Re: Social Networking Benefits to Independent Musicians

["Stephen Goodman" <spgoodman@earthlight.net>]

Hi Andy,

> 1.  Firstly, when did you discover the Internet?

In the mid-1980s while using a connection to it, known at the time as 
Telenet (a GTE project).  I've been involved with PCs since 1980 so 
dealing 
with communications was a default situation; I worked through the old 
CompuServe system, and when the Internet became available to the general 
public I was implementing it at businesses in the LA area, but had already 
been accessing newsgroups via text-based bulletin boards.

> 2.  If so, how has the Internet been of a benefit to you as an artist,
> or other artists you know?

In addition to more available, cheaper technology, the Internet made it 
possible for artists to self-publish, without having to grovel to some 
cigar-chomper at a music company just for the privilege.

> 3.  Can you think of any negative effects internet technologies have
> had on artists (for example, say, people getting annoyed by the
> e-flying that swamped message boards on MySpace or perhaps very
> expensive and very annoying advertising campaigns by the majors)?

People definitely count it as a necessity like telephone coverage these 
days... and potentially take it for granted as a result, considering also 
the usual effects of saturation on a market.

> 4.  Do you think the way artists use the internet has changed in the
> last 10 years, and do you think this will change in the next 10, if
> so, how?

I think artists have assumed more control over their use of the Internet, 
but there are two sides of Internet use on the part of artists: first 
there 
are those who self-publish on their own web sites in combination with 
those 
run by 3rd party companies (myspace etc); and there are those who just use 
the 3rd party sites.  I don't include established artists in that 
division, 
but the same paradigm tends to apply: established artists who do their own 
thing (example: Todd Rundgren has been in advance of most musicians in 
this 
regard for some time, so he's an oddity statistically. David Bowie of 
course 
does not manage his own Myspace page - but Steve Hunter, Lou Reed's/Alice 
Cooper's guitarist, certainly does manage it himself) but I suspect most 
Myspace/Facebook/etc pages for established artists are run either by fans 
or 
by subalterns assigned to the role.

I believe that in the next 10 years the graduation away from established 
music companies will continue, and some brave souls out there will break 
away from said companies, to form their own concern.  They'll have 
experience in music publishing with all the inherent issues like royalties 
and writing credits etc, and will hopefully know how to apply these 
practices in an honest manner, to provide not just publishing services but 
also distribution and marketing efforts.  This will be a new business 
model 
with less middlemen and therefore more revenue for the creators than the 
purveyors.  (After all the Big Four/Five are only really very good at the 
distribution and marketing aspects, and certainly not A&R anymore, the 
absence of new talent being the glaring evidence.  Once they figure out 
this 
factor and have positioned themselves for the non-publishing elements such 
as these, the rest of the world will have outstripped them altogether.)

In 1996 I put my first web page up, throwing my own music onto the web for 
listening (RealAudio).  That same year I collaborated with a programmer 
friend to create a self-executing encapsulated sound file dubbed The Loop 
of 
the Week, which still runs under Windows 7 and reportedly PC-capable Macs. 
After people had heard my music I was asked to put it on a tape to send 
people, and after this I thought of the notion of selling it online, but 
decided to wait for recordable CDs to come along for less than £300, which 
they did in 1998-9.  I became more engaged in the technical end, while 
concentrating on public performance instead of web promos.  In the 
meantime 
mp3.com had come and gone, due to bad management and having a goal to sell 
out to a music corporation ultimately; I was an MIS Director by this time 
at 
a music company, and those people's assessments of online music or 
file-sharing was restricted to being able to pronounce the word "Napster", 
when they were asking me to install it on their work PCs.  No kidding!  
P2P 
was never seen as anything but a resource the music corporations wished 
they 
had full control over, as opposed to the role of a passive user - and it 
was 
only through subjugation via lawsuit, followed by outright purchase, that 
Napster became 'controlled'.  By then it was too late, and us cats were 
out 
of their bag altogether.

Independent musicians are now producing full video streaming shows, the 
only 
thing presently lacking being full-surround and cheap video mixing 
real-time.  Cave people in the music corporations haven't caught up to 
that 
one either! [snicker]

As you can tell I have a lot of opinions from having worked in IT for over 
25 years while maintaining an interest in creating new music, and having a 
4-year business degree (Bus. Administration, with contract law), and will 
go 
on as long as you like.

Thanks for asking!

Stephen Goodman
http://www.earthlight.tv
http://www.ustream.tv/StephenGoodman
http://www.vimeo.com/spgoodman
http://www.myspace.com/spgoodman


> I really hope you can help me out, and if you do, you'll be cited in
> my report:)  So far I've managed to get a handful responses - of which
> most are from UK artists, although I have managed to get a couple of
> willing New York antifolkers involved, as well as my boss at the
> venue.
>
> Thanks for reading, look forward to hearing back from you.
>
> Andy