We only need each other
September 26, 2020 2:54 PM Subscribe
In How Can We Pay for Creativity in the Digital Age? (The New Yorker), Hua Hsu reviews William Deresiewicz's new book, The Death of the Artist: How Creators Are Struggling to Survive in the Age of Billionaires and Big Tech (Bookshop). Deresiewicz writes artists “do deserve to get paid for doing something you love, something other people love ... Wanting to get paid does not mean that you’re a capitalist ... It doesn’t even mean that you assent to capitalism. It only means that you live in a capitalist society.”
Previously on Metafilter:
Previously on Metafilter:
In fact, our array of choices proved paralyzing, and attention consolidated around those at the very top.
As I point out every time, this is what the head of a “long-tailed” power law distribution looks like. Nobody felt like writing a zillion articles about this in Wired for some reason though.
posted by atoxyl at 3:15 PM on September 26, 2020 [2 favorites]
As I point out every time, this is what the head of a “long-tailed” power law distribution looks like. Nobody felt like writing a zillion articles about this in Wired for some reason though.
posted by atoxyl at 3:15 PM on September 26, 2020 [2 favorites]
Wonder if Banksy has PayPal.
posted by clavdivs at 3:53 PM on September 26, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by clavdivs at 3:53 PM on September 26, 2020 [1 favorite]
Recent LA Times article: The anti-Spotify: How online music company Bandcamp became the toast of the COVID age
posted by gwint at 4:01 PM on September 26, 2020 [17 favorites]
posted by gwint at 4:01 PM on September 26, 2020 [17 favorites]
A lot of folks I know have been yelling about this for a while, and the only genuinely encouraging development I’ve seen in decades is the rise of patronage sites like Kickstarter and Patreon.
Back when we blogged about things, I wrote a lot about how a lot of the “money for art” system was built around habituating people to paying for the expense of making a copy of something. The Physical Act Of making a painting or playing a song became the thing that money was thrown at, and it made sense until it didn’t. Now everyone is trying to figure out how to re-attach value to the creative act itself, and it turns out it’s tough.
posted by verb at 5:09 PM on September 26, 2020 [10 favorites]
Back when we blogged about things, I wrote a lot about how a lot of the “money for art” system was built around habituating people to paying for the expense of making a copy of something. The Physical Act Of making a painting or playing a song became the thing that money was thrown at, and it made sense until it didn’t. Now everyone is trying to figure out how to re-attach value to the creative act itself, and it turns out it’s tough.
posted by verb at 5:09 PM on September 26, 2020 [10 favorites]
“We do not need the government to pay for art, or the rich with their philanthropy,” [Deresiewicz] tells us. “We only need each other.”
hahaha sure yeah that's working out okay, but I sure would not complain if the NEA had an actual budget again, and I might not have left Seattle if Bezos poured some of his money into supporting the arts instead of stashing it all in his giant balls while the rents just kept on ratcheting up every year.
I am generally happy with Patreon as a way to pay for the long process of doing the comics I want to do without worrying about what sells, and Kickstarter as a way to pay for the process of printing those comics on a lot of paper. Some creators disdain them, saying they can get the same thing going for themselves without paying a percentage to what they say is a glorified middleman; I find that I am willing to pay that percentage for a middleman who has spent a lot of energy on building some degree of trust with people - do you really want to trust someone who has worked very hard to align her life in a way where art is about the only thing she has to worry about with your credit card details? I don't want to have to worry about your credit card details.
Unlike the "most Kickstarters fail" statistic mentioned in the New Yorker review, I'm three for three on successful Kickstarters. There was a period where Patreon was paying my entire rent* for about a 20h workweek, which I am pretty sure put me in the 2% of creators who exceed minimum wage on there**.
But they are both still corporations, and Patreon's regular "hey we just got another dose of venture capital, yay!" press releases continue to make part of me worry about the other shoe dropping, when they say "hey now the VC people who own us thanks to pouring all that money into us want some kind of return on that, we are gonna start squeezing creators every way we can". They say this will never happen, of course. All their VC is people who are perfectly committed to Supporting The Arts and who will never do that. And surely none of this ownership/debt will ever pass into anyone else's hands, who is much more interested in profits than supporting the arts.
