And... Jonathan Coulton Crowdsourcing A Piece Of His Next Tour As Well

from the a-growing-trend dept

Tue, Oct 23rd 2012 7:57pm — Mike Masnick

It would appear that crowdsourcing concerts is suddenly becoming quite popular. Just as we wrote about Andrew Bird crowdsourcing his new South American tour via Songkick, someone points out that Jonathan Coulton (who has experimented with crowdsourcing shows in the past using Eventful), just announced a similar effort via a new ticketing site called BringTheGig. BringTheGig has a slightly different feature set, which is also interesting. The first group of people to pledge to bring a concert to the area (providing enough support to make the show happen) can actually then get their money back if the show itself turns out to be really big. So, this gives incentives for fans to sign up early and to tell all their friends about it.

Here’s how it works. There are 40 funder slots available – basically 40 tickets that go on sale in advance of the rest of them. After two weeks (or sooner), these slots will theoretically be filled, and the rest of the tickets will go on sale. If you are one of these first 40 people, you get your money back if we get more than 160 people to come to the show.

It’s a pretty cool idea I think: get a core of fans to cover what you need to make the show happen, and then incentivize those to spread the word

There are other similar sites, like GigFunder, and Eventful's "Demand It!" feature is still around as well. Songkick's Detour platform also has similar incentives, but through a very different mechanism. Given all this activity, I'm hopeful that we'll start seeing more innovative ways to make live shows more efficient and effective, while also creating new ways for artists to connect with fans and to help fans spread the word about their favorite artists. It seems like a real opportunity that is only just now being explored more deeply.

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Filed Under: concerts, crowdsourcing, jonathan coulton, tours
Companies: bringthegig, eventful, gigfunders, songkick

10 Comments

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out_of_the_blue, 23 Oct 2012 @ 8:23pm

So those in early get to go for free...
Kind of a Ponzi scheme for concerts. I'm none too happy with the "something for nothing" aspect, especially as the system can be cheated, either overall or personally: artist informs his pals first, then they put the bite on others, perhaps not telling them it'll make their own attendance free...

Let's just have everyone PAY something: how about artist sets a figure wanted, then people make a contingent commitment, spreading word as needed. Of course, that removes the "incentive" for artist for the more people attending, but hey, it's all about the music, right?

And I fail to see how this is high-tech; though don't have any actual examples to mind, the ancient "lined up a gig" seems to indicate it's not new to call ahead and check interest. -- Well, except that kids nowadays have more income to toss away on music, and in general are more trusting of unknown but likely drug-addict musicians.

Still, it can be a "learning" experience for the unsuspecting. -- Exactly how would the 120 feel IF not told about the free deal the first 40 get after suckering them into paying? HMM? -- Better make sure this is all known! -- Because my notion of human nature is that most will say: "HEY! I'M not paying so YOU can go for free!" And the scheme falls to pieces.
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- Anonymous Coward, 23 Oct 2012 @ 9:02pm
  
  Re: So those in early get to go for free...
  I tend to agree here. Actually, it almost makes me think this is the first step towards taking the thing that everyone here claims makes money for the artist (concerts) and turning it into another FREE thing to give away, at least in part.
  
  For now, it's sell 200, then first 40 get a refund. The next could be 50-50, and then after that, it's "free concert if someone buys a $10,000 vip gold package box".
  
  It's one of the things that people don't realize here: The race to the bottom isn't won by the best, it's often won by the first. The prize? Everyone else ends up competing at your low level.
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- Anonymous Coward, 23 Oct 2012 @ 11:10pm
  
  Re: So those in early get to go for free...
  Missed the point much?
  
  The idea of the incentive is to encourage those first 40 to get more people to come to the gig. It wouldn't work if it was the artists friends as they probably, A get free tickets, and B will already be encouraging more people to come.
  
  Why not just let people try new ways of getting people to gigs instead of shouting down every attempt and then getting pissy when the new attempts actually work and arguing that 'it wont work for everyone', it doesn't have to.
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  - Anonymous Coward, 23 Oct 2012 @ 11:26pm
    
    Re: Re: So those in early get to go for free...
    Actually, I think both of us get the point - but you are missing the implications. The other 160 in theory pay more to coer the first 40 (who get a refund). That is almost a ponzi scheme.
    
    It's classic "CwF" stuff, because it depends on some people to pay more in order to support others getting something for free.
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    - PaulT (profile), 24 Oct 2012 @ 1:27am
      
      Re: Re: Re: So those in early get to go for free...
      "It's classic "CwF" stuff"
      
      So you still don't understand what that actually means?
      
      "because it depends on some people to pay more in order to support others getting something for free."
      
      Just like radio, promo CDs, free preview screenings of movies, competitions where purchases are required, and all sorts of other things that have been happening for decades if not centuries. You never criticise it when your corporate buddies do the same thing though, right?
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    - Anonymous Coward, 24 Oct 2012 @ 9:34am
      
      Re: Re: Re: So those in early get to go for free...
      You're just mad that Coulton pointed out that the Megaupload takedown has not resulted in more money for the RIAA.
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- Shon Gale (profile), 24 Oct 2012 @ 6:10am
  
  Re: So those in early get to go for free...
  You're SO positive! To you Elvis was just another Drug Addict!
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Adam Reynolds, 24 Oct 2012 @ 12:31am

This works if the first 40 'deserve' the slot
What stops somebody from filling one of the slots and doing nothing?

A better scheme is to have some sort of referral scheme and give a free slot for every 3 tickets sold or simply reduce the price of tickets by a 3rd and if you are going to give something away, a backstage pass or drink in a bar with the musician is probably a far better incentive for a real fan.
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- The eejit (profile), 24 Oct 2012 @ 2:55am
  
  Re: This works if the first 40 'deserve' the slot
  To be honest, I think this isn't the best way to connect with fans, but if it works, I'm not gonna argue with it.
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Atkray (profile), 24 Oct 2012 @ 7:20am

And now for something completely different...
I think the main point here is that he is trying something different. It might be a roaring success and it might be a bust. But instead of crying about piracy ruining his life he is trying different things to reach out to fans and to get others to become fans.
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