Mediachain, a open source platform using blockchain technology to track media ownership, has received $1.5 million in seed funding from Union Square Ventures and Andreessen Horowitz – two of the biggest VC investors in the blockchain and digital currency space.

The funding round also saw participation from RRE Ventures, Alexis Ohanian, William Mougayar and Digital Currency Group, among others.

Established in 2016 by Jesse Walden and Denis Nazarov, Mediachain is the first decentralized repository of digital media that retains the link between the media file and its author, “We created Mediachain not as a rights registry, but it’s more of a knowledge base that preserves information about attribution and information about its creator,”

Mediachain is an open network, so there are no barriers to entry. The platform is made decentralized by registering details of media files on the metadata layer of the Bitcoin blockchain, “Our goal with Mediachain is to put the creator in control and give audiences a means to interact with them directly.”

According to today’s press release, Mediachain has received over 2 million digital images Getty Images, The Museum of Modern Art and Europeana, to get the library populated with content.  Getty Images CTO Steve Heck said the company is always on the lookout for new distribution channels, “We are excited to explore how Mediachain’s blockchain technology can automate image attribution to the benefit of our photographers and partners.” he added.

The new funding will allow the 7-person Mediachain Labs developer team to continue working the platform and to build numerous additional services that will hopefully attract a wider user base, “More importantly, we’re really interested in building the community around the project.” said Walden.

Blockchains are disrupting many industries these days and Andrew Weissman, Partner at Union Square Ventures, sees the same thing taking place in the online media space.

Weissman explained:

“As a platform for open, decentralized data, Mediachain enables the type of permissionless innovation that could disrupt existing power structures in media distribution.”

The developer team is now working on releasing an alpha version of the Mediachain platform.

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