Which is why I am following the development of Comradery with some interest; its basic pitch is "what if every creator on Patreon owned a piece of it". Which I guess is maybe kind of coming around to the same place as the quote I lead this comment with, but again, let me tell you about my grant proposal for a performance piece wherein I dig up the corpse of Newt Gingrich, piss on it, and send chunks of it to all his buddies who joined in his quest to destroy the National Endowment For The Arts, the National Endowment For The Humanities, and PBS.
* which it is not right now, my progress on big stuff has slowed to a crawl thanks to general pandemic malaise, and even before that I was working on an ambitious project that generally takes at least twice as long per page. My rent's less since I left Seattle for New Orleans and that helps a lot too, but right now I'm mostly paying it with horny commissions.
** I can do this because of a lot of financial privilege that let me take the time that getting good enough at drawing to pay my rent with it required, and to build enough of an audience for my particular brand of nonsense to do that. Raise the minimum wage, create basic income, whatever, and many more people will have a chance to get good enough at a thing for it to become their day job.
posted by egypturnash at 6:43 PM on September 26, 2020 [33 favorites]
hahaha sure yeah that's working out okay, but I sure would not complain if the NEA had an actual budget again, and I might not have left Seattle if Bezos poured some of his money into supporting the arts instead of stashing it all in his giant balls while the rents just kept on ratcheting up every year.
I am generally happy with Patreon as a way to pay for the long process of doing the comics I want to do without worrying about what sells, and Kickstarter as a way to pay for the process of printing those comics on a lot of paper. Some creators disdain them, saying they can get the same thing going for themselves without paying a percentage to what they say is a glorified middleman; I find that I am willing to pay that percentage for a middleman who has spent a lot of energy on building some degree of trust with people - do you really want to trust someone who has worked very hard to align her life in a way where art is about the only thing she has to worry about with your credit card details? I don't want to have to worry about your credit card details.
Unlike the "most Kickstarters fail" statistic mentioned in the New Yorker review, I'm three for three on successful Kickstarters. There was a period where Patreon was paying my entire rent* for about a 20h workweek, which I am pretty sure put me in the 2% of creators who exceed minimum wage on there**.
But they are both still corporations, and Patreon's regular "hey we just got another dose of venture capital, yay!" press releases continue to make part of me worry about the other shoe dropping, when they say "hey now the VC people who own us thanks to pouring all that money into us want some kind of return on that, we are gonna start squeezing creators every way we can". They say this will never happen, of course. All their VC is people who are perfectly committed to Supporting The Arts and who will never do that. And surely none of this ownership/debt will ever pass into anyone else's hands, who is much more interested in profits than supporting the arts.
Which is why I am following the development of Comradery with some interest; its basic pitch is "what if every creator on Patreon owned a piece of it". Which I guess is maybe kind of coming around to the same place as the quote I lead this comment with, but again, let me tell you about my grant proposal for a performance piece wherein I dig up the corpse of Newt Gingrich, piss on it, and send chunks of it to all his buddies who joined in his quest to destroy the National Endowment For The Arts, the National Endowment For The Humanities, and PBS.
* which it is not right now, my progress on big stuff has slowed to a crawl thanks to general pandemic malaise, and even before that I was working on an ambitious project that generally takes at least twice as long per page. My rent's less since I left Seattle for New Orleans and that helps a lot too, but right now I'm mostly paying it with horny commissions.
** I can do this because of a lot of financial privilege that let me take the time that getting good enough at drawing to pay my rent with it required, and to build enough of an audience for my particular brand of nonsense to do that. Raise the minimum wage, create basic income, whatever, and many more people will have a chance to get good enough at a thing for it to become their day job.
posted by egypturnash at 6:43 PM on September 26, 2020 [33 favorites]
One thing I've been wishing would come for a while now is micropayments. If you saw a video or article or webcomic you liked, would you put a nickel in the tip jar? I suspect many would, and while I'm not sure that's a solution for everyone, it could be a big help to many.
posted by lemonshush at 6:51 PM on September 26, 2020 [8 favorites]
posted by lemonshush at 6:51 PM on September 26, 2020 [8 favorites]
If you saw a video or article or webcomic you liked, would you put a nickel in the tip jar?
