(Kevin Kelly)
vo: True Fans 1.000
March 2008
We know that the long tail is good news for two categories of people: some aggregators such as Amazon and Netflix and 6 billion consumers. These last two, I think consumers earn the most wealth hidden in infinite niches.
But the long tail is decidedly mixed blessing for creators. Individual artists, producers, inventors and makers are overlooked in the equation. The long tail does not increase the sales of creators much, but it actually adds a massive competition and endless downward pressure on prices. Unless artists become large aggregators of works by other artists, the long tail offers no escape from the doldrums Sales tiny quiet.
Unless targeting a blockbuster success, what can an artist to escape the long tail?
One solution is to find 1000 True Fans. While some artists have discovered this path without calling it so, I think it is worth trying to formalize it. The bulk of the 1000 True Fans can be stated simply: A creator
as an artist, musician, photographer, craftsman, a musician, an animator, designer, video artist or a writer - as of other words, anyone producing works of art - has need to acquire only 1,000 True Fans to experience his art.
A True Fan is defined as someone who will buy anything and everything that happens. They lead more than 300 miles to see you sing. They will buy the series of luxury boxes republished resolution of your stuff even if they are low-resolution version. They have a Google Alert for your name. They mark the eBay page where your edits appear exhausted. They come to your first. They make you sign their copies. They buy the t-shirt, mug and cap. They are anxious that you publish your next work. They are true fans.
To increase sales beyond the horizontal line of the long tail, we must have direct contact with his true fans. Another way of stating this is that we need to convert miles into a thousand Lesser Fans True Fans. Suppose
cautiously that the True Fans will spend each year, each with their daily earnings to support what you do. This "daily wage" is an average, because of course the most loyal fans will spend much more than that. set that per diem each True Fan expenditure at $ 100 per year. If we have 1,000 true fans, we arrive at $ 100 000 per year, which at least some modest expenses, is sufficient income for most people.
Thousand is a number available. You can count up to 1000. If we added a fan every day, it would take three years. True Fanitude is feasible. Pleasing a True Fan is fun and invigorating. Stay true reward the artist, like the focus on the unique aspects of his work, qualities that are appreciated by true fans.
The key challenge is that we must maintain direct contact with its 1000 True Fans. They give you their support directly. Maybe they come from your private concerts, or do they buy your DVD on your website, or they order your prints at Pictopia. Whenever possible, recover the full amount of their support. It also benefits from the direct reaction and love.
The connection technologies and manufacturing cycle time reduced make this possible. Blogs and RSS news and distill upcoming appearances or new works. Websites host galleries of your past work, archives of bibliographic information, and catalogs of your personal property. Diskmakers, Blurb, rapid prototyping shops, MySpace, Facebook, and the entire digital domain all conspire to make the duplication and dissemination in small quantities, fast, cheap and easy. We do not need a million fans to justify producing something new. Just a measly thousand.
This small circle of friends irreducible, which can provide a livelihood, is surrounded by concentric circles of Lesser Fans. These people will not buy anything we do, and they may not seek direct contact, but it will buy much of what we produce. The process you develop to feed its True Fans also fertilize the Lesser Fans. As you acquire new True Fans, you can also add many more Lesser Fans. If it continues, it is possible that we end up with millions of fans and achieve success. I do not know a designer who is not interested in having a million fans.
But the essential point of this strategy is that we do not need a phenomenal success for survival. We do not need to target the cream of the realm of bestsellers to escape the long tail. There is a middle ground, which is not far behind, where you can at least earn a living. This oasis halfway called 1000 True Fans. This is another destination that an artist can aim for.
Young artists starting out in this digitally mediated world have another path that stardom, a path made possible by technology that drives the long tail. Instead of trying to reach the summits of narrow and unlikely-platinum blockbuster of the most selling and celebrity status, he may seek a direct connection with 1,000 True Fans. It is a destination much healthier to hope. They earn their living instead of fortunes. It is surrounded, not fad and latest fashion, but real fans. And there is much more likely to get there.
few caveats. This formula - one thousand direct True Fans - is forged to a person, the artist solo. What's in a duet, a quartet or a film crew? Obviously we will need more fans. But the additional fans that will be needed are in direct proportion to the geometric increase in the creative group. In other words, if we increase the group size of 33%, one should add that 33% of fans and more. This linear growth is in contrast with the exponential growth that many things growing in the digital world. I would not be surprised to observe that the value of True Fans follows the classical law of network effects, and increases as the square of the number of fans. As the True Fans connect with each other, they will increase their average spending more readily in your work. Thus, while increasing the number of artists involved in the creation increases the number of True Fans needed, the increase does not explode, but gently and increase proportionately. A warning
most important: Every artist has not cut out to keep the fans, or do not want necessarily. Many musicians just want to play music, or just want to shoot photographers, painters, paint, and by temperament they do not want to deal with fans, especially of True Fans. For these creative, there is need of a mediator, a manager, coach, agent, gallery - someone to manage their fans. That said, they can still target the destination of the 1000 True Fans average. They work just as a duo.
