Contxto – Nowadays, blockchain technology can apply to practically any professional field, even journalism and content creation. Proving this is the Sharp Shark project from Argentina that recently won the Conexión Conference startup competition.
Moving forward, the startup will travel to China in search of funds and further collaborations, according to CMO Germán Guismondi to Cointelegraph. Part of the group’s solution involves the mitigation of copyright and intellectual property appropriation.
“Sharp Shark began from a need for press workers regarding the expropriation of digital content, especially photographers when publishing an image and third parties borrow a photograph without citing the author,” said Guismondi. “In other cases, something similar happens with the theft of content from written articles.”
Sharp Shark at La Conexión Conference
While Sharp Shark may sound like a VC investment tool, it’s actually a platform leveraging blockchain technology to protect original content from theft. On September 26, it came out victorious at La Conexión Conference in Buenos Aires.
From September 25 to 26, the event was an opportunity for Latin American and Asian startups to identify mutual opportunities. Innovative and disruptive technologies took center stage, including blockchain as well as cryptocurrencies.
Ultimately, Sharp Shark allows any type of digital creator to prove that content is authentically theirs. For example, writers and journalists use the solution to detect plagiarism, in addition to preventing potential copyright violations.
Similarly, academics also use Sharp Shark to protect their work, not to mention photographers, artists, and even designers.
To accomplish this, the decentralized protection platform for texts and images uses timestamps to prove authenticity. In other words, Sharp Shark generates digital certificates for intellectual properties to utilize.
The young company founded by CEOs Sasha Ivanova and Valeriia Panina also recently became part of Start-Up Chile. Moreover, it’s currently working with Argentine legislators to amend the intellectual property law. Specifically, the goal is for blockchain technology to become an official registration tool.
“This would allow more agility in the registration of copyright,” said Guismondi. “Not only for journalists but for anyone who needs to validate their authorship.”
Memorandum of Understanding
To develop its concept, Shark Shark signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Javier De Pascuale from CISPREN. By joining forces with a trade union for press officials in Cordoba, the startups devised a solid proof of concept for prospective investors.
“The signing of the intention of the proof of concept had great repercussions among the press media since it is a theme that directly affected them, “said Guismondi.
“Many journalists who did not know the benefits of Blockchain and IPFS (Interplanetary File System) now understood them and were able to convey to their readers what this means for the industry.”
-JA