Processing that transaction costs a quarter.
posted by mhoye at 7:02 PM on September 26, 2020 [6 favorites]
Processing that transaction costs a quarter.
posted by mhoye at 7:02 PM on September 26, 2020 [6 favorites]
@mhoye - right, which is why it isn't a thing yet. I also think micropayments would be nice, if/when someone can make it work.
posted by ®@ at 8:14 PM on September 26, 2020 [6 favorites]
posted by ®@ at 8:14 PM on September 26, 2020 [6 favorites]
Copyright needs to be updated. Only grant copyright to the creator, and have a windfall clause where the creator sells rights to massive corporation for $1000 and it explodes to millions, some significant percentage returns to creator.
posted by sammyo at 8:34 PM on September 26, 2020 [11 favorites]
posted by sammyo at 8:34 PM on September 26, 2020 [11 favorites]
Ah yes, the opening lines of Das Kapital:
"Wanting to get paid means you're a capitalist"
posted by symbioid at 8:56 PM on September 26, 2020
"Wanting to get paid means you're a capitalist"
posted by symbioid at 8:56 PM on September 26, 2020
...copyright is important.
Yep. But The Mouse steals the cheese.
posted by ovvl at 9:50 PM on September 26, 2020 [7 favorites]
Yep. But The Mouse steals the cheese.
posted by ovvl at 9:50 PM on September 26, 2020 [7 favorites]
One thing I've been wishing would come for a while now is micropayments. If you saw a video or article or webcomic you liked, would you put a nickel in the tip jar? I suspect many would, and while I'm not sure that's a solution for everyone, it could be a big help to many.
Twitch actually uses microtransactions - their system is called 'bits'. It is notable that bits aren't particularly viable an income for streamers, who acknowledge them but really care about subscriptions, merch and affiliate links.
Patreon is a """microtransaction""" system that actually works, because it lets creators get paid in a predictable lump sum every month, and users are encouraged to only chip in a couple of bucks a month to creators they love. Turns out stability is actually kind of desirable for artists.
posted by Merus at 9:58 PM on September 26, 2020 [7 favorites]
Twitch actually uses microtransactions - their system is called 'bits'. It is notable that bits aren't particularly viable an income for streamers, who acknowledge them but really care about subscriptions, merch and affiliate links.
Patreon is a """microtransaction""" system that actually works, because it lets creators get paid in a predictable lump sum every month, and users are encouraged to only chip in a couple of bucks a month to creators they love. Turns out stability is actually kind of desirable for artists.
posted by Merus at 9:58 PM on September 26, 2020 [7 favorites]
Processing that transaction costs a quarter.
A viable system would have users fill up their virtual piggybank once a month or whatever so there's only a single credit card transaction fee for the platform that would then be spread out across all of the microtransactions. Patreon got in trouble last year for basically trying to get rid of the amortization of transaction fees, IIRC.
posted by Candleman at 10:26 PM on September 26, 2020 [2 favorites]
A viable system would have users fill up their virtual piggybank once a month or whatever so there's only a single credit card transaction fee for the platform that would then be spread out across all of the microtransactions. Patreon got in trouble last year for basically trying to get rid of the amortization of transaction fees, IIRC.
posted by Candleman at 10:26 PM on September 26, 2020 [2 favorites]
Processing that transaction costs a quarter.