Third distinction. Direct fans are best. The number of True Fans needed to make a living indirectly growing fast, but not much. Consider blogging as an example. Because the fan support for a blogger goes through advertising clicks (except occasionally in the case of a box tip), more fans are required for a blogger living from his pen. But while this moves the destination towards the left of the curve of the long tail, it is still far from the land of blockbusters. It's the same for the publication of books. When there are companies dedicated to taking the majority of income from your work, then there need a lot more true fans to support you. Plus an author cultivates direct contact with his fans, plus the required number is small.
Finally, the actual number may vary depending on the media. Maybe it is 500 True Fans for a painter and 5000 True Fans for a videographer. The numbers certainly vary around the world. But in fact the actual number is not critical, because it can not be determined by trying. Once you're in this mode, the actual number will become obvious. This will be the number of true fans that works for you. My formula may be shifted by an order of magnitude, but even so, it is much less than a million.
I examined the literature looking for a reference to the number of True Fans. Carl Steadman, co-founder of suck.com, had a theory about microcélébrités. According to his calculations, a microcélébrité was someone famous for 1500. Thus, these fifteen hundred people would rave about you. As quoted Danny O'Brien, "A person in every British town likes your stupid online comic. It's enough to keep you in beers (or T-shirt sales) all year. "
Others qualify this support microcélébrité micro-philanthropy, sponsorship or distributed.
In 1999, John Kelsey Bruce Schneier has published a model in this First Monday, an online journal. They called the Protocol of the street artists. Using
the logic of a street artist, the writer goes directly to readers before the book is published, perhaps even before the book was written. The author bypasses the editor and made a public statement about: "When I received $ 100 000 in donations, I will go out the next novel in this series."
Readers can go on website of the author, see how much money has already been given, and give money to the cause of the novel to be published. Note that the author does not care who pays to release the next chapter he mocks also the number of people who read the book without paying for it. He cares only that his $ 100 000 prize pool is filled. When it does, he publishes the next book. In this case, "publish" simply means "making available", not "connect and distribute through bookstores. The book is available free of charge to everyone: those who paid for and those who have not paid.
In 2004 author Lawrence Watt-Evans has used this model to publish his latest novel. He asked his True Fans to pay collectively $ 100 per month. When he took $ 100, he posted the next chapter of the novel. The complete book was published online for his True Fans, and on paper for all his fans. He is now writing a second novel in this way. It merely about 200 True Fans because it also publishes the traditional way - with claims to a publisher backed by thousands of Lesser Fans. Other writers who use fans to directly support their work are Diane Duane, Sharon Lee and Steve Miller and Don Saker. The game designer Greg Stolze employed a similar model of True Fans to launch two games pre-funded. Fifty of his true fans have contributed to the seed capital development costs.
The genius of the True Fan model is that fans can move away from the artist depths of the long tail to a degree beyond what their numbers suggest. They can do this in three ways: buying more per person, spending directly, so that the creator keeps more for each sale, and enabling new models of support.
The new models include support micro-patronage. Another model is the pre-funding startup costs. Digital technology allows the fan support takes many forms. Fundable is a web project that allows anyone to raise a fixed amount of money for a project, while reassuring supporters that the project takes shape. Fundable holds the money until the full amount is collected. They repay the money if the minimum is not reached.
Here's an example from the site of Fundable:
Amelia, a classical soprano singer of twenty years, has pre-sold her first CD before entering a recording studio. "If I get $ 400 pre-orders, I will pay the rest [of the studio costs]," she told potential contributors. The model all-or-nothing Fundable has guaranteed that no customers would lose money if it missed its target. Amelia sold over $ 940 in albums.
thousand dollars will not keep alive even a broke artist for a long time, but with sustained attention, zealous an artist can do better with his True Fans. Jill Sobule, a musician who has enjoyed a respectable amount of followers in many years of touring and recording, is doing well by sitting on his True Fans. Recently she decided to go to his fans to fund professional fees of $ 75,000 she needed for her new album. She lifted almost $ 50,000 for now (translator's note: article dated March 2008) . In the direct support through their sponsorship, without gaining intimacy with their artist. According to the Associated Press,
Contributors can choose a level of pledges ranging from "rough stone" $ 10, which entitles them to a free download of her disc when it is done, the "level Plutonium weapons "to $ 10 000, where it promises:" You get to come and sing on my CD. Do not worry if you can not sing - we can fix that on our side. " For a contribution of $ 5,000, Jill Sobule said she will give a concert in the donor's home. The lower levels are more popular, and donors can gain things like an advanced copy of the CD, a mention in the CD booklet and a T-shirt identifying them as "junior executive producer" of the CD.
If one does not earn his living from real fans, are the usual possibility of poverty. A 1995 study showed that the price we agreed to pay to be an artist was important. Sociologist Ruth Towse sounded artists in Britain and determined that on average, they earned below the poverty line.
What I suggest is a space for creative between poverty and be a star. Somewhere in the stratospheric realm of bestsellers, but higher than the darkness of the long tail. I do not know what is actually the right number, but I think an artist could cultivate 1,000 True zealous fans, and their support using new technology, earn a decent living. I'd love to hear from someone who sailed on such a path.
Updates:
An artist who is partially dependent on True Fans responded by revealing its finances: The Reality of True Fans DEPENDING ON
I realize the results of my investigation into the artists supported not True Fans: The Case Against 1000 True Fans
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