Trustless Media wants to reinterpret the TV studio for Web3

The Future. A new startup called Trustless Media wants to build a decentralized TV studio where NFT holders will be able to decide on the direction of its various shows. While several projects are already experimenting with this crowdsourced-development idea, Trustless may be the first to do it across multiple productions, which may test if community engagement can be sustained across a diverse slate.

NFTV
Instead of a C-suite of TV gatekeepers, Trustless Media wants (almost) anyone to be a gatekeeper with the first “community-owned media company.”

• TechCrunch reports that the Web3 studio has raised $3.25 million in a seed financing round led by FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried to launch “NFTV shows.”
• The NFTV shows will be voted on and developed by a community of token holders, numbering the thousands.
• The first four of 1,000 “Network NFTs” have already been distributed to Trustless’ first financing partners, who can then subsequently invite others to mint (creating a curated community).
• After that, the company will release 9,000 “Caucus NFTs” and an unlimited “Subscriber NFT,” which will be key to scaling the community.

The first show on the slate is Coinage, which will “focus on exploring crypto’s biggest stories with a skeptical lens.”

Choose someone else’s adventure
Trustless Media comes across almost as a Buzzfeed for the decentralized diehards. Co-founder Zack Guzman said that “the whole concept is trying to figure out a way to break down a wall between content creators and the audience of the show they’re creating.”

Eventually, Trustless does want to expand past its crypto beginnings and move into other areas that work well for digital publishers (again, like Buzzfeed), such as travel and food. For example, Guzman points to how a show like Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives would work through Trustless: “It’s not just Guy Fieri choosing where he goes, but the community picks certain restaurants they enjoy for the show to visit.”