- ArtistshouseMusic -

Classroom as Company, Company as Classroom

cathy — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 14:16:34 -0700

Classroom as Company, Company as ClassroomWe are enthralled with the idea of classroom as company, company as classroom in the virtual environment. We believe think we can make this work as a model for making “industry” out of the creative enterprise. It’s simple: songwriter writes song, it’s recorded, both artist and song are monetized, artist gets career, song creates revenue streams, more music/visuals get made, more communities are created, and worker/stockholders share profit. The model is scalable and replicable. This is virtual free enterprise built around the exploitation of various rights: copyrights, trademarks, contractual rights, and personal rights. The data resulting from the process and the activities themselves creates value and will reveal the roadmap for sustainability. If you pay attention to it, manage it, administer it, and if all functions are more or less done efficiently, you will have a virtual media company, created from a classroom. In fact, the classroom always attaches to the company. The company is a product of education and it is a purveyor of it. Education is, in fact, one of its products. The name of the game is to LEARN how organizations work and how the functions of that organization mesh to produce specific, intended, innovative, and creative results as you engage in that very behavior. It’s not just a matter of learning by doing, it’s doing by learning. The class is organized in groups, in departments: company management, creative services, production, A&R, marketing, distribution, sales, merchandise, special products, international, finance, legal/business affairs, aggregation/compilations, broadcast (audio, video, etc.), education, customer relations, HR, etc. The point is to start with the core functions, the core departments, have the students sign up for their choice. Ning functionality pertains to the groups, the groups do their job with respect to the creative work that comprises the company’s productions and services. These departments can take on outside business as well. The marketing department should act entrepreneurially and seek business, growing as necessary, although not autonomously. We seek a corporate character that is entrepreneurial and creative in every respect. Combined with respect for those in company itself as well as respect for “customers”. But when customers are members of a community, that’s a different level. Each group could have its official, employed members and that group could, in addition to doing the work of the enterprise as related to their field, and outside work as time and resources allow, they could also create other groups of “interns” or “volunteers” from the Internet at large. These “interns” wouldn’t share in the profits as the members would, but they are being trained to eventually join the community, so they receive value for their participation. In this way, the “classroom/company” is not closed, although it does have three levels of participation: administrative, members, guests. Music creates fans, short for fanatics, and that is one inspired customer. The power of this community of fanatics is clearly unlimited. Suppose you were to be able to organize those people according to their individual talents. And suppose there was this three-dimensional quality to it. For example, the designer in the creative services department has her own business on the side as a photographer. Well, the community celebrates her photography by visiting the gallery of it on the site. The focus is on the company’s “products”, but since all participants have their own user page, they may engage in their own enterprise. You learn it as you do it, like a machine assembling itself from the actions of the community, of the participants. In this way the business evolves organically, from essentially nothing. The only real requirement for this business to be created is for a songwriter to wake up and pick up her guitar. Do you see it? It’s all about the INDIVIDUAL power, and the business part comes with communities of individuals aligned by common purpose and shared values. This is just a fancy way of saying, “I like your music, dude.” An industry pro oversees each “department”. The culture of the organization is built around music. The people in the company/ classroom will live with the music and the artists and give thought to their responsibilities to them. How do you think about this need that this product creates? I want the videos and the music to be omnipresent on the site. I want the virtual community to be a creative community. The thin air is the creative act. And this makes business – it makes a beeline to business. It is instant business. No capital is required to make this business. It may cost a little money to engage in it, and a lot of money if the economy of scale warrants it, but there are no barriers to entry to this business. In this virtual company will be individuals with their own user pages for their own stuff, including radio and tv broadcast, their own players, their own materials, their own blogs. In this social community, the members have roles and responsibilities, and share the acceptance and the allegiance to a common goal. Mission, values, goals align. “I may not make the music but I sure as hell love to market it. In fact, I am the John Lennon of marketing.” I think we can get 50 dedicated people to populate this “company” and actually make something happen. It is far more efficient than every artist and would be artist trying to reach every other person through their MySpace page. Right now it’s hard enough to convince artists/musicians that they are walking businesses. And the next challenge is to teach them to treat it this way. They are entrepreneurs, they are small businesses, in the very act of what they do. They have the essential trait of all entrepreneurs: they are completely convinced, and they have a way of improving their skills and approach and a way of measuring it. They understand method in the way that a child understands their native language: it is just natural, a neural wiring that will never go away. For the musician, it is called practice or rehearsal. Musicians can work on a problem for 6 hours straight and never lose concentration or the overwhelming desire to attain a certain, specific proficiency, one that is so refined that the uninitiated might not even be able to identify it. There is no ADD in the practice room. But not all artists, as small businesses, need engage in the SAME activities to monetize their work. That is, rather than all artists being all things (creator, producer, manufacturer, distributor, marketer, PR, broadcasting, etc.), why not encourage the nonperformance entrepreneurs to provide those functions. These too are called businesses, and there are a LOT of them in the constellation of the entertainment industry. In the classroom as company there will be all functions and all aspects of the media business, a 360 degree approach. All sectors may be dealt with. For every healthy artist there are ten jobs. And what is the fuel of this economic engine? Talent and the act of creation, it is as simple as that. In our model, talent is not just the songwriter or the artist, it is every person in the organization. Every individual will be prized for the same uniqueness and originality, the same dedication and passion, as the artist and the songwriter. The songwriter/artist creates the businesses but someone has to manage those businesses, and that can either be the artist or someone the artist has contracted with, the entrepreneur, the nonperforming business oriented person who loves music and share the values of the artist and the others in the enterprise. Our idea seeks to elevate these people as we elevate artists to embrace the reality of them being businesses. Employment is created out of the either of creativity. What is music if it is not the ultimate act of innovation, of individuality, of uniqueness? And it’s not just music that makes enterprise. Ideas in all fields make enterprise. Engineers are revered for their creative leaps, not their drawings. Architects are known for their aesthetic sense, not the plumbing of the building. Surgeons are brilliant because of the elegance of their work, not their ability to sew. Our philosophy is sound. What we’re working on is the implementation of it in a virtual environment, in a social community made up of people who share the same values, who are in the same “tribe” as it were – the tribe of music and creativity. It is a way of turning the business model on its head. It’s not about prizing structure and doctrine, its about prizing creativity and innovation. The structure and doctrine is there, and in my little classroom/co world it’s a sidebar world, a sort of reference library for the entrepreneur. Leaning the rules is something you do by doing something and bumping into the rules. Like broadcasting music. We want to broadcast music. And we bump into the rule of paying ASCAP and Sound Exchange. Do we ignore these rules? No, we don’t, because they are founded in law and adherence to them makes the world go around. These are good rules, and they actually