Crowdfunding Projects: It Helps To Let Your Personality Shine Through
from the my-fantasy-baseball-team-needs-help dept
You may recall a few weeks back, we had a guest post from musician Erin McKeown about her reaction to finding out that a Sony Music artist had copied one of her songs without credit, and the copied song was now becoming a hit. That story kicked off quite a discussion. A few days later, I actually got to meet Erin in person at the Innovate/Activate conference, and we had a really enjoyable chat about the whole thing. So I was interested to see that Erin recently launched a crowdfunding project for her new album on PledgeMusic. PledgeMusic is a platform that's similar to Kickstarter, but focused just on music (obviously). It has some nice features (music player plus the ability to share some of the proceeds with charities) and some oddities (total goal amount isn't clear, and no way to embed anything?!), but if you understand Kickstarter, you'll understand what's going on here.Of course, tons of musicians (and other creators) have jumped on the crowdfunding bandwagon over the past few years, so just seeing "yet another" project isn't newsworthy by itself. But what struck me about Erin's approach was that some of the tier offerings solidified an idea that had been bouncing around in my head lately about these kinds of projects: the ones that work are somehow uniquely personal to the artist in question. Figuring out what goes into the tiers is always something of a challenge, but I think going with purely generic tiers doesn't do much. I've said before that it's important for artists to understand the kind of relationship they have with their fans and build on that, and it appears that Erin does exactly that with her tier options. Some of them are just amusing, like offering her first Spotify check to a backer, or the anti-SOPA petition video she did during the SOPA fight.
But then there are some that seem like they're totally out of left field... and many of them really show off Erin's personality. Things like having her buy some books for you. Or spending an hour fixing your fantasy baseball game. Or actually going to a baseball game or a museum with her. Or, best of all, getting to play a game of wiffle ball with her and some friends (she seems to like baseball).
Now, again, quirky tier options aren't a new idea. We've been writing about them for years, and I know how some of our usual critics will react: with horror at the idea that Erin has to help people with their fantasy baseball teams to get them to support her music. Hell, we heard exactly that criticism three years ago when we highlighted Josh Freese's hilarious tiers, which included things like playing mini-golf with you, or getting lunch at PF Changs, having him wash your car, or giving you a tour of Disney land. To this day, one of our usual critics still brings up the mini-golf example derisively, arguing that if the new business model means musicians have to play mini-golf with their fans to get their support, the new model is a failure.
But that totally misses the point. No one is arguing that playing mini-golf or wiffle ball with your fans is the future of the music business. We're saying it's all about the kind of person you are and how you connect with your fans. That is, what works has to be something that is unique to the artist's personality, and which fits well with the kinds of things that make fans like that artist in the first place. One assumes that Josh chose minigolf and Erin chose baseball/wiffleball not because it was some horrific thing that they didn't like, but precisely the opposite: because those things are fun to them and they wanted to offer up something fun and unique that they could share with their fans as well. And, in both cases, it seems like they're succeeding.
These kinds of offerings help the artist not just make money, but to better connect with their fans by letting their own unique personality shine through. It's that kind of personality that makes people want to support the artists. It's not because they want to play mini-golf or wiffle ball, but that they like supporting the artist in a manner where the artist gets to have fun as well. And that's pretty cool.
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Filed Under: copying, crowdfunding, erin mckeown, innovate/activate, reason to buy
Companies: kickstarter, sony music
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+1. Just standard excuses from the regular critic who failed as a musician to connect with their fans and now spends their time on Techdirt bemoaning successful musicians. Probably shilling because they still owe the industry millions of dollars from an unconscionable contract.
Connecting with fans isn't a concept, it is reality, and has been reality for a lot longer than the Statue of Anne gave musicians limited (and ever expanding) monopoly powers over the common good. If you can't connect with your fans and give them a reason to buy, you have failed. Mike is just pointing to ways to do so.
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My sarcasm gets more use the longer I have a problem with the program I am debugging.
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Sorry, it just looked like the common TAM screed. I should have my sarcasm meter checked, because it has been failing quite a bit lately.
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I like taking pictures. Pictures count as art. I do not intend to sell the pictures I take. Therefore, I shouldn't be taking pictures, because not making money off of the photography overrides that I like photographing? I disagree.
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ftfy
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I make music
Some of the greatest music has been made by weird assholes, sometimes with crushing issues like drug dependency and alcoholism.
Why would you link great music to great socialising?
