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In this Discussion
- 1234 July 2012
- curt July 2012
- distant_shoe July 2012
- ed_chigliak July 2012
- flossy_log_lady July 2012
- joey July 2012
- kdawg July 2012
- Leland July 2012
- Loose_Thread July 2012
- Marcus July 2012
- MirandaJuly July 2012
- Nick July 2012
- swamp_knobbler_mahan July 2012
- the_owls July 2012
- ThickeningAgent July 2012
- YoursTruly July 2012
you pay my rent, utilities & food for a year, i send you files: a kickstarter project
i have been toying with this idea for a while
sort of a joke about kickstarter as a sustainable method for making a living
sort of stemming from my real life need to figure out how to afford life while not working a 9 to 5 job
but i really like this concept and want to kick it around with you guys
so, if i can live on $12,000 a year
or $1000 a month
rent $450, bills $250, food $300
and given that in kickstarter world there is no need to show receipts, to give back to your supporters the same in goods what is given by them in moneys
i want a start a kickstarter called something like:
PAY FOR MY LIFE FOR A YEAR AND I WILL GIVE YOU FILES, T-SHIRTS AND PRINTED MATERIAL TO ENJOY
maybe it has a $15,000 goal?
$12,000 for me to live on for a year
$3000 to host the files, make and send the t-shirts and printed materials
thing is, the files have to be REALLY COOL
the t-shirts have to be REALLY SWAG
and the printed material have to be HAND MADE
or is it the satisfaction of supporting someone else's life that is the main pull of the new online crowd-funding craze
so the things you get in trade dont have to be that swag
what would be good files, good t-shirts, good printed materials?
what sort of files/t-shirts would you buy for $20, for $50, for $100??
"i will play a show via skype just to you" is that worth $500 or $0
what is life worth?
what is streaming life worth?
what are t-shirts worth?
mp3 vs analog?!?!?!
big questions
open idea
social experiments on the internet involving life, community, money, files and t-shirts, this is the sort of stuff urho was made for
thoughts?
sort of a joke about kickstarter as a sustainable method for making a living
sort of stemming from my real life need to figure out how to afford life while not working a 9 to 5 job
but i really like this concept and want to kick it around with you guys
so, if i can live on $12,000 a year
or $1000 a month
rent $450, bills $250, food $300
and given that in kickstarter world there is no need to show receipts, to give back to your supporters the same in goods what is given by them in moneys
i want a start a kickstarter called something like:
PAY FOR MY LIFE FOR A YEAR AND I WILL GIVE YOU FILES, T-SHIRTS AND PRINTED MATERIAL TO ENJOY
maybe it has a $15,000 goal?
$12,000 for me to live on for a year
$3000 to host the files, make and send the t-shirts and printed materials
thing is, the files have to be REALLY COOL
the t-shirts have to be REALLY SWAG
and the printed material have to be HAND MADE
or is it the satisfaction of supporting someone else's life that is the main pull of the new online crowd-funding craze
so the things you get in trade dont have to be that swag
what would be good files, good t-shirts, good printed materials?
what sort of files/t-shirts would you buy for $20, for $50, for $100??
"i will play a show via skype just to you" is that worth $500 or $0
what is life worth?
what is streaming life worth?
what are t-shirts worth?
mp3 vs analog?!?!?!
big questions
open idea
social experiments on the internet involving life, community, money, files and t-shirts, this is the sort of stuff urho was made for
thoughts?
Comments
NEW PATRONAGE, is what you are trying to establish. New mode of ancient patronage system, involving more individual freedom and not having to live in some Lord's house as a servant. Patronage open to anyone who wants to get in.
private skype show: definitely worth $500!!!!
I wonder if you'd be willing to compose actual pieces just for someone else's use, à la the ancient patronage system ("write me a birthday symphony for my party on Friday, Mr. Haydn," etc.). Like, you create a 2 hour soundscape for somebody's dinner party/dance party/whatever, and deliver it to them for x amount of dollar. Similar to the private skype show but being an actual mp3 they can then own. Single-edition mp3s! Seems really fun
signed shit
personalized shit
putting someone's name in a track? I dunno
definitely hand-made stuff that can't be got elsewhere / that no one else will have / limited edition hand made stuff, I think this concept continues to have pull in the world of consumption
mix-tapes? Like curating somebody's musical education into your weird world
being available for one hour of live chat per month or something
the reason old-school rich dudes patronized artists (like Count Esterhazy having Haydn live with him as a servant for like 20 years) is because it made them feel cool / made them feel tapped into the arts / spread their name around / etc. Like if Esterhazy could be connected with the career of one of Europe's greatest composers, it brought fame and honor onto HIM as well--it made him legit. Seems like you're trying to access some sort of modern version of this. So you really should hype it, like, this mp3 JUST FOR YOU, etc. etc. Then people can be all "Yeah, Adam Forkner made this party playlist for me" and everyone goes "ooooh."