work for us. They provide us with economic advantage. We then learn about how to be in compliance and why. And we do this a brick at a time. And the whole group is observing the work of its parts. And we are a community, a group of individuals participating in this virtual reality game. Only it’s not a game. It’s business built around the creative acts of all involved, from the musician to the business affairs person. One can be just as creative in the latter as in the former role. This idea and structure is built on pre-existence and the future of what we know. Music, business, social networking, the advantages of the Internet, the workings of a virtual community, these are preexisting and existing conditions. The idea of a virtual enterprise uniting these “existences” is just a matter of aggregating resources and tools, not a matter of actually creating either one. The resources and tools already exist. The glue that holds the enterprise together is the shared desire of the participants to be a part of it, to care about it, to find meaning in the philosophy and actions it reflects and engages in. It will only be possible to work in this company if you care and you elect to accept the responsibilities participation incurs. The trick is to create a structure and a process template in which every position has a detailed job description and a specific function in the larger enterprise. The trick it so create the environment and the process check lists to make the gears mesh so that the machine works efficiently and in harmony. It’s company as symphony orchestra. Such a structure accommodates all levels of proficiency and expertise. But as is common in other areas, the beginners become intermediates and the intermediates become experts, with all gradations in between, depending on time, resources, and training. In this model, since the work force is virtual, the choices are unlimited, and presumably the quality will be high on every level of the enterprise. We can use diagnostic tools to channel applicants (or students) to the appropriate positions. We will engage a dozen industry “mentors” to monitor and interact with each “group” or department. And we should have a “teacher’s blog” or “instruction blog” for every department. Each group is charged with creating its own culture of communication and interaction, and the development of an approach to their responsibilities that not only meshes with the other departments but achieves unique and innovation methodology in respect of those responsibilities. If you think of this as an academic “program”, the departments become courses, on going courses, and the mentor is the teacher, and the courses are taught simultaneously, concurrently, rather than consecutively and without direct reference to what precedes it and what succeeds it. In this new model, the connections are obvious and all part of the same enterprise, all part of singular, shared goals. Classroom Inc. is a way of learning organically, of creating commerce organically, of using the power of social networking to create groups based on shared values as part of a large enterprise, a larger group. The idea is to find talent, not just musical talent, but all talents related to the enterprise of monetizing creative work. The idea is to “train” this talent to make it aware of its opportunities not only individually but in relation to the group. There’s another component: the production training component that involves cameras in the production suites in the AECG facility in LA. AECG provides all sorts of post-production services, including licensing, audio/video post-production including new music, voice-overs, and preparation for all media broadcasting. From graphics, to music supervision, to audio recording and mixing, to film scoring and to all forms production music applications, almost all areas of AV post production are provided. The learning is in the real environment and it is directly connected to the job market. We have access to the employers in a way that most people do not. This has value. There are sites that already teach every single program under the sun (http://www.lynda.com/) so we don’t need to recreate that wheel. What we will offer is the virtual participation in the real world as it is happening. This is the Virtual Apprentice sector of Artists House Classroom, Inc. (classroom as company, company as classroom). In summary, the Classroom, Inc. approach to learning and doing provides the student with a way to enter the businesses of popular culture in a way that combines the instruction and the theory with the practice of it and its experiential exploration. Remember, this is an introductory course, one that touches on all of the elements of business (marketing, accounting, economics, management, marketing, planning, entrepreneurship), as well as the legal, copyright and contractual rights issues involved. Every topic in the Intro course has a course or courses in the curriculum. The idea is to show the structure right up front to the students and cause them to participate in it. They will see it. They will work in it. They may even see some results. But more than anything they will see what is necessary, what is involved, and where everything fits going forward. But the system is more than an index of what’s to come. It’s a context for what’s to come as well. It allows the structure to emerge from the goals, from the “big picture”. It allows the student to understand where everything fits in relationship to everything else. Simply put, the classroom as company, company as classroom idea is the horizontal reality and practice of the vertical “fields” or “courses” in a typical curriculum. Typically, subjects are taught in a train. In our concept, they are taught and learned concurrently, as they inter-relate, as they each affect the totally mechanism, the overall organization. Further to this, we accomplish these results by using the social networking, group organizational technologies that young people currently employ on the Internet. Our course basically operates like Facebook plus Blackboard, like a social networking site and a course management system co-joined, creating an actual media company as a structure for these methodologies. The educational component is presented in the form of “topics”, and these topics are organized in the same way that things are organized in a course management system: subjects, objectives, assignments, props (PPT, etc.) texts, media, discussion boards, student posts, testing/grading mechanism. If we can perfect this model, that is, be able to make each of the “groups” organized according to responsibility and product/services/administration flow; if we can connect them to one another; if we can perfect the organizational structure and the structure of responsibilities as they relate to the processes necessary for the organization to work, we will have a model that not only gets the job done but it encourages creative solutions. The challenge is to create a structure that is tight enough to cause a work flow to happen but loose enough to allow for creative solutions to achieve the ultimate purposes of that work flow. The idea is a structure for virtual apprenticeship as a step to virtual entrepreneurship. The students would be learning as apprentices would learn but they have a teacher and a reference library in the back room, always on standby to help, to explain, to provide the context for the activity. And the student can roam free in these libraries, in these departments, in the entire enterprise, even as they have specific responsibilities – a job – in respect of it. Topics are covered “in class”, which is 3 hours a week. The company is a 24/7 operation that happens asynchronously for the most part, although the groups could meet via video conferencing as they see fit. Students will be dealing with different “topics” at different times depending on their department and the work that they are doing. For example, the business affairs department will get to the topic “legal issues” before the marketing department, and the reverse is true. In this way the class is learning more organically, less linearly, creating many more points of view and various ways of looking at the same issues. This is a much richer way to learn and much more individualistic as well. It causes the student to develop as an individual more quickly by playing to their own strengths and shaking their “interests” like a snow globe, so that they are all floating around them at once, making it easier to choose where they want to start, but always aware of where they are in the bigger picture, including the other elements/topics that they need to know about in order to fully understand the world they are in. Classroom as enterprise and enterprise as classroom makes both better places to be, and they both improve as a result of the reflection of the other. Academic integrity is enhanced and respected and enterprise is elevated to be more thoughtful, fully integrated, and better organized. Theory is tethered to practice and practice is made perfect by the application of theory and accumulated knowledge. This makes for a humane and efficient world, where learning is prized and art and commerce co-exist to the betterment of the economy and the culture.

