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A DAO investor group wants to buy Blockbuster and revive it as a decentralized movie-streaming service

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the last blockbuster
A Blockbuster store.

Popmotion Pictures

  • BlockbusterDAO is a group of investors who want to purchase and relaunch the movie-rental company. 
  • The group outlined its aim to raise at least $5 million through NFTs to buy the brand from Dish Network. 
  • The organization envisions Blockbuster running as a decentralized film-streaming service.
  • Sign up here for our daily newsletter, 10 Things Before the Opening Bell.

A group of investors wants to unleash Blockbuster's potential in the next iteration of the internet by purchasing and rebooting the movie-rental company as a decentralized streaming service.

The investors, via a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), are aiming to raise at least $5 million to purchase the "nostalgic" and "historic" company. Such a move would follow last month's high-profile attempt by another DAO to purchase an original copy of the US Constitution. 

"It's time to liberate the brand from purgatory and give it a new lease on life. A brand of the people should be owned by the people and governed by the people. Even the name, Blockbuster, lends itself to becoming a Web3 product," wrote BlockbusterDAO in a Christmas Day Twitter thread noted by The Block Crypto. 

Web3 is a reference to the next phase of the internet that envisions the web as largely run by users using blockchain technology, rather than it being run by corporations. Web3 would also feature the virtual immersive world known as the metaverse. 

DAOs are organized communities that have rules enforced through blockchain technology. They've been around for years, but 2021 saw a burst of fundraising through DAOs along with the surge of the overall cryptocurrency market's valuation. 

"It's time to build a massive DeFilm project that will revolutionize the creative decision-making and financing of the film and television industries forever. I believe that BlockbusterDAO will be like lighting in a bottle for the future of DAO governance," BlockbusterDAO wrote on the thread. Its Discord page indicates it has more than 2,100 members. 

The group is proposing to raise $5 million or more by selling BlockbusterDAO non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, for 0.13 ether, or about $530.54 as of Monday. The money would be used to purchase the Blockbuster brand from Dish Network. But the DAO foresees needing a portion of funds raised to run a PR campaign to put pressure on Dish Network to sell the brand. 

"Another interested party has low-balled an offer of $1.8 Million for the brand, but it seems that the price tag is going to be higher to beat out any counter-offers," said BlockbusterDAO. 

If a purchase is successful, the DAO's roadmap for Blockbuster includes developing an NFT presence for further fundraising that would support activities such as buying movies from the film circuit. It also envisions creating a "Movie Pass" subscription model for a decentralized streaming platform and investing in the development of original content. 

In November, a group of people calling themselves the ConstitutionDAO banded together to bid for one of 13 remaining copies of the US Constitution put up for auction by Sotheby's. The group raised $46 million but lost the bid. Ken Griffin, the founder of Citadel Securities, was revealed as the winner. 

The last standing Blockbuster store is in Bend, Oregon, with its website indicating it has more than 21,000 movies in stock as well as apparel with the company's "Be Kind, Rewind" tagline.

Read the original article on Business Insider


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