in this day of pirated music, i don't blame a musician one bit for using kickstarter to raise funds to at least cover the costs of making an album- including the costs of living during the time the album was made. i do think your 'pay for a year of my life' is interesting, and might be super successful, but my instinct is that people will want something more concrete or specific.
YT:
the "skype concert" trick is a classic kickstarter perk
and the "hand-made stuff u send"/ value added trick is also at this point a crowd-funding cliche
my feeling is that kickstarter and other crowd funding engines are not designed to create sustainable, long term new patronage relationships, but generally used to fund smaller, more short term (year or less) projects
someone might have a successful campaign, make a bunch more than they thought, send the people their cd-rs, t-shirts, hand made items and do some one-on-ones with the people who gave
but then a year goes by, the money's all spent and what does that person do then?
start another campaign?
will the patrons come back for seconds?
or will they feel like "ohhh this guy's back...what're you gonna do? mail me a hand drawn card with a CDR and a t-shirt?" and feel like not supporting again?
i feel like the novelty of crowd-funding is wearing thin. once its been lampooned on portlandia, u know the jig/gig is up
so my idea would be for someone to both lampoon it, but at the same time make a bunch of money by being brutally honest about how non-value based the exchange was
i actually don't think the "personalized art for the patron" trick works as well as it once did. i also think it makes for terribly bad art
as noel galleger said in a semi-surpressed* recent interview at coachella
"the audience didn't ask for jimi hendrix, they got jimi hendrix and it changed the world"
crowd-funding of the arts makes for Lowest-common-denominator mediocrity
more imaginative, adventurous, weirder or experimental concepts obviously get less support
anyway,
my new concept is to just flip it to this level where people would be very keenly aware of the fact that they are not getting anything of much value back
thats the funny part, to me.
i wonder if people with money will also think its funny and then maybe fund such a campaign, based on it calling out the value inequity in crowd funding scams
its not like with art grants where u have to show receipts and say exactly what you need the money for and have an exact plan...
other thoughts
that kickstarter campaign to buy kickstarter that got kicked off of kickstarter
that was a funny one
*http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xq9djs_noel-gallagher-ecco-dove-sbagliano-le-case-discografiche-sottotitoli-coachella-festival-2012_music?search_algo=1
I don't think crowd-funding is designed as a new form of patronage. The intent, if it matters, is you have an idea for an ambitious project, and you don't have the money to pull it off, even though it should make money later... so you "kickstart" it.
Don't lampoon... Portlandia beat you to that. Sincerity is the new lampooning.
Bolder: What if you did it for real? Honest. No jokes. Sincere asking in exchange for work.
a) i don't have to do a kickstarter to make records
b) setting up a camera and looking sincerely into it as i talk about my project makes me want to puke
it would be awesome to make 12 grand off a funny joke
i guess my joke isnt that funny to you guys
i know the intent of kickstarter, and for that intent i think its rad
crowd funding venture capital. cool concept! make your ipad stylus or whatever
how it has been used by people, i guess specifically by musician peoples, and then used as a launching point for discussions of "new patronage" for the arts, to me, is what im looking at
its true it has already been made fun of
but i thought it would be funny for someone to actually successfully fund a campaign that was basically asking for money to live off of
If you move forward this you should look into the alternate sites that let you keep ANY AND ALL pledges made. That way if only $6000 gets donated, you still get to keep it!!
You should set up the rewards for parts of your life:
$5 - One Meal For Me: blah blah, reward, blah blah
$100 - Utility Bill of Some Sort: blah blah, reward, blah blah
Also, Wepay.com and indiegogo.com do not have policies of that sort (and you can keep the dough even if you don't meet your goal.)
Personally I think if you ask your friends/their friends for money, you had better be accountable with regard to promised "paybacks."