Expert in Business Planning and Entrepreneurship Comes to Class

cathy — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 14:10:57 -0700

Expert in Business Planning and Entrepreneurship Comes to ClassI invited a guest speaker to class the other night and he showed a video about entrepreneurship. It was structured around the eight characteristics of an entrepreneur: • Wants to work for themselves, doesn’t want to work for someone else • Can communicate and is organized about it • Isn’t afraid of taking risks • Sees opportunity and takes it • Understands the need for innovation and innovates • Overcomes adversity, doesn’t take no for an answer • Knows how to sell themselves and their ideas • Ready to fight for what they believe In academia this is called “entrepreneurship”. In the language of business and government, it’s also called “small business development”. In the language of art, it is called “artist”. Who possesses every one of these characteristics? How about every musician and every artist we know? You can’t be an artist or a musician without these characteristics. 1. Artist and musicians work for themselves even when somebody else is paying them for their individuality. They are inner driven, inner directed, self-inspired and value-driven. We live in the DIY world because everyone CAN do it them selves. There are no barriers to entry in the music business. Any kid with a laptop and a guitar can be a record company and a publisher. There is a perfect match between these opportunities and the character of the musician and the artist. There is a perfect match between the tools of creation, marketing and distribution and the fact that the musician and artist can create “content”, songs, books, paintings, and all other types of intellectual property, out of their imagination. 2. The whole point for the musician and the artist is communication. They are compelled to write something, to create something, to play gigs, to perform music, to display their work, to broadcast it, share it, post it, build it, dance it, and otherwise communicate it to other people. They CRAVE performance, the stage, and communication, and they can certainly organize themselves to achieve it. Musicians and artists are organized because they have to be organized in order to perfect their craft and their skills. The practice room is where the musician makes a beeline approach to achieving a specific goal. Musicians and artists understand method and problem solving. They may not be organized in ways that their friends and family fully appreciate, but at what they do, they are naturally organized. If they weren’t they’d never make any progress. That’s why they make good lawyers – they understand method and they can define goals and devise ways to achieve them, and they don’t stop until they do. Like music and art, markets are conversations, especially suited to the applications of technology and the personal platform provided by the Internet. Therefore, musicians, as natural communicators, are natural marketers. But do they think of themselves as this? No. Many might even frown at the mention of the word. That’s not their fault, nor is it the word’s fault. That would be the fault of ignorance, and easily remedied. Let’s start by changing the name to “sharing”. How’s that? Better? The point is, its all part of the same person, one person who’s natural abilities make them good at music along its ENTIRE journey, not just the expression of it. 3. Risk? Musicians and artists take risks every time they walk on stage, perform a new work, write a new work, or display a new work. They are taking the ultimate, personal risk, and they do so full-throated and with abandon. If they make a mistake, they make it loud. And since they know what it is to prepare for a performance or a display or a book, they are not reckless so much as fearless. 4. Opportunities to musicians and artists are everyday occurrences because they create their own. And they are members of a community that they create and that offers them opportunities as individuals. The opportunities of community come from the very nature of the artist’s work. Artists create fans and followers. They create virtual communities and the communities of public performance. They join existing communities and they connect to them in multiple ways. And these communities offer opportunities to the artist and to the musician in terms of affecting and changing these communities in a cultural sense as well as the economic sense: selling them something! Seizing opportunity for artists and musicians comes naturally. It’s how this action manifests itself that is the question, and usually where the business training comes in. 5. What is music and art if it isn’t innovation? Innovation is the whole point. Originality is an essential character trait for an artist and all artists struggle to seek their own “voice”. And it is with that voice that they will create. And the drive to create is the drive to go deeper, to understand more, and innovate on the most basic and human levels. Creativity is just another word for innovation. It is another word for life. Innovation is the sine qua non of the entrepreneur, and musicians have this in their DNA. Musicians may not think of themselves as innovative in the business sense, but innovation is something that creates value and attraction. It is a business for someone. There are two consequences to the innovation of the musician: creative and artistic progress and advancement as an artist, and new businesses and products based on monetizing intellectual property rights. 6. Artists and musicians live with adversity and often with opposition to what they do; without appropriate recognition or financial remuneration. They not only accept adversity, they are able to deal with it day in and day out. And they will not stop. You cannot prevent them from doing what they do or being who they are. You may as well tell a leopard to change its spots. Artists and musicians do not take “no” for an answer and they are generally quite stubborn. But they have the work ethic and creative output to back it up. The inability to take “no” for an answer defines the musician just as it defines the entrepreneur. 7. Artists and musicians are selling when they walk on the stage, sing a song, show a painting, publish a book, or design a building. They are keenly aware of their markets because often their markets are sitting right in front of them. And if those markets don’t like what they’re hearing or seeing they will let you know. And if they do, they will let you know that too. They will clap, criticize, sell, buy, sing your praises, boo, carry you on their shoulders, throw crap, hate your guts, and steal everything you put out. Artists and musicians walk that thin line of pleasing the market and leading the market, of ignoring the market and changing the culture. They are astute in this sense, whether they choose to abide by the market’s decision or not. And when they don’t, they apply for a grant, engaging a whole other market to please, and much harder to influence (better to have fans). In the long run it is much harder to talk people out of money than it is to make it by selling something. 