I may not be the nicest person to spend the day at the ballgame with, or to go out to dinner with.
This makes funding great music production more about 'the hang', than the actual music.
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Re: I make music
Who wants to connect with a total asshole with a major crack habit?
Does that mean the flawed personality has no value artistically?
Well, during their most productive periods, making genius music, both Miles Davis and Charlie Parker were crazy, difficult heroin addicts.
Rather you than me when it comes to spending the day at the crazy-golf.
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Re: I make music
Some of the greatest music has been made by weird assholes, sometimes with crushing issues like drug dependency and alcoholism.
Why would you link great music to great socialising?
I think Amanda Palmer said all that needs to be said about that:
We're entering the era of the social artist. It's getting increasingly harder to hide in a garret and lower your songs down in a bucket to the crowd waiting below, wrapped in a cloak of sexy mystery above. That was the 90s. Where an artist could be as anti-social as they wanted, and rack up cred left and right for shoe-gazing and detaching. It's over. The ivory tower of the mysterious artist has crumbled. If you're painfully shy and antisocial and hate tweeting and blogging and connecting and touring...and you really just want to write and sing music and be left alone, you can still succeed...if your music is BRILLIANT. But you better have a damn clever boyfriend, girlfriend or friend-manager to fight your battle for you and lift the megaphone in your name, because no longer will a huge, magical company scoop you up and do all the heavy lifting (or if they do, they'll charge you 100% of your income for the service).
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Re: Re: I make music
Thanks for the honest post Leigh.
It really reinforces my view.
Does the music fan want great music, or great people making that music?
Like many new music business concepts being currently touted, it's genesis is rooted in the consumer ideal, which is also somewhat naive as to the realities of music.
Truly great art that we've held dear for hundreds of years has almost gone hand in hand with difficult personalities. I mentioned Charlie Parker. What about Vincent Van Gogh? Phil Spector, Roman Polanski?
Would we have turned away Joy Division, unable to fund their recordings because no one wanted to spend a day at the ballpark with Ian Curtis having one of his many episodes of deep depression?
This isn't about 'the 90's', it's about the reality of the artistic mind. The artist is very often a difficult character to be with, and when you've worked with as many as I have, you want to spend as little time with them as possible.
I want my music to be funded based on it's greatness, not on the artist's great personality.
The title of this article says it all: "it helps to let your personality shine through". Unfortunately, personable people and great art do not always come together. We should still value a cracking song recorded by a crack addict, however dark that reality might be.
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If you're painfully shy and antisocial and hate tweeting and blogging and connecting and touring...and you really just want to write and sing music and be left alone, you can still succeed...if your music is BRILLIANT.
There will always be reclusive geniuses, and eccentric geniuses, and self-destructive geniuses. And if they truly are geniuses, their creations will find a way to reach the world, one way or another. I'm afraid I don't share your concern that this will ever stop - and i'm not sure the situation where media conglomerates swoop in and manipulate reclusive geniuses is any better than the situation in which they must find some help or struggle with stuff they hate to reach their fans.
But what there won't be is false reclusive/eccentric/self-destructive geniuses. It's a lot harder to manufacture a fringe personality, and nobody will care if you don't have the talent to back it up. There are too many genuine geniuses out there vying for attention.
Remember that under the old system, the labels didn't care if someone was a genuine genius. They only cared if people bought the records as though they were. So whenever faking a genius was easier than finding a real one, they'd just do that.
Besides, for every fucked up genius who drifts through the label life and shared their gift, there are a thousand other fucked up geniuses who wallow in their inability to breach the industry -- because of the exact same social failings, and the exact same lack of someone to go to bat for them that you are so worried about. For the vast majority of fucked up geniuses, the new system lowers the bar to entry. For the extremely fucked up geniuses, the new system makes it possible for them to find an appropriately sized audience who appreciates their genius even if the broader market never will (a condition that, before, would have forever locked them out of the big labels). The only people who, arguably, are less lucky now are those one-in-a-thousand fucked up geniuses who won the lottery and got propelled to stardom the old way.
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Look, I just don't want my music in a cuddly, non confrontational personality form. I just want good music.
Actually the music business has struggled to deal with difficult personalities, or artists mired in self destruction. So I can't see 'crowd funding' being any more able.
By all accounts John Lennon was a real d**k to be around much of the time. Many of his songs are written apologies for the crap behavior he owned up to.
