Real-Time Royalties – Justin Chong

Problem

Artists only saw earnings after monthly payout cycles. The gap between releasing music and seeing money was long and opaque.

Paid-tier artists needed a reason they could feel every day, not once a month.

Evidence

No dedicated user research. I designed from the system's real states: active, delayed, suspended, and opted out, so the interface never claims more than the payout pipeline can deliver.

Decisions

Explain before asking. A short education screen explains daily earnings before the opt-in, so artists know what they are turning on.

Design every money state. Active, delayed, suspended, and opted out each get their own card and message. Artists never have to guess why money isn't moving.

Earnings tied to streams. The wallet shows earnings arriving from each platform, connecting money to the music that made it.

What is Real-Time Royalties education modal explaining daily earnings visibility — Educational modal builds understanding before commitment

Solution

Real-Time Royalties Activated success screen with confirmation checkmark — Clear success state confirms activation with immediate next steps

Wallet with RTR ACTIVE tab showing real-time transaction history from Spotify and Apple Music — Live earnings from Spotify, Apple Music, and other DSPs flowing into the wallet

Outcome

Real-Time Royalties shipped on iOS and Android and anchored a launch campaign with EARTHGANG.

Activation is tracked, but there was no control group, so I don't claim a lift from the design.

EARTHGANG RTR campaign banner reading GET PAID DAILY with a royalty notification UI overlay — Launch campaign with EARTHGANG, built by marketing around the product UI

RTR campaign video shoot scene with visible royalty dollar amounts — Artist Forward campaign creative showing real-time royalty amounts in context

EARTHGANG RTR portrait campaign reading GET PAID DAILY with a streaming earnings overlay — Portrait format campaign asset for social and in-app placements

EARTHGANG RTR story format campaign with real-time earnings UI mockup — Story format for Instagram and in-app story placements

Role

Lead designer from wireframes to final designs: the activation flow, wallet cards and states, opt-out and suspended flows, animation prototypes, and design QA.

Worked with the PM, a copywriter, and iOS, Android, and web engineers. Launched in spring 2025.

Other Projects

UnitedMasters App 3.0

Product Design · App Redesign

Wallet views +21%, cash-outs +5.9% in an A/B test

Casefile: Fraud Investigation Tooling

Fraud Ops investigation view listing flagged tracks with an investigation status on each row

Internal Tools

Spreadsheets replaced by one investigation record per track

Designing for the Machine That Builds It

Design System Infrastructure

Tokens, verification, and AI-assisted handoff across three platforms

Distro 2.0: Web Platform

Distribution Systems

Flow completion up 2.1× after launch

Decisions

Explain before asking. A short education screen explains daily earnings before the opt-in, so artists know what they are turning on.

Design every money state. Active, delayed, suspended, and opted out each get their own card and message. Artists never have to guess why money isn't moving.

Earnings tied to streams. The wallet shows earnings arriving from each platform, connecting money to the music that made it.