8. Artists fight the fight daily and although they might not be ruthless about it and fiercely competitive with one another, they are certainly ruthless and fiercely competitive with themselves. Artists fight the battle of self-improvement, self-doubt, of creating the new, of balancing their egos and psyches on the foundations of the timeless masters of the past. In that sense they are fighting history to make history. Artists are genetically driven to produce, reproduce, survive, create, and fight. Like a mother to her cub they are to their art. And if you’re not careful, they will bite your hand off. Need any further convincing? Can we agree that musicians and artists are natural born entrepreneurs? The word “entrepreneurs” describes the character of a person; it sums up their personality. An entrepreneur is a type of person. But entrepreneurship is also a business discipline, a structure of rules and experientially derived formulas and doctrines. And that is the side of it that musicians and artists don’t get. Entrepreneurial acts (“look ma, I made my own CD!”) are a good thing, but running a small business is another. We must show artists and entrepreneurs how they can apply business doctrine and the discipline to their natural character. An entrepreneurial approach involves setting goals and making plans to achieve them, including a way to measure the progress of this process. An entrepreneurial approach involves defining what excellence is on every level of what you do and devising a way to achieve it. An entrepreneurial approach involves constant improvement in not only your art but also your business. You’re always looking for ways of doing better, of improving and innovating in your business just as you do in your art. An artist or a musician can use their creativity to bear on the way and what they create and on the way and what they do in relation to that creation. It’s all the same. Musicians are not two people doing two different jobs, they are one person being who is already entrepreneurial and a creator of intellectual property. The only thing that separates them from realizing their fullest potential in both respects is information. But once they have that, they are good to go. Business is divided into disciplines: management, marketing, finance, economics, and international, and there are many subheadings: strategic planning, statistics, human resources, decision-making, accounting, etc. When you think about the activities of a typical musician who plays gigs, or an artist who shows her work in a gallery, or author who gives lectures and goes on promotional tours, you will see all of these elements present in some form. But artists do not think or know that they possess these essential business abilities and sensibilities. Let’s tell them! Let’s draw them a picture: idea committed to medium (write it down!) creates a copyright creates business. And it’s automatic. “You didn’t know till I told you, now I told you, now you know.” There’s another side to this equation as well. As luck would have it, in addition to being a born entrepreneur, the musician and the artist can also create an endless flow of intellectual property to which the exclusive rights of copyright attend. And these rights, the right to make copies, to distribute them, to publicly perform and display the work, the right to make derivative copies and control the digital transmission, create businesses, almost all of the businesses of the entertainment world. They create record companies, publishing companies, performance rights organizations, and printing presses. They create radio stations and libraries, and they create YouTube, MySpace, Facebook, etc. The songwriter becomes a business by writing down the song or recording it on their cellphone. There’s no box to check or form to fill out. The act of creation creates the rights, the act of registration creates the remedies. We must each our young musicians to “register” their copyrights and we might also tell our legislators to get in the game and make this process extremely cheap, easy, and online. That would be one way to encourage respect for intellectual property: make it easier to be officially recognized. Interesting confluence of circumstance: entrepreneur creates own renewable product line out of thin air. That’s a license to print money, folks. You not only have someone with the perfect character for the job, they can create their own intangible property with very tangible results, including profits and revenue in multiple ways. So what are you waiting for? Monetize those rights! Maybe you should start by making a list of them and the “goods” or “services” that are inherent in what you do. There’s a market for everything. “The Long Tail” tells us that. All you have to do is have as many products as you can reasonably handle and reach those people who might care about them. And that is a matter of finding communities of the shared values and planting yourself right in the middle of it. Connecting with people of shared interests and values is not only a great virtue of the Internet, it is a great opportunity, including a marketing opportunity. It’s all about who knows you, not who you know; it’s about connecting personally with people who care about what you do. It’s about social networking, the virtual community, the live performance, and the detailed attention to all of the opportunities available to you as one who holds all of the cards. And that is one long list of opportunities. Make your list! John Snyder March 1, 2009 Bibliography (2007-2009): The Long Tail – Chris Anderson The Art of the Start – Ryo Kawasaki From Good to Great – Jim Collins The Clue Train – Levine, Locke, Searls, Weinberger What Would Google Do? – Jeff Jarvis The Tipping Point – Malcolm Gladwell Made to Stick – Chip Heath and Dan Heath Groundswell – Josh Bernoff The Lexus and the Olive Tree – Thomas Friedman Never Eat Alone – Keith Ferrazzi Herd – Mark Earls These are best sellers of a certain type but they contain a lot of great information and lead to many wonderfully interesting and useful places and resources. They are concerned with the new technologies and opportunities through media and broadcast platforms. They are theoretical yet practical enough for the young, intelligent musician to read with interest and satisfaction.