What about a membership system, similar to what you would find at a local organization you can go to? Personally I like this because it is more about an ongoing relationship rather than a product that one receives once.
Like... at a certain membership level, you attend 1 show for free. At the next you get a +1. At the top you get an annual pass for all shows. Etc. As a musician actually I think you have more flexibility in this arrangement, because what you do is a combination of goods (records) and services (shows) and intangibles (your persona).
As a creator you put more in to what you make than any single person will get out of it. Then they feel like they got a great deal, and because you can distribute it to a lot of people, you also get a great deal. When I buy your music on Bandcamp I feel like I'm getting more than I paid for. How do you create that same sense of value in a kickstarter environment?
That is kind of like joking.
I mean, my marriage is a good example, because we were definitely like "This would be a really funny joke, and we could always bail on it if it was actually a stupid mistake." We got married and it was actually a really great move.
So my point is that while I understand the urge to warn, "don't shield yourself with a joke," sometimes the jokester's approach turns out to be a great one.
Or, as they say on the course, "The honest man's aim is true, but the fool is always swinging the dinger."
Amanda Palmer is charging people $500 or something for "personalized painted turntables". Selling people super shitty $25 wholesale chinese turntables made by Crosley with plastic fucking tonearms with some paint blobs splashed on them.
Another different joke: I'd love to see a kickstarter to start a business where you'd do inexpensive kickstarter fulfillment for other people. Like, outsourcing the "personal" rewards. Setting up the skype cameras, autographing postcards on someone else's behalf. Because who has time for that stuff?!?
Also, young people. Fucking young people! With fewer bills and greater energy to take on unpaid internships and projects that yield future contacts!
I'm too fucking old for that now!!!! What, so now I just toil away without any new experiences, scratching softly at the door of "anyone who gives a shit about what I'm doing".
Almost all of my gear is outdated and/or broken. Where's the kickstarter for that?
Everything is about projects and products, and what you can give away- little pieces of the project for your backers. Which is a beautiful model and I would like to use it sometime, but what about the needs of an artist that are not surrounding a consumable object???
I need time- time to think, write, read. I can get this through an artist residency, THANK GOD such a thing exists. That's assuming I get accepted to one, and can afford it, and can work my life (job, loan payments, etc) around it.
At this point I can't make a project proposal because I'm so scrambled from working full time and I don't have the tools I need. Sure, you can write in a thing or two to a proposal- a video camera, a printer, whatever. What about how I need a new tripod (mine is so light my 4x5 camera tips it over, meaning I can't ever use my 4x5 camera), new lights (1 out of my 3 is working and occasionally shocks me), 2 different cameras, and a dedicated studio space.
Whoops! This isn't the rant thread, sorry guyz!
Of course you can make art with nothing, I believe that and I do benefit creatively from restrictions. But, after a number of years with the same restrictions I really just feel restricted and cramped.
Kickstarter proposal- Sarah needs a nap at the beach and some really expensive equipment, and then she will make pictures that you might like.
I shouldn't really get mad about this situation because the world needs more photographs like it needs a kick in the head!
I have gotten some cool free trips as well.
but for me the next project is definitely "start thinking about things like health insurance and a retirement plan" - because i don't think making $15K a year and getting a couple free trips will really 'float my boat' when i'm 60.
"buckets"
"People who make content learn to like it, because they want to make content, and they also want to eat food and sleep under a roof, and the opportunity to do both at the same time seems like a pretty good idea."
Rewards include an office tour and ice cream social ($25,000).
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/575109064/penny-arcade-sells-out
"PLEDGE $500 OR MORE
6 BACKERS • Limited Reward (19 of 25 remaining)
Within reason, Gabe and Tycho will retweet one of your tweets."
6 people bought this what the FUCK!
