CoinSpeaker: 50 Cent was one of the first singers who started selling his albums for bitcoins. You’ll be the first to register the copyright of the song through the blockchain. Do you think it is a trend? Will it be used in the future or is it just a fad? 

22HERTZ: I’m sorry but 22HERTZ was the first band that accepted bitcoin for album sales. Detonate was released in summer of 2013 and the bitcoin was available, all of my claims can be verified of course. I think 50 Cent started in 2014 to accept bitcoin. Once there are more and better infrastructure in place, I can’t see how other bands won’t at least add a bitcoin option for sales or use it in other ways.  It’s just a matter of time for people to learn about all the potential bitcoin has. Blockchain technology is definitely not a fad however, it will evolve and change.

Coinspeaker: Have you informed Copyright Registration Service that you won’t need their registration? How did they take it?

22HERTZ: In Canada it costs $50 a pop for one song and all you get is a certificate mailed to you with the title of your work on it. How this would ever help you in court regarding lyrics or a melody is disheartening. I contacted their support to ask this question and they replied “I can’t answer that because I am not a lawyer”.

Still, we cannot say whether other content creators are going to take 22HERTZ’s experience as an example, but their initiative appears to be really important.

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