Funding For Artists House

admin — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 10:18:12 -0700

Funding For Artists House

Article:

Artists House has been funded by the Herb Alpert Foundation for the past four years. We are now attempting to apply for other funding from various governmental and private foundations. Here is our recent application to the Kauffman Foundation . We are asking our community for their suggestions and advice regarding possible funding opportunities. Please let us know what you think about our approach and if you have any suggestions concerning to whom we could send funding requests they would be greatly appreciated. We’re trying to keep AH free of advertising and free to all users. We are developing ideas to create revenue streams for long term sustainability but we need about two more years of funding (around $400,000) to give us the time and wherewithal to achieve that goal. Thanks for any advice or suggestions you might have. Testimonials that would help us make the argument that we’re having a qualitative impact with respect to our community would be very helpful as well.

Thanks, y’all! John Snyder

Click Here for the Document

Attachment	Size
kf.jpg	7.46 KB

Expert in Business Planning and Entrepreneurship Comes to Class

John — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 12:59:25 -0800

Expert in Business Planning and Entrepreneurship Comes to Class

Article:

I invited a guest speaker to class the other night and he showed an old video about entrepreneurship. It was structured around the eight characteristics of an entrepreneur:

* Wants to work for themselves, doesn’t want to work for someone else
* Can communicate and is organized about it
* Isn’t afraid of taking risks
* Sees opportunity and takes it
* Understands the need for innovation and innovates
* Overcomes adversity, doesn’t take no for an answer
* Knows how to sell themselves and their ideas
* Ready to fight for what they believe

Sounds right. In academia this is called entrepreneurship. In the language of business and government, it’s called small business development.

Who do we know who possesses every one of these characteristics? How about every musician and every artist we know? You can’t be an artist or a musician without these characteristics.

1. Artist and musicians work for themselves even when somebody else is paying them. They can’t help it because they are inner driven, inner directed, self-inspired. We live in the DIY world because everyone CAN do it them selves. There are no barriers to entry in the music business. Any kid with a laptop and a guitar can be a record company and a publisher. There is a perfect match between these opportunities and the character of the musician and the artist. There is a perfect match between the tools of creation, marketing and distribution and the fact that the musician and artist can create “content”, songs, books, paintings, and all other types of intellectual property “product”, out of their imagination.

2. The whole point for the musician and the artist is communication. They are compelled to write something, to create something, to play gigs, to perform music, to display their work, to broadcast it, share it, post it, build it, dance it, and otherwise communicate it to other people. They CRAVE performance, the stage, and communication, and they can sure as hell can organize them selves to achieve it.

Musicians and artists are organized because they have to be organized in order to perfect their craft and their skills. The practice room is where the musician makes a beeline approach to achieving a specific goal. Musicians and artists understand method. They may not be organized in ways that their friends and family fully appreciate, but at what they do, they are naturally organized. If they weren’t they’d never make any progress. That’s why they make good lawyers – they understand method and orgainzation and they can define goals and quickly devise ways to achieve them, and they don’t stop until they do.

3. Risk? Musicians and artists take risks every time they walk on stage, perform a new work, write a new work, or display a new work. They are taking the ultimate, personal risk, and they do so with abandon and full-throated. If they make a mistake, they make it loud. And since they know what it is to prepare for a performance or a display or a book, they are not reckless so much as fearless.

4. Opportunities to musicians and artists are everyday occurrences because they create their own. And they are members of a community that they create and that offers them opportunities as individuals. The opportunities of community come from the very nature of the artists’ work. Artists create fans and followers. They create virtual communities and the communities of public performance. And these communities offer opportunities to the artist and the musician in terms of affecting and changing these communities in a cultural sense but also in the economic sense of selling them something. Seizing opportunity for artists and musicians comes naturally.

