As much as the word "monetize" makes me reach for my revolver - artists, musicians, writers, and radio stations are now competing for fewer and fewer dollars, as dinosaurs like the music industry and the publishing industry shuffle off the world stage. There is plenty of great work being made right now, but until new funding models emerge its difficult to imagine how creative types can sustain the output.
October 28th - 30th, WFMU is holding its first ever Radiovision festival. On Saturday the 29th (Symposium Saturday) we will examine three possible funding models of the future:
There are plenty of crowd-funding websites and platforms but there is only one Kickstarter. This month the company announced that they just hit one million backers, that's one million backers of comics, albums, books, video games, urban farms, documentaries, exhibits, performances, and thousands of other creative works. Yancey Strickler is one of the co-founders of Kickstarter and he will be on stage to talk about why Kickstarter campaigns are so successful, and what the future of crowdfunding will be.
While most foundations have long lists of requirements you need to meet before they will consider writing you a check, The Awesome Foundation has only one prerequisite: that you be awesome. Christina Xu is one of the founders of The Awesome Foundation and she is going to talk about how her organization is regularly passing out no-strings-attached $1,000 grants to people doing awesome things like documentaries, public art projects, even interactive community notice boards. Awesome Foundation does not have a very complicated formula - every month a group of trustees get together and award a grant to a project they like best. New chapters are opening in cities all over the world, and they were just awarded a Knight News Challenge grant, this is a model with a future.
The music and publishing industries may be in free-fall but the advertising indusry is doing great. Jeff Tammes is the EVP, Creative & Strategy at Cornerstone of Cornerstone a marketing agency that pairs artists with lifestyle brands. Cornerstone also helped set up Converse's recording studio, Rubber Tracks, in Williamsburg. Jeff's message for creators is that lifestyle brands can help artists and musicians realize their dreams.
Our moderator for this panel is Rebecca Gates. who as a member of The Spinanes can remember both the bad and the good of the old model, as a working musician has awareness of the complexity of the current scene and as a member of the Future of Music Coalition wonders: “How are all these shifts affecting working musicians? What are the implications for a musician’s practice? And what do these new models mean for the shape of arts culture in the future?
Tickets are on sale, but they are going fast. We already sold out the Radiovision Opening Night performance with Joe Frank! Don't miss out.