And yet for Amazon and others it clearly doesn't, in so far as through the Kindle Direct programme, where you get paid a penny per page view, or something derisively similar, I regularly get monthly payments of less than 5p at the end of the month (and sometimes in four or five different transactions, from their various different Kindle stores, in various different currencies). So they can process payments for free, or as close to it so as to make no difference.
posted by dng at 6:01 AM on September 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
And yet for Amazon and others it clearly doesn't, in so far as through the Kindle Direct programme, where you get paid a penny per page view, or something derisively similar, I regularly get monthly payments of less than 5p at the end of the month (and sometimes in four or five different transactions, from their various different Kindle stores, in various different currencies). So they can process payments for free, or as close to it so as to make no difference.
posted by dng at 6:01 AM on September 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
I was reading William Wharton's Houseboat on the Seine and it seemed completely fantastic that he could pay for construction materials and labor for his boat by selling landscape paintings on the street in post-WWII Paris. I keep wondering how this could be -- was artistic talent scarce, or was there a surplus of labor, or was secular visual art highly valued at that time, or was he just a really good artist/salesman? It's the same kind of incredulity as when you hear that Steely Dan commissioned a $150K custom drum machine to record an album -- so much money was sloshing around for certain kinds of creative artifacts that isn't anymore.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 6:51 AM on September 27, 2020 [8 favorites]
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 6:51 AM on September 27, 2020 [8 favorites]
so much money was sloshing around for certain kinds of creative artifacts that isn't anymore.
The money is still around, more of it, actually. The problem is that it is now concentrated in the hands of fewer people.
posted by jeremias at 8:03 AM on September 27, 2020 [4 favorites]
The money is still around, more of it, actually. The problem is that it is now concentrated in the hands of fewer people.
posted by jeremias at 8:03 AM on September 27, 2020 [4 favorites]
This makes me think of scroll.com - you put in five dollars per month and it gets distributed based on what you view. It’s not a perfect model but as a consumer it’s the sort of thing that I'd like to see more of.
I’m imagining creator-owned (creator-union-owned?) or nonprofit orgs with the mission of making it easy for consumers to pay creators. Automate the payments as much as possible and keep transaction costs low (one $10 charge that gets divided up among creators instead of 10 $1 charges, one for each creator). Employ software developers to make a platform so you don’t need Instagram or Spotify or whatever. Take a modest cut (15% like Bandcamp seems reasonable).
So for music, I could pay $10 per month and they could distribute it based on who I listen to that month. Or have a set payment per song played and every time my balance goes below $1, charge my card and put another $10 or $20 into my account. My web host does the “pay as you go” model and I like it. Honestly I’d rather give an artist some cash every time I play a song rather than once and never again, and these days that’s technically possible.
Of course, the problem with this is getting it off the ground requires capital and a lot of effort. Making a platform that rivals Spotify is difficult and expensive. For example I see that Bandcamp promised Chromecast support 4 years ago and it still hasn’t arrived. And getting artists on board isn’t easy - I just checked Bandcamp and the 3 artists I thought of to support aren’t there. I found some esoteric tribute albums and I think I’ll buy those, but no Chromecast support and none of the artists I want to hear are nearly dealbreakers. It’s tough.
posted by Tehhund at 11:46 AM on September 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
I’m imagining creator-owned (creator-union-owned?) or nonprofit orgs with the mission of making it easy for consumers to pay creators. Automate the payments as much as possible and keep transaction costs low (one $10 charge that gets divided up among creators instead of 10 $1 charges, one for each creator). Employ software developers to make a platform so you don’t need Instagram or Spotify or whatever. Take a modest cut (15% like Bandcamp seems reasonable).
So for music, I could pay $10 per month and they could distribute it based on who I listen to that month. Or have a set payment per song played and every time my balance goes below $1, charge my card and put another $10 or $20 into my account. My web host does the “pay as you go” model and I like it. Honestly I’d rather give an artist some cash every time I play a song rather than once and never again, and these days that’s technically possible.
Of course, the problem with this is getting it off the ground requires capital and a lot of effort. Making a platform that rivals Spotify is difficult and expensive. For example I see that Bandcamp promised Chromecast support 4 years ago and it still hasn’t arrived. And getting artists on board isn’t easy - I just checked Bandcamp and the 3 artists I thought of to support aren’t there. I found some esoteric tribute albums and I think I’ll buy those, but no Chromecast support and none of the artists I want to hear are nearly dealbreakers. It’s tough.
posted by Tehhund at 11:46 AM on September 27, 2020 [2 favorites]
I just ran across a review (from 2013) of Kurt Vonnegut's collected letters. He was working in public relations for General Electric (in the early 1950s, I gather) when he sold his first story to Collier's (a large-circulation magazine of the time). He wrote to his father that if he could sell five stories a year, he would make more than a year's pay at GE.
