DSound - Decentralized Sound Platform | Media DApp Review
Despite the efforts and capital that are required in making quality sounds, making money from music is becoming harder every day. If you want your song to be excellent, you need to get your beat from a reputable producer, record in a well-equipped studio, give the sound file to an experienced sound engineer for mixing and mastering, and all these don’t come cheap. Any serious artist can endure undergoing the aforementioned but it causes heartache to wake up one beautiful morning and discover that the sound you spent your hard-earned money and effort to make has been taken down from where you uploaded it.
Some of us do music purely for passion. Yet, when you upload your sounds on streaming sites and music stores, you are surely expecting to make some money for your effort. However, before you can be rewarded on SoundCloud and many other musical platforms, you need to be a popular artist signed under a big record label or your content can just end up being taken down for copyright infringement claim even when everything about the sound is original or there has been a fair-use of copyrighted materials. You will earn some money from selling your songs on music stores but it extra effort is required through distribution if you really want to make decent money. Be that as it may, these centralized systems end up taking the higher percentage. DSound is here to put a stop to that.
Introducing DSound
DSound is a decentralized sound-streaming platform where music artists and sound lovers upload, discover and listen to songs and recordings. It is built on STEEM blockchain and the media files are stored on IPFS network, a protocol that allows decentralized file storage using Distributed Hash Tables. Songs and other sounds uploaded on DSound appear as a post on Steemit.com, a blogging platform also built on STEEM. DSound is much like SoundCloud. However, on DSound, artists are rewarded for creating contents immediately without the need for distribution. The rewards come in form of upvotes just like we have on many other DApps built on Steem.
When you upload a song or any other sound on DSound, it appears on Steemit.com as a post and your followers and anyone on Steemit can find the song, send feedbacks through comments and give their upvotes. These upvotes result in STEEM and SBD (STEEM native currencies) that can be exchanged for other cryptocurrencies or fiat.
Getting Started On DSound
DSound is built on STEEM blockchain and requires that you have a STEEM account before you can contribute on the platform. Click on this link or simply type dsound.auido on your web browser to get to their homepage
Hit on Login button on the top right corner and the login page should appear, asking you to provide your Steemit username and posting key. DSound is a reputable DApp on Steemit, so your private keys are safe. To get your posting key, go toWalleton your Steemit account, click onPermissionsand then clickthe Show Posting key button under the Posting Key and your posting key should show up. Now copy the password and go back to the DSound login page and paste it in the required field.
Uploading sound on DSound
After signing in, the Upload icon should be viewable at the top right corner beside your profile. Click on it and the upload dialog will appear.
Click on Select Sound File to browse your device for the sound file you wish to upload or simply drag and drop the file in the provided space. Add a high quality cover art to give your audience a good vibe of the sound (although this is optional).
Provide the content title. I will suggest that you use keywords relating to the title of the song and your stage name for a better search result.
Provide the song details in the require field. Have it in mind that your first 160 characters will represent your content description when searched on search engines. So be mindful of these first 160 characters and ensure a good SEO practice. In a nutshell, use relevant keywords but yet appropriately here.
When all is set, click on publish to post the content. It should take a few seconds (depending on your connection speed and the IPFS network status).
Discovering Sounds on DSound
DSound homepage is much like that of Steemit. Contents are sorted in three categories: New, Hot and Trending. While we have the newly uploaded sounds situated in the New page, the sounds that attract much interactions (feedbacks, upvotes and resteems) as soon as they are uploaded are found under the Hot page. The sounds with maximum upvotes and feedbacks are seen under Trending page.
Clicking on the tag under a song will take you to the tag page and all the songs uploaded under this tag are displayed. Clicking on a song title takes you to the song page while you are directed to the artist page (where you see all his contents) when you click on the creator username.
You can download the sound into your device if the creator enabled the Download option while uploading it. With the help of IPFS, people can download songs even when the creator disables the Download option. As well, the creator can easily sell the content by enabling the Buy button which links the sound to any music stores such Spotify, Boomplay, etc (you need to add the links to these stores).
Main Components Of DSound
Built on STEEM blockchain:
- DSound is built on STEEM blockchain. This makes its contents accessible to the users of Steemit. Contributors are rewarded with STEEM reward-earning mechanism (upvotes) and you get to mine the native currencies; STEEM and SBD.
- Uses IPFS as static file storage:
- InterPlanetary File System (IPFS) is an open source application protocol that allows decentralized file storage using Distributed Hash Tables. Many decentralized music platforms are using this protocol to host their contents.
- Simple, clean and fast-loading UX:
- DSound is pretty simple. Browsing, navigating through pages and discovering new sounds are very easy.
Why I like DSound DApp
- It helps music creators to monetize their content without the need of distribution.
- To upload your contents on DSound, you need to have a Steemit account. This aids the development of Steemit community.
- DSound uses a decentralized protocol to host files. This gives the content owner full control over their contents.
- Music artists are showcasing their talents on Steemit through the use of this platform. It therefore brings about more creativity in the community.
Where I think DSound Needs Improvements
- The lack of copyright infringement countermeasures tarnishes the integrity of the system. Some users will surely abuse this advantage and hence it will affect the prestige of DSound.
- Although creators are getting instant rewards from their contents, it is all about whatever the content is able to earn within 7 days (as it is on Steemit). Sometimes, good sounds take a couple of days or weeks to get appreciated by listeners. I think DSound team needs to create a protocol token that could be rewarded to sounds based on listeners’ reactions later in future. This is expected to be in addition to the rewards earned through Steemit upvotes. It will benefit both the content creators and DSound owners as these protocol tokens could be used by artists to promote their songs (probably to get them listed on the homepage for maximum exposure). Artists could choose to keep their tokens to exchange them for SMT later in the future.
Comparing DSound To Other DApps, and Departing Thoughts
DSound has added unique values to the STEEM blockchain as many users could have joined this great platform so as to get exposure for themselves and their musical career. However, there are still some things that the developers need to work on. One of these is the sign up requirement for contributors to join the platform. As much I like this since it aids the growth of Steemit.com, compared to another music DApp; Musicoin, I think it makes this platform isolated. This platform needs to have direct sign up (probably with email) aside the SteemConnect if it is to expand its boundary and grow to the point where it can contend with top music streaming sites like SoundCloud.
Star Rating
Simple, fast-loading UX that gives satisfying user experience. I would rate it 4/5.