Photochain

Motivation

Photochain has clear advantages for contributors and customers. Contributors at Photochain benefit from an extremely low fee - only 5% of the selling price. Keeping 95% of the final sale price allows contributors to offer their work cheaper. Consequently the market becomes more affordable for customers. This type of fair market not only benefits the users, but should benefit the photography industry as a whole, as the possibility of increased income incentivizes contributors to perform better.

These profound market changes are only made possible by using blockchain technology, Smart Contracts, machine learning and Photochain’s own user community. Most of the processes become automated and decentralized, significantly reducing costs of platform governance. It’s unavoidable that more and more stock photography contributors and customers will prefer to use Photochain.

The development of the Photochain platform is an ambitious and organically growing process. Our main aims for the project come under three significant prongs:

• P2P Marketplace

It’s very important to us that only the artists themselves can determine the value of their work and they’re given the opportunity to offer their work to many potential buyers.

• Crypto Economy

Photochain appeals to a broad audience of people that aren’t yet adopters of blockchain and cryptocurrency technologies. The relatable use case of "Photochain" will appeal to this audience. The easy-to-use GUI and the trading process facilitates the onboarding process and supports the Crypto Economy in becoming mainstream.

• Photochain Digital Copyright Chain: DCC

Over the course of the project, more and more artists will be able to strengthen their copyright using the Photochain platform, since their works will be linked to their name. This link is manifested as a transaction in the Ethereum blockchain and is therefore visible to all users at all times. This means that the artist’s ownership of the image can be accounted for. The database with all manifested links has been constructed in a decentralised way, (for further details, see chapter 2 ). We call this database a DCC.

Photochain Platform

With all currently existing stock photography platforms, the only way security of transactions can be ensured is via central control. Our platform works autonomously, securely and efficiently based on predefined rules.

We are developing the Photochain DApp on the Ethereum blockchain. Additionally, Photochain also uses computer vision (machine learning) to fulfill the specific technological requirements of stock photography.

The Photochain DApp is a platform on which artists have the opportunity to sell their work to a broad audience at a price they themselves set, and where sellers are also fully and solely liable for the works they sell themselves.

The Photochain Team does not have any liability or responsibility for illegal behaviours of the sellers. The artist is responsible for the legality of the works they are selling, and is held fully accountable for any illegal activity. However, Photochain will uphold users copyright protection, by preventing any unauthorised sale of photography.

Photochain DApp

These are the design requirements for the Photochain DApp. The requirements result from current issues with microstock photography, which we have already presented in the previous sections, as in 2.3.1

1. Decentralized governing bodies: The Photochain DApp network must be decentralized.

2. Security: Transactions are intended to be safe and verifiable at all times for both artists and buyers.

3. Decentralized Storage: Transaction data, as well as all digital works traded on the Photochain DApp, should be stored decentrally and encrypted. Photochain will use the IPFS protocol and the Photochain DB .

4. Content: The network is intended exclusively for the trade of stock photography. In particular, offensive content such as pornography will not be allowed.

5. License Terms: Observance of copyrights must be ensured.

Photochain DAO

A "decentralized autonomous organization" (DAO) is an organization governed by an initial set of rules and codified into Smart Contracts. This organization’s biggest strength is rooted in the decision-making capacity of its community as future developments and changes undergo a democratic voting process.

Some of the Photochain DAO’s most interesting qualities are the possibility of scaling, lack of a single unit or person for criticism and the instinctive commitment to the rules of the game, thanks to the Smart Contracts. Photochain Governance and the moderators are responsible for the stability of the platform. Moderators differ slightly in that they are rewarded for their contribution. Studies suggest that creating personal agency amongst users of such platforms, or networks, enhances the long-term development of the platform .

Photochain Token – PHOTON

PHOTON tokens are the means of rewarding users across the Photochain Ecosystem. Any type of transaction on the platform will require the use of PHOTON Tokens.

Use cases for the Photon Token are:

Access to the services of the Photochain platform

Rewarding the resolving of claims
Listing on a “featured photographer“ section
Service delivery from Photochain's partners (like our cooperation partner 1World)
Featured in search results
Other microservices, which will facilitate the Photochain Ecosystem in the future

Reward system

For the photographers and their services

The number of PHOTON tokens will be strictly limited by the declared Hard Cap. After the Crowdsale 21% of the PHOTON Tokens will be reserved for the Team, Advisory board, Photochain partners and legals. After this event, no other PHOTON Tokens will be issued.

Due to the common regulatory situation, it is important to note that PHT is purely a utility token, which does not replace fiat currency and cannot be treated as a currency or an investment asset. In no case can PHOTON Token be regarded as a security token or similar. Rather, they’re to be regarded as a means of exchanging services in the Photochain Ecosystem.

Photochain Roadmap

Photochain DApp development is a technologically and organizationally ambitious project and needs careful planning. We run the project with a mixture of agile methods like Scrum and classic IT project management ITIL. Important milestones of the Photochain roadmap are listed below.