But he wrote in 1986, "the magazines had gone out of business, and I was suddenly in the position of having to write a whole book in order to get what used to be my fee for just one story."
posted by JonJacky at 12:07 PM on September 27, 2020 [8 favorites]
But he wrote in 1986, "the magazines had gone out of business, and I was suddenly in the position of having to write a whole book in order to get what used to be my fee for just one story."
posted by JonJacky at 12:07 PM on September 27, 2020 [8 favorites]
This is a minor update to my comment but in the interest of accuracy: Bandcamp said they were working on Chromecast support in 2016 and I found a bunch of 2020 tweets from people saying “when is this coming?” so I assumed it was not supported (and I didn’t see it in my version of the app). Well, they added support a couple days before my comment. The fact that it took 4 years kind of drives home the point that it’s not easy to bootstrap a platform that competes with the big players.
posted by Tehhund at 6:57 AM on September 28, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by Tehhund at 6:57 AM on September 28, 2020 [1 favorite]
let me tell you about my grant proposal for a performance piece wherein I dig up the corpse of Newt Gingrich
Fake news
posted by snuffleupagus at 10:31 AM on September 28, 2020
Fake news
posted by snuffleupagus at 10:31 AM on September 28, 2020
So for music, I could pay $10 per month and they could distribute it based on who I listen to that month.
You basically just described Spotify and all the other music streaming services. The problem is that it turns out a tiny amount of money per play doesn't actually allow musicians to make a living at it.
posted by Candleman at 6:43 AM on September 29, 2020
You basically just described Spotify and all the other music streaming services. The problem is that it turns out a tiny amount of money per play doesn't actually allow musicians to make a living at it.
posted by Candleman at 6:43 AM on September 29, 2020
Candleman: That's not how Spotify distributes payments, although it's understandable why most people think it does. Instead they distribute based on global plays, so if you only listened to (say) The Beatles on Spotify, they wouldn't get your full $10.
There is an argument to move towards what's called "user-centric" payouts (see point 4 here) but it's unclear how that would pan out, and most streaming services don't even want to try it.
posted by adrianhon at 8:14 AM on September 29, 2020 [1 favorite]
There is an argument to move towards what's called "user-centric" payouts (see point 4 here) but it's unclear how that would pan out, and most streaming services don't even want to try it.
posted by adrianhon at 8:14 AM on September 29, 2020 [1 favorite]
You make a good point that it’s not a settled question whether the model of paying $10 per month to stream anything is a model that will pay musicians enough to live on. I actually forgot something in my comment: I meant to add that such a system might need a way to push heavy users to pay more. Maybe a nudge to optionally pay more: “you stream more music than 90% of users but you’re paying the minimum. If you increase your subscription over $10/mo we’ll give 100% of the extra to the artists you listen to.” Or maybe tips: “you listen to $artist more than 99% of users. Maybe send them a $5 tip to help them buy coffee and make more music?”
But this is different than Spotify, which exists to maximize owner value and artists feel obligated to participate because that’s where the audience is, not because it pays them well. I threw out the idea of keeping 15% of the subscription cost and passing along 85% to artists. Unless Spotify’s costs are 85% paying artists, we’re talking about different things.
posted by Tehhund at 11:08 AM on September 29, 2020
But this is different than Spotify, which exists to maximize owner value and artists feel obligated to participate because that’s where the audience is, not because it pays them well. I threw out the idea of keeping 15% of the subscription cost and passing along 85% to artists. Unless Spotify’s costs are 85% paying artists, we’re talking about different things.
posted by Tehhund at 11:08 AM on September 29, 2020
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posted by grumpybear69 at 2:58 PM on September 26, 2020 [10 favorites]