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EnaCoins:​

Project Origin and Concept (2017–2018)

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I created EnaCoins in 2017–2018 as an experimental crypto-art project that merged blockchain technology with music composition. My vision was to explore new ways of connecting with my audience: I invited followers to share their personal stories with short phrases or small anonymous journals—real-life experiences that I would then transform into original songs. Through this process, my fans became symbolic co-creators of the music, as each song was born from their narratives.

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To facilitate this active participation, my collegue Steve Enamakel designed a custom cryptocurrency called ENA coin, an ERC-20 token on the Ethereum blockchain. ENA coin allowed my audience to influence my creative process in a symbolic way. By holding ENA coins, fans were not just supporting me as an artist—they could also “vote” or influence certain artistic decisions . It was my way of giving the audience a seat inside the studio, breaking the traditional wall between musician and listener.

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Technological Innovation: Blockchain in Service of Music

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To bring EnaCoins to life, I partnered with developer Steve (aka Enamakel), who led the technical implementation. Together, we introduced several key innovations to make the project viable:

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• ENA Token on Ethereum: We deployed a custom ERC-20 smart contract to create the ENA token on the Ethereum blockchain . We defined a symbolic token supply that fans could store in digital wallets and use within the project ecosystem.

• Commitment Hashes (Crypto IOUs): We implemented an architecture based on commitment hashes—essentially cryptographic IOUs recorded on-chain . This system allowed us to scale participation without paying gas fees for every microtransaction. In practice, our website could generate thousands of ENA token “subaccounts” for users and assign them token rewards off-chain. Only when the user claimed them were on-chain Ethereum transactions executed , optimizing cost and performance.

• Fan-Friendly Access: We designed the user experience so that anyone, even those with zero crypto knowledge, could participate. The website automatically generated an Ethereum wallet in the user’s browser . This way, each fan received a simple digital wallet ready to store ENA coins, without any technical barriers. This user-centered approach was essential to keep the artistic dimension at the forefront.

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With these technical tools, we built an art-tech ecosystem where blockchain was the invisible infrastructure enabling interaction, while music and storytelling remained the visible core.

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Community and Co-Creation: Turning Listeners into Collaborators

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The heart of EnaCoins was its community-driven spirit. Far from being passive listeners, my fans became active contributors to the creative process. Through our website (the now-defunct enamarley.com), fans could submit personal stories—anecdotes, emotions, life moments—knowing that they might inspire a song. When a story was selected, I would craft a song based on it, making that fan a symbolic co-author of the finished piece.

The ENA token served as a symbolic acknowledgment of this collaboration. It wasn’t about buying songs or making money—it was about participatory value. We rewarded fans with ENA coins when they submitted meaningful stories or actively engaged with the project. In return, those who held ENA tokens could “vote” or contribute to artistic decisions (e.g., choosing between two demos, suggesting themes, or influencing priorities for new songs).

This token-based model helped fans feel like they were part of something bigger. They weren’t just supporting my career—they were shaping it alongside me. In live shows and project updates, I often highlighted the community as the creative engine behind the work, showing that music can be a shared process between artist and audience.

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Creative Exploration and Legacy

As an artist, EnaCoins was a personal journey of creative exploration through new formats and audience relationships. My main motivation was to push boundaries—experimenting with early-stage blockchain technology as a way to introduce interactivity and participation into music. In 2017–2018, very few musicians were thinking about cryptocurrency, so we stepped into uncharted territory. I knew it might not reach a large audience, and that was okay; the real goal was to test new ideas and learn from them.

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Ultimately, EnaCoins was an artistic experiment, not a commercial product. We didn’t seek profit or launch a big marketing campaign—the token was distributed freely and experimentally within our small community. This gave us the freedom to innovate without pressure, almost like a conceptual art piece in digital form.

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The legacy of EnaCoins lies in its role as an early attempt at participatory art powered by blockchain. It showed us that blockchain technology could serve purposes beyond finance—it could be a tool to connect human stories with artistic creation, transparently and meaningfully. Each song that emerged from this project carries with it the voices of those who shared their lives with me, and that’s something I remain deeply proud of.

 

Though small in scale and lifespan, EnaCoins proved that independent artists can meaningfully engage with blockchain to involve their communities. It was a living lab for reimagining how technology, creativity, and audience can blend.

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