We all need to be considering the applications of blockchain on the creative industries.

This new digital economy, created by giving value to data, opens up the digital world to the scarcity mindset.

Think about how interesting this will be in terms of art, music, illustration, books.

You can create an original print or painting. A first edition book. A one-off. A batch of limited editions.

Everything else is a copy — the decentralised network will then confirm the owner and mark anything else as an imitation, a fake and not the original.

Artists can create an original digital “print”. Anything else is an imitation.

This may seem small, but it then opens up your work to the market. Is a first edition book published online worth more than the identical duplicate? Let’s find out. I would bet it is.

It puts the power back into the hands of the content creator, you can assign value and scarcity to digital assets. This is huge.

Expand this out further. We can rent out 3D assets for example, for a small fee. Exchange digital content. Own digital land. Host content and pay micro-transactions to the creator.

I myself have created digital assets whose value for the company is based on exposure — being seen, being part of the brand. They earn far more value over time than I get paid for my time to create them.

This puts the power back into the hands of content creators. When you publish your work to a platform, you add value. You can be repaid for that value.

Imagine a platform where these assets can be created, used, shared and sold. IP can be properly assigned and royalties paid. When your work is seen, you are rewarded.

It takes the emphasis off attention and advertising revenue, and back onto creating content with value and being rewarded by platforms for adding that value. When your exposure scales, the value of your work and returns scale. Without the need for ad revenue.

Facebook and the other big platforms will no longer get our data for free — we will get rewarded for posting. For submitting our data.

Smart contracts and the blockchain will completely transform the paradigm of abundant data. This is going to be super empowering for the creative industries and content creators and will turn the economy on its head.

I personally can’t wait to see how the blockchain community will tackle all these problems and create a new world economy.

It’s just a matter of time.