Kodak Says 'Hold My Beer' With Odd Cryptocurrency Bid

LAS VEGAS—The strangest photograph-related news to come out of the beginning day of CES is an easy option this yr. Kodak is getting into cryptocurrency, but with a photographic twist—its offering, KODAKCoin, will be used to manage digital prototype rights and to pay photographers for use of images.

Well, that's what it's saying at least. Information technology's a weird movement, even for Kodak, which has a track tape of doing weird things to catch attending at CES. Two years ago, I rushed to the Kodak booth in South Hall to get hands on with the Super viii, a retro analog movie camera.

There was a big spiel most selling picture show processing as a service, and how it would take interchangeable lenses and an electronic viewfinder. Information technology never turned into an bodily product, but it did win a couple of awards (including one from PCMag's sister site, Mashable). The Super viii was on display once again final yr, along with news that Ektachrome slide moving picture was coming dorsum into production. (Ron Howard voiceover: It didn't.)

It's not all vaporware. Kodak announced a foray into smartphones at the 2022 show and has followed through with a couple of handsets. And the twelvemonth prior it showed off its Due south-one Micro 4 Thirds camera, a product that appealed to the company's traditional market, only was an ambitious undertaking.

This twelvemonth's spate of offerings includes cameras, as y'all'd wait. But there's also a total-torso 3D scanner—yous know, then you can clone yourself in plastic, a racing drone, and jigsaw puzzles. On its own, Kodak's entry into the cryptocurrency space seems random, even borderline schizophrenic, only in the one thousand scheme of Kodak's weirdness, it'southward not basics. We're used to seeing weird stuff from Kodak, especially at CES, and its post-bankruptcy existence has a lot to practice with this. Since its emerged from Chapter eleven, the company has licensed its brand and logo to a bunch of non-photo products, ranging from what we're seeing this year to more generic fare like HDTVs.

Pretty much everything y'all see with the Kodak brand on it is at present fabricated by a third-party licensee, a company that partners with Kodak proper and pays money to use its logo and brand name. Kodak digital cameras? Those are really made and marketed by JK Imaging. The Ektra smartphone? It's from the Bullitt Grouping, which is presumably full of Steve McQueen fans. Even the company'due south consumer picture business—yes, yous can still purchase Portra and Tri-10—is managed by a spin-off, United kingdom of great britain and northern ireland-based Kodak Alaris.

KODAKCoin is another instance of the results of Kodak's licensing model. Another company, WENN Digital, is developing the platform and handling the initial money offer (ICO). The currency will drive the KODAKOne organization. Photographers who register their piece of work with KODAKOne will enjoy automatic copyright protection.

Information technology will clamber the web, searching for employ of a copyrighted image. If information technology discovers a copyright violation it will alert the photographer and initiate what Kodak is calling the mail service-licensing process. It'southward not clear what that entails, merely I'd imagine at the very least information technology would initiate a DMCA takedown asking and perchance depict up some legal average to request financial compensation for the copyright violation.

Is this going to piece of work? Are photographers going to sign up for this? Time will tell. Wall Street is bullish over any anything blockchain. Before the proclamation, shares of Eastman Kodak were trading for virtually $three. They shot to $12 yesterday, and have leveled off around $10 as I'k writing this.

So Kodak doing something like this? It's buzzworthy, merely information technology's not crazy.

Crazy was later in the day, when news of the company's other cryptocurrency bid bankrupt. In a total "concur my beer" moment, Kodak announced a hardware partnership with Spotlite Energy Systems of California to sell time on a bitcoin mining figurer.

Here'due south a photo of Kodak'due south magic money making car. moving picture.twitter.com/wjWeJqMUBF

— Chris Hoffman (@chrisbhoffman) Jan 9, 2022

They're branding it as the Kodak KashMiner—that's right kash with a "k"—which is not but a terrible name, but one that seems weird when it could easily exist chosen the Kashmatic, Coinmatic, InstaKashmatic, or whatever other play on the legendary Kodak Instamatic camera.

I'm non a bitcoin skillful, only the financials seem a flake sketchy to me. There'south a $3,400 fee to apply it for two years, and you have to share your profits with Kodak/Spotlite on a 50/50 ground. The pamphlet touting the contract promises a $nine,000 return past the cease of two years, $5,600 profit, not bookkeeping for income taxes. Merely those figures assume that Bitcoin prices stay where they are now. If information technology increases dramatically, you accept the potential to make a lot more. If Bitcoin tanks, you could end upwardly losing money.

You lot'll never see your KashMiner, it volition live in a server farm somewhere. It was actually on the CES bear witness floor yesterday, but has since been removed; Kodak reps declined to email a photo or allow PCMag snap a pic. But you can come across it in the tweet above, and if you think it looks like one of the ghost traps employed by Bill Murray and his ghostbusting friends, you're non wrong.

The KashMiner is the weirdest Kodak production I've seen, and that'south saying something.

Source: https://sea.pcmag.com/cryptocurrency/19059/kodak-says-hold-my-beer-with-odd-cryptocurrency-bid

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