Anyone with any first hand knowledge of music making (which not many here have) will understand that great music almost goes hand in hand with reclusive, destructive, difficult behavior.
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Actually not true to the extent you suggest. Often it is merely a publicity stunt. Insofar as it is true it is actually aided and abetted by the copyright based model.
However the real self destructive geniuses are unaffected by monetary considerations anyway.
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Wait, so if a music maker wants to be great, you HAVE to be reclusive, destructive and/or difficult?
Why do you hate artists?
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While many say "your best comes from when you are at your worst" that's not always true!
And I do have many musician friends who are very strange, some have self destructive behaviour, others do not. Reclusivity is not a requirement for the creation of great music.
And for the record, I too create music and no, I'm not the best baseball. In fact, I don't like baseball. Does that mean I will avoid contact with fans? Ugh, no. I'd do different things. I find touring hydro electric dams fun, who else does? Don't all raise your hands now. But I also find cycling fun. Who doesn't mind cycling? Sure, very few would want to do training rides, like I would, but you get the point.
You can give examples all you want of great musicians who were recluse or in patterns of self destructive behaviour. And if you think outside that "only greatness comes from suffering" mentality, you'll discover many a great musician who is not suffering.
Case and point: Matthew Good. When treated for mental illness he often worried, as do his musician contacts, that once "cured" or "managed" he'd somehow lose artistic abilities. He confirmed that's an unjustified fear. In fact, he's on record in interviews explaining that your creativity will flow even better without that BS messing up your head.
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Look, I just don't want my music in a cuddly, non confrontational personality form. I just want good music.
I don't understand. Why are making good music and being non-confrontational, non-destructive, or whatever positive traits mutually exclusive?
Actually the music business has struggled to deal with difficult personalities, or artists mired in self destruction. So I can't see 'crowd funding' being any more able.
So I don't see what the problem is. If you feel that neither solution is working then why is there an issue with crowdfunding as an alternative option?
By all accounts John Lennon was a real d**k to be around much of the time. Many of his songs are written apologies for the crap behavior he owned up to.
Anyone with any first hand knowledge of music making (which not many here have) will understand that great music almost goes hand in hand with reclusive, destructive, difficult behavior.
What are you trying to say? Are you saying that nice people can't be geniuses, or that normal people can't have inspirational epiphanies, or are you trying to justify artists being dicks so they can make music?
I'm starting to see why you and the rest of the shills advocate the "sue the fans" approach of dealing with IP. You have absolutely nothing to hope for humanity because you think humans can only accomplish something if they're complete dicks and anyone who disagrees is a naive idealist or a freetard.
And you wonder why people hate the RIAA?
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Could you imagine a modern-day Vincent van Gogh, never receiving any acclaim until well after his death because he didn't want to play mini-golf?
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In their nature these people are also completely untouched by money or business realities anyway.
The so called "incentives" of copyright and the traditional business model of the recording industry are irrelevant to them. They will live in the same self destructive poverty making their art under any system or none.
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Re: I make music
Which part of " No one is arguing that playing mini-golf or wiffle ball with your fans is the future of the music business. We're saying it's all about the kind of person you are and how you connect with your fans." did you not read?
No one is saying you should go to a ballgame or out to dinner. I said that you need to find what helps you connect with your fans.
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And in music, which is an auditory experience, it's MUSIC that people connect with. You just wont admit it because you think music should be free, so you're fumbling around for other non-musical ways musicians can fund their music making.
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So what are you complaining about? If you actually connect with fans with your music, they'll support you.
It's only if you can't actually connect with a fanbase that you have a problem.
You just wont admit it because you think music should be free, so you're fumbling around for other non-musical ways musicians can fund their music making.
No. I don't think music *should* be free at all. I'm dealing with a market reality -- which is that many people treat most music as free (though they're also willing to pay for plenty of it as well). Thing is, if you're a total dick, perhaps they don't pay for yours. You should maybe try being nicer.
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Oooh, can I report this as abusive?
You should be able to make your point without calling someone a 'dick' right?
Anyway, you claim to be dealing with a market reality. So am I. It's also a human reality. Why would you pay for something you already obtained free?
The claim that people will buy something if they like it is just a theory, and a pretty wild unsubstantiated theory at that.
Crowdfunding is such a middle class, western concept. It helps if you speak English and have a computer with a net connection.
How does a Romanian gypsy crowdfund, or a Malian Kora musician?