5. What is music and art if it isn’t innovation? Innovation is the whole point. Originality is an essential character trait for an artist and they all struggle and seek their own “voices”. And it is with that voice that they will create. And the drive to create is the drive to go deeper, understand more, and innovate on the most basic and resonant levels. Creativity is just another word for innovation. It is another word for life.

6. Artists and musicians live with adversity and often with opposition to what they do, without appropriate recognition or financial remuneration. They not only accept adversity, they are able to deal with it day in and day out. And they will not stop. You cannot prevent them from doing what they do or being who they are. You may as well tell a leopard to change its spots. Artists and musicians do not take no for an answer and they are generally just stubborn as hell. But they have the work ethic and creative output to back it up. The inability to take no for an answer defines the entrepreneur just as it defines the musician and the artist.

7. Artists and musicians are selling when they walk on the stage, sing a song, show a painting, publish a book, or design a building. They are keenly aware of their markets because often their markets are sitting right in front of them. And if those markets don’t like what they’re hearing or seeing they’ll let you know. And if they do, they will let you know that. They will clap, criticize, sell, buy, sing your praises, boo, carry you on their shoulders, throw crap, hate your guts, or buy everything you put out.

Artists and musicians walk that thin line of pleasing the market and leading the market. They are astute in this sense, whether they choose to abide by the market’s decision or not. And when they don’t, they apply for a grant, engaging a whole other market to please, and much easier to manipulate. In the long run it is much harder to talk people out of money than it is to earn money.

8. Artists fight the fight daily and although they might not be ruthless about it and fiercely competitive with one another, they are certainly ruthless and fiercely competitive with themselves. Artists fight the battle of self-improvement, of creating the new, of balancing their egos and psyches on the foundations of the timeless masters of the past. In that sense they are fighting history to make history. Artists are genetically driven to produce, reproduce, survive, create, and fight. Like a lioness to a her cub they are to their art. And if you’re not careful, they will bite your hand and your head off.

Need any further convincing? Can we agree that musicians and artists are natural born entrepreneurs? The word “entrepreneurs” describes the character of a person; it sums up their personality. “Oh, there goes Sally. She’s entrepreneurial.” An entrepreneur is a type of person. But entrepreneurship is also a business discipline, a structure that his rules and experientially derived formulas and doctrines. And that is the side of it that musicians and artists don’t get. Entrepreneurial acts (“look ma, I made my own CD!”) are one thing, but an entrepreneurial approach is another.

We must show artists and entrepreneurs how they can apply the doctrine and the discipline to their natural character. An entrepreneurial approach involves setting goals and making plans for achieving them, and to measure the progress of this process. An entrepreneurial approach involves defining what excellence is on every level of what you do and devising a way to achieve it.

An entrepreneurial approach involves constant improvement in not only your art but also your business. You’re always looking for ways of doing better, of improving and innovating in your business just as you do in your art. An artist or a musician can use their creativity to bear on the way and what they create and on the way and what they do in relation to that creation. It’s all the same. The artist and musician are not two people doing two different jobs, they are one person being who she or he is. The only thing that separates them from realizing their fullest potential is information. But once they have that, they are good to go.

Business is divided into disciplines: management, marketing, finance, economics, and international business, and there are many subheadings: strategic planning, statistics, human resources, decision-making, accounting, etc. When you think about the activities of a typical musician who plays gigs or artist who shows her work in a gallery or author who gives lectures and goes on promotional tours, you will see all of these elements present in some form. But the artist does not think that they possess the essential abilities of all business school students as well as all business men and women.

“You didn’t know till I told you, now I told you, now you know.”

There’s another side to this equation as well. As serendipity would have it, in addition to being a born entrepreneur, the musician and the artist can create an endless flow of intellectual property to which the exclusive rights of copyright attend. And these rights, the right to make copies, to distribute them, to publicly perform and display the work, and the right to make derivative copies, create businesses, almost all of the businesses of the entertainment world. They create record companies, publishing companies, performance rights organizations, and printing presses. They create radio stations and libraries, and they create YouTube, MySpace, Facebook, etc.

Interesting confluence of circumstance: entrepreneur creates own renewable product line out of thin air. That’s a license to print money, folks. You not only have the perfect character for the job, you can create your own intangible products that very tangible results, including profits and revenue on a massive level.

So what are you waiting for? Monetize those rights! Maybe you should start by making a list of them and the products they imply from the work you do. There’s a market for everything. “The Long Tail” tells us that. All you have to do is have as many products as you can reasonably handle and reach those people who might care about them. And all that is based on the shared values of those people with those who create the work.

It’s all about whom you know, it’s about connecting personally with people who care about what you do. It’s all about social networking, the virtual community, the live performance, and the detailed attention to all of the opportunities available to you as one who holds all of the cards. And that, my friends, is one long list of opportunities.

Make your list!