ha/ get me a gun
joke's over
as an artist who believes in pure creative freedom,
i don't ever want to be beholden to anyone with regards to my creative works
this trending idea of "direct consumer patronage" is something i will never bend to, and as an artist find repulsive
perhaps this is naive or overly idealistic, but i am not one for compromising my creative freedom to make more money as an artist
i was raised to believe that what i do as an artist has a value beyond money, both for myself and maybe sometimes hopefully a few others
and that the creative spirit was meant to ride free of commercial expectations
we talk a lot about creative business
and i think business informed by crazy creative ideas is a great thing
what i am good at, mostly, though, is just being crazy and making fucking up sounding sounds, exploring/breaking new music tech, breaking things, slap bass, DJing in ways people find offensive/funny, getting into arguments with people about what my duty as a musician in any given situation is
sometimes people enjoy listening to and or watching me do it
i have no idea why they would enjoy this, as i generally enjoy doing it more than watching/listening to others do it
anyway, the crowd-funding phenomenon isn't something i connect to as a person, because i would NEVER consider letting people into my "very special creative process"
as patrons
of course, this means i have to look for other ways to sustain life
the joke was, for me: wouldn't it be awesome, tho, to somehow hack the system that exists into paying me Gs and i wouldn't have to go get another wine delivery/coffee shop/wedding sound system rental/plaid pantry job
anyway
joke over
bank account empty
time to get a real job/move to a city where i can get a fake creative job/consider living in my car
The reason people are paying $500 for a retweet is because they love the community and content that has been created for a LONG TIME and they want to support it. The tweet part is a joke! Duh!
I have a dayjob, and it prevents me from being as creative as I would like, but also allows me to be MUCH MORE creative than it should. (Thanks boss!) So the creative work I do doesn't have to make me money. If it did, I'd be doing much different creative work, cause in order to sell something you have to make something people want. Like Mr. Frogtor, I don't want to change what I do because that is what will sell (yes, I realize that is a somewhat silly considering the nature of my creative work is about being beholden to others), but because it's what I want to do/make.
Wasn't there an article somewhere recently about the idea that maybe our art isn't supposed to make money? Maybe that is what jobs are for. Maybe.
http://www.alexmahan-artist.biz
I'm not saying I should never have a job, or that I should get lots of money for art, just that working full time makes art nearly impossible.
Different types of creative work require different inputs of energy, time, and money!
I don't know what I'm saying here, but I sure don't like it.
AlexBut that is the true punk spirit. Although lots of "true punks" made major money off their true punk.
WHAT *IS* ART? WHAT *IS* PUNK? #contemporarysociety
As for the rest of this art stuff, in some ways I suppose I've "made it" since selling/showing/talking about my art has been the way i've paid the bills for the past 10+ years. but it's been a meager living and i'd probably be financially better off if i had just had a full time $15 an hour job. But I also feel very fortunate, and know I've worked very hard.
I don't think artists/musicians/etc have any "right" to make money for what they do, and have little patience for that argument. But, as someone who has been in it a bit, what drives me bonkers with rage is seeing how fucked up the system really is. Owls is totally right about money stuffs- gallerists push art that sells, and art made by young artists with rich parents and rich friends sells a lot better than art made by some blue-collar-small-town artist. the amount of political BS, and sheer bad taste, is staggering. there have been so many times in my life when i was at some fancy gallery where i really thought there was a hidden camera and it was all a practical joke... horrible art being sold for 20K while some ridiculous gallerist goes off about how "important" it is. THE ART WORLD IS A PATHETIC PLACE. at least with kickstarter there is a populist element to it- it's not based on smoke and mirrors and a select few gate-keepers who are totally corrupt.
RANT
Like...
WHUT
Adam, you should make your bacon being interviewed by cultural studies doctoral students. Do they ever need house show experts on CNN sometimes? YOU NEED AN AGENT, DOG
http://folktek.com/instruments/electrocoustic/impossible-box
My plan to get rich:
-Write some songs about "California" for MTV to use on their shows.
-Write some songs intended to be used as "Jock Jams".
-Write some songs with a "car commercial" vibe.
-Write some songs to be used in movie trailers (eg that "How Ya Like Me Now!" song)
if you just select the $500 pledge level on my kickstarter.
but srsly, the every-art-star-has-a-trust-fund thing is true and very depressing. the only ones I know who really made it without one were hustling insanely, obscenely hard when they were young.
(also srsly I am happy to give tips on getting your songs into corporate america)
And the kickstarter founders have created their own "art" by making this website. I'm glad they did, because it makes it easier for myself and others to get and give that kind of support. Making a joke of it seems a little like pissing on someone else's creative project, IMO.
"b) setting up a camera and looking sincerely into it as i talk about my project makes me want to puke" -- because that wouldn't be "sincere" for you! But you don't have to resort to making a joke of the whole thing, either. Get creative. Find a way to be sincere via this platform that doesn't make you want to puke... OR don't use the platform. Create a different one! Whatever. My 2 cents.