And yet labels like ECM and World Circuit brought these type of artists to western audiences.
http://www.enotes.com/topic/World_Circuit_(record_label)
http://www.allaboutjazz.com/ph p/entity.php?id=1494
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A: Because I want more!?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: I make music
You should be able to make your point without calling someone a 'dick' right?
I didn't call you a dick. Please learn to read.
Anyway, you claim to be dealing with a market reality. So am I. It's also a human reality. Why would you pay for something you already obtained free?
Because the fans want to support the artist. It happens all the time.
The claim that people will buy something if they like it is just a theory, and a pretty wild unsubstantiated theory at that.
That's not what we said. We said people will support the artist if they like the artist. Those are slightly different, but the difference is what matters.
Crowdfunding is such a middle class, western concept. It helps if you speak English and have a computer with a net connection.
Indeed. Who said crowdfunding was the solution for everyone? Not us. So why pretend we did? As we've been saying for years, THERE IS NO SINGLE business model that works for everyone.
So what's your point?
How does a Romanian gypsy crowdfund, or a Malian Kora musician?
Again, who said it has to work for everyone for the fact that it works for many to matter?
Because if that's your standard, then selling music is a pretty crappy business model, because it doesn't work for lots and lots of people who can't sell their music.
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I do this a lot. If an album I want leaks, I'll download it and buy it when it's released. I've even downloaded leaks of albums I already have preorders for.
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No we think that copies of recordings should be free - copies are not music.
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That's just the reality - hate to break it to you, the fans.
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I am sure it is relatively easy to win fans in the music licensing scene as they are looking for good music that fits the theme of the film/tv show/ commercial. However, it is far more difficult for someone to win fans in the general public without putting themselves out there and connecting with those fans.
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The reality is, it is as much your music as it is the person/people in the band. Hate to break it to you, the AC.
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Well you could be right, but many 'difficult' artists I know also don't like being taken advantage of. So they likely wouldn't agree with you.
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Put some names up, or we'll be left to speculate.
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I hate to break it to you but if you have issues with letting things get out of control you shouldn't be recording songs at all.
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To AC: "I make music"
You're absolutely correct that the music should be front and center when it comes to musicians. As lame as I feel some of the crowdfunding perks are, it's still a better alternative to the traditional label-dictated model wherein the artist becomes an indentured servant. Via crowdsourcing, the consumer is allowed to make the decision whether or not to financially support the artists in question, artists who otherwise might never have been given a chance. What this means is that instead of some corporate suit deciding who gets promoted and who doesn't, the consumers effectively take up that role themselves.
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Re: To AC: "I make music"
This conversation (before it devolved into an ad hominem exchange) does illustrate a valuable point - that there is a place in the market for someone to find the people who make great music and take care of the marketing and promotion side of things while the musician focuses on what they do best. This is what the record labels should be doing - if they stuck to this then they'd make plenty of money and everyone would be better off.
The problem isn't that record labels exist, the problem is that record labels have forsaken their productive purpose in favor of buying bad laws from a corrupt political system, suing fans for amounts exceeding the GDP of many countries, robbing artists blind (while claiming said artists are still eyebrow-deep in debt), and attempting to hamstring the advancement of technology.
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A day job by any other name...
Spending time connecting with fans is nice, but isn't all this fundraising just another form of a day job? So is merchandising. All these things take time away from making music.
This may be the new reality, but I don't think it's an equal substitute for getting paid for each copy of your music.
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Re: A day job by any other name...
So does dealing with middlemen who want to rip you off!
As an academic I also find bidding from money a pain when I would rather just get on with the research - but that is just modern life - unfortunately most of us who are above the bottom rung of any profession have to deal with that.
This may be the new reality, but I don't think it's an equal substitute for getting paid for each copy of your music.
Getting paid for every copy of music was never really a fair deal. People put up with it when the royalty was 2% of the cost of the copy. Now it is 2 Billion percent it is indefensible.
Also it was never the intention of the architects of copyright law (the publishers) that the author/artist should get royalties. Their plan was always to buy the rights outright from the start. However it has proved convenient to them, in their attempts to rip the artists off, to allow a few artists to become rich as a loss leader.
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Re: Re: A day job by any other name...
TechDirt likes to tell the story of Dickens getting copied mercilessly here in America, so he toured America and made a lot of money that way instead. Fine, but what Dickens novel is the world missing because he was out glad-handing for a year? If we believe that the purpose of copyright is to promote the arts and sciences, then we have to account for the missing Dickens novel on the debit side.
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