John Snyder

Attachment	Size
edu.jpg	7.85 KB

Governor Jindal and Small Business Development

cathy — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 11:12:31 -0800

Governor Jindal and Small Business DevelopmentGovernor Jindal and Small Business Development We are all familiar with the Governor's commitment to developing the business community in Louisiana. His determination to bring about ethical reform in all areas of government and civic life have set a standard in the nation and built a necessary foundation for this business development. The Governor's recent comments about the arts and arts funding are depressing to some but not to me. Because to me they indicate a change of attitude that is much needed in the music and arts communities. It is time to depend less on grants and donations and more on our selves and on our native entrepreneurial abilities as they pertain to our native talent. We need the Governor's head, not his heart. We don't want him to believe, we want him to listen and consider, and we want his powerful intellect to be directed to the immediate opportunities that reside in the untapped, native talent of the citizens of his state. What I mean is this: musicians create wealth out of the thin air of human imagination when write a song, perform that song, or record that song. Authors as well and anyone else whose creative works are animated by the copyright statutes do the same. When I write down the words or the melody to a song, it is copyrighted, automatically, and it's not the protection that is important, it is the RIGHTS that are important. The very act of writing down the original song creates the exclusive right to copy it and to distribute it, and even the exclusive right to control the public performance of it. No one can use it, translate it, or broadcast it on the Internet, in Walmart, on the radio, or in a club without my permission. These rights, along with their exceptions, create wealth and jobs. These rights make recording companies, publishing companies, ASCAP and BMI, and all of the ancillary businesses, such as recording studios and CD plants, all members of the extended family of the song. The whole edifice is built on the songwriter. Culture becomes infrastructure. So, musicians are a walking bundle of rights that can be monetized. The very act of doing what they do makes them a business. It is time that they run their businesses more like businesses, and if they can't, find someone who can. But even then, there is no way for an artist or a musician to avoid the fact that they are a business and that their only choice is whether they are going to be good at it or not, make money or not. Talent, it has been said, is our state's greatest natural resource. It is renewable, it is "green", it requires only the infrastructure of the public school system, but otherwise it is not capital intensive. It requires minimal investment in the form of arts programs in the public schools. This is not a luxury, it is an economic necessity. The legislature has passed legislation that mandates minimal music and arts instruction but this mandate remains unfunded. We should not confuse our love for music and art with some sort of warm and fuzzy, constantly demanding luxury. It is, on the other side of it, cold hard economic development. If we could harness 30% of the talent in this state we could create an economic engine that would create jobs, value, and wealth out of the creative imagination of our children and of our friends. We call this the Cultural Economy in this state, and that is no slogan. That is a fact. The creative community of this country, broadly defined creates a third of our GDP. Entertainment is still this country's number one export. Arts = business! Music has defined Louisiana. Louis Armstrong could only have come from New Orleans. In addition to the musician, the artist, the author and the playwright, we need to immediately take steps to empower the music and entertainment entrepreneurs, the people who love marketing and design, sales and broadcast, producing and engineering, law and finance, management and business, as much as musicians love playing their instruments. It is THOSE people, all of those business school graduates, those law school graduates that this state raises up year after year, who could run these companies to market and distribute this endless natural resource of intellectual property. We need to keep a higher percentage of those people in the state. They are leaving the place they love because they find jobs elsewhere. That should be our focus, the government's focus, and, as far as I'm concerned, the purpose of arts funders. It is not enough to give a musician rent money to write a song. You can give her money if you want. But if you want to help artists create sustainable careers, give them some business advice, some legal advice, give them business incubators and the tools to compete, and tell them how copyright law makes them producers of wealth with every breath they take. Fund small business development in arts, entertainment, and the digital economy if you want to fund something. Fund education in the arts and in the business of the arts if you want to fund something. Fund something that has resonance, that keeps on giving, that creates start-ups by the thousands, that builds careers, that inspires people, that harnesses the power that absolute belief can generate. The people we're talking about are already motivated, intelligent, hardworking and dedicated people. Artists are NATURALLY entrepreneurial and are capable of creating an endless stream of "product" based only on their own talent. They are businesses on the hoof. Fund workforce development AND small business development in the entertainment and music fields. This is not an investment that will take years to pay out. The state is filled with musicians, authors, and others with thousands of songs and creative works with thousands of potential revenue streams. This requires no plants be built, it has no negative impact on the environment, and there is no significant capital expense. This is SMART investing. It uses tax incentives to stimulate investment in industries where it's not just about the jobs, it's about the jobs that the jobs create. It makes the best of an existing reality and it projects an incredible return on a minimal investment. A down payment could be a change in attitude. It is the artist and musician who creates the massive and sprawling entertainment world, and it just so happens that we have those people on every corner, in every classroom, and in every performance facility in this state. Tax incentives alone could sustain and kick-start this powerful new industry. We should be aggressive in their use. It's not about the money we don't collect, it's about the money that we will collect. The workforce development programs and the tax incentives that are in place should be broadened and extended. And we need to be creative and innovative in their application and development. But we have the foundation and that's such a great advantage. The music and entertainment worlds aren't just businesses, they are communities of caring and innovative people. What better workforce than one that is inspired by their own beliefs? Lead this powerful army, Governor, towards our shared goals, and what we disagree about will not matter as much as what we agree on: small business development. I know you're taking some heat, Governor, but if you're looking for a bright side it's that many of the citizens of your state are incipient businesses, poised to stimulate the economy of this state, not to mention its culture and tourism. We can no longer depend on the old sources of revenue and we do not want to depend on the generosity of strangers. If you can't think of it as investing in the arts for arts sake, then think about it as small business development. Seen in that light, investing in the arts is the best economic stimulation course you could take. And taking it also puts you on the high ground of championing small business development, the creative power of your citizens, and the necessity of creative education to raise well-rounded, creatively inspired individuals capable of endless innovation (you need to water the crops, Governor). We are fully engaged in the digital economy at this point and these are the growth industries of the future. We can help you lead the way to a dominant position in this new economy, Governor. Help us help our artists and our fellow citizens monetize their passion. Passion moves mountains. Help us replenish this natural resource through education and a dedication to creative thinking as well as critical thinking in our public schools. Help us light up this state in celebration of self-sufficiency and the marriage of art and commerce. Help us create this economic engine that is fueled by the creative work or our citizens and by the digital economy, an economy that will help those citizens create wealth for themselves, employment for others, and cultural value for our society as a whole. That's not just support for the arts and for arts education, that is support for small business development and the power of individuals to make a difference in this world. Thanks for taking the time to read this and I welcome your comments. John Snyder PS Stick with us, Governor, and maybe you'll write a song with the economic impact of "You Are My Sunshine" like your esteemed predecessor Governor Jimmy Davis. That's a billion dollar song, Governor, and we have more where that came from.

Loyola University Music Business Entrepreneurship Program – Module #1: Isolating the Aim and Purpose of Your Enterprise

sarah — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 09:04:10 -0700

Loyola University Music Business Entrepreneurship Program – Module #1: Isolating the Aim and Purpose of Your EnterpriseIn this installment of the Music Business Entrepreneurship Program at Loyola University New Orleans, Assistant Professor of Management Michelle Kirtley Johnston outlines three critical questions to ask before beginning any entrepreneurial venture. Academic experts Brenda Joyner and Jerry Goolsby talk about why it is essential to create a mission statement, explaining what they are and how they affect every aspect of an organization. Goolsby also talks about value systems, and why such systems should supersede policies and regulations. This module concludes with a series of questions for the viewer based on the concepts discussed in this module.

A Conversation about Ethics with John Snyder and New Orleans Inspector General Robert A. Cerasoli

Luke — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 20:13:43 -0700

A Conversation about Ethics with John Snyder and New Orleans Inspector General Robert A. CerasoliArtistsHouse's John Snyder interviews Inspector General of the City of New Orleans Robert A. Cerasoli about ethics – what ethics are, how communities enforce ethics, how ethics figure into good governance of institutions, and how he carries out his role as Inspector General. Their conversation ranges from the nuts and bolts of advocating for ethical behavior from within an institution or government, to placing ethics into context as a branch of philosophical inquiry, to Cerasoli's career as a pioneer in the field of legislating ethical standards of conduct for governmental bodies.

A Conversation about Ethics With John Snyder and Kenneth Keulman of Harvard’s Weatherhead Center

Luke — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 19:48:38 -0700

A Conversation about Ethics With John Snyder and Kenneth Keulman of Harvard’s Weatherhead CenterJohn Snyder of ArtistsHouse discusses the ethical and moral dimensions of international affairs and foreign policy in a frank discussion of the ethics of recent American actions on the world stage.

Loyola University Presents a Seminar in Wellness & Injury Prevention for Musicians

sarah — Tue, 13 May 2008 13:40:50 -0700

Loyola University Presents a Seminar in Wellness & Injury Prevention for MusiciansJohn Snyder of Artists House Music and Loyola University, New Orleans moderates a seminar for musicians in wellness and injury prevention titled “Physical Activity and Music (Be Fit or B Flat),” presented in conjunction with the Joint Commission on Sports Medicine on March 6-9, 2008. The panelists are three members of the Preservation Hall Jazz Band (clarinetist Ralph Johnson, pianist Ricky Monie, and drummer Joseph Lastie, Jr.), who discuss the physical aspects of their craft, such as embouchure and endurance, ergonomics, repetitive stress injury, and other aspects of the chain of physical activities required to play music.

Jason Crosby: Making the Album

admin — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 18:06:03 -0700

Jason Crosby: Making the AlbumIn this section, you can watch a video from the making of Jason Crosby's album, Four Chords and Seven Notes Ago. In this clip, Jason is interviewed about his musical career and the recoding of the album. Jason began studying violin at the age of 2 and piano at the age of 4. He has studied trumpet, viola, violin, French horn, baritone horn and percussion, entered and placed in many musical competitions at an early age and toured most of the world between 1987 - 1990 with The Long Island Youth Orchestra. Jason has been performing for a living since the age of 16 and joined Solar Circus at age 19 - recorded on 2 CDs and toured the country. A wanted studio musician and a live hired gun, Jason has performed and recorded with numerous musical acts in a wide variety of genres.

- ArtistshouseMusic -

Classroom as Company, Company as Classroom

Expert in Business Planning and Entrepreneurship Comes to Class

Funding For Artists House

Article:

Related Links

Expert in Business Planning and Entrepreneurship Comes to Class

Article:

Related Links

Governor Jindal and Small Business Development

Loyola University Music Business Entrepreneurship Program – Module #1: Isolating the Aim and Purpose of Your Enterprise

A Conversation about Ethics with John Snyder and New Orleans Inspector General Robert A. Cerasoli

A Conversation about Ethics With John Snyder and Kenneth Keulman of Harvard’s Weatherhead Center

Loyola University Presents a Seminar in Wellness & Injury Prevention for Musicians

Jason Crosby: Making the Album