Preparing New Techdirt CwF+RtB Offerings, And Extending The Crystal Ball For Those Who Bought

from the cooking-in-the-kitchen dept

We haven’t talked much about our very own CwF+RtB offering in a while, but when it launched in the summer of 2009, one of the items was the Techdirt Crystal Ball, which gives you a peek into some posts on Techdirt before others have a chance to see them — and it’s become a popular feature for many. The deal was that it was a one year offering, after which we hoped people would renew. However, as we started to get close to that one-year deadline, we were working on some new ideas for new CwF+RtB offerings… and we didn’t want people to feel compelled to re-up without us offering any additional “reason to buy.” So we (quietly) extended anyone who bought a Techdirt Crystal Ball (which came with most other offerings as well) by a couple months.

Unfortunately, it’s been a busy couple of months… and one of the reasons why we still haven’t released the new offerings is that some of them actually involve some backend development on our part, which is ongoing. After realizing that we weren’t going to have everything we wanted in place by now, we’ve actually extended everyone’s 12-month Crystal Ball for an extra 12 months — and we hope that when we’re ready to release the new offerings, you’ll find them worth buying as well.

In the meantime, as we’re working on new offerings, I did want to see if anyone had other ideas of what they’d like to see as an offering. No promises, of course, but we’re already planning to incorporate some user suggestions, and it would be great to hear about what others might find compelling.

Filed Under: crystal ball, cwf, cwf+rtb, rtb, techdirt

Guardian Tries CwF+RtB, While Experimenting With Hack Day Event

from the cool-experiments dept

With our upcoming Techdirt Saves* Journalism event to be held June 16th at Google’s offices, we’ve been looking deeper and deeper into stories of newspapers doing interesting things. The Guardian, over in the UK, has been pretty adamant that a paywall is a bad, bad idea, and has, instead, been looking into some more innovative business models. In fact, it recently announced a premium membership program that sounds quite a bit like the whole CwF+RtB formula that we’ve talked about for quite some time — and which (of course) we’ve experimented with ourselves for a while now. Back when the NY Times was exploring options, it also had considered a similar system, but chose to go with a straight paywall instead.

The Guardian’s offering is that you pay £25 per year and you get a variety of scarcities outside of the content of the paper (which remains free). Those scarcities include things like newsroom visits and events involving journalists and editors (i.e., the scarcity of “access”) and other offers as well — such as tickets to various cultural events. Unlike the various paywall efforts out there, none of this is about locking up infinitely copyable content, but about using that content to make scarcities, like access, more valuable and giving people a real reason to buy. It’ll be interesting to see how well it goes. I like the basic idea of it, though I think they could do some more to segment their audiences.

That’s not all The Guardian is doing. At the same time it announced this Guardian Extra program, it also held a “hack day”, where the Guardian asked various media partners to ask for certain tools or features, and folks would try to create them using the Guardian’s open platform. The results (for a quick two day hack event) look pretty impressive. It’s pretty cool to see these sorts of experiments going on in news organizations, rather than the typical “woe is us” complaining.

If you’d like to talk about these ideas and many others (as well as hopefully come up with some new ideas for what news organizations, both new and old, can do going forward), I hope you’ll consider attending our Techdirt Saves* Journalism event. Sign up for here, if you haven’t already:

We look forward to seeing you there.

Filed Under: cwf+rtb, journalism, premium services
Companies: the guardian

Photographer Makes One-Third Of His Living Expenses Off Only 94 Fans

from the cwf+rtb-works-here-too dept

Jim Hein writes “a very well known Fine Art photographer is using the CwF+RtB model. He breaks things down into actual dollars and cents. He has figured out how many “True Fans” he needs to make a living.”

Photographer Ctein’s “Contributor Program” gives his fans the opportunity to collect his prints and allow him to focus on creating. He shared the latest results:

Make no mistake, I didn’t get anywhere close to 1000 True Fans (didn’t expect to), I got 94. But those Contributors provided me with approximately $15,500 gross revenues, $12,500 net. That’s about one third of what I need to live on, not a life-altering level of support but certainly a life-enhancing one that provides me with considerably more time to work on my art — the point of this.

Even though the tiers start at only $9.50 a month, his average sale was around $165 — demonstrating that he has given his customers a real reason to buy. Additionally, Ctein recognizes that his subscribers are his most passionate fans, so he takes this as an opportunity to further solidify his connection to them:

Last winter I offered them about a dozen extra dye transfer prints from the first TOP print sale at an extraordinarily low price, and super-cheap copies of my photo restoration book before the new edition came out. They also got advance notice of this year’s print sale.

Offering exclusives is one of the ten scarcities that we’ve discussed before, so it’s great to see it in practice. The other lesson that Ctein learned from his experiment is that, yes, it does take work. He now has to devote about 3 days a month dealing with the administration of his subscriber program. That said, spending 3 days a month on something that provides 1/3 of your living expenses seems like a worthwhile investment. And this is only in the first few months of launching his program — if he’s able to improve the performance, he could do much better. So yes, it’s exciting to see photographers embracing the CwF+RtB concepts and making them work.

Filed Under: cwf+rtb, photographer, true fans

Modest Success Is Still Success For Indie Bands

from the Musicians-Wanted dept

A few months ago, we wrote about the band Pomplamoose for its unique way of making a living by selling its music digitally. The musical duo playfully connected with fans, sold homemade soap, and even encouraged listeners to give goats to charity. More recently, the band has gained more attention and was accepted into YouTube’s Musicians Wanted program where YouTube offers a 50/50 ad revenue split with independent artists who use Google’s video platform. Pomplamoose fan Joseph Johnson also points us to an interview with the band in which they describe their creative process and talk a bit about how they manage without the backing of a major label:

Ms. DAWN: I mean, if you can’t just do it all yourself, then you do need help. If, for example, you’re somebody who writes songs, like Lady Gaga, and you need everything, you know, that’s going to make you Lady Gaga, then you need a big, fat label. But if you’re just a band, I don’t think we’re in an era anymore where you need that sort of major backing.

Pomplamoose admits that the band doesn’t cash $10 million royalty checks for its music, but that its two singers make a modest living doing what they enjoy doing. They don’t play in clubs too much and haven’t gone on tour because it’s a lot of work for them to set up live shows. Actually, given the way they record their music videos, they don’t really know how to play their own songs in a “normal” linear way without editing and remixing. And interestingly, they seem to be making enough to pay for the mechanical rights for the songs they cover.

Mr. CONTE: … we make sure that we have all our ducks in a row. We bought mechanical licenses to all of our covers before we put them on iTunes. So it’s all legit and legal.

So despite criticism that says bands like OK Go have failed and can’t make it without a label, the reality is that more bands are able to create more music — and are getting paid in a variety of different ways. Selling plastic disks isn’t the only way to make a living. Touring isn’t the only way to make a living. Selling T-shirts isn’t the only way to make a living. And Google ads certainly aren’t going to save every struggling indie band, either. In fact, there is no silver bullet for how a band can support itself. Simply put, the barrier to become a famous band has dropped considerably, but that doesn’t guarantee success — however, it makes it a lot easier for a much broader array of musicians to try to become professionals doing what they enjoy.

Filed Under: cwf+rtb, music industry, pomplamoose, successes

More Movies Trying Out Tiered CwF+RtB Support Models

from the fun-to-watch-this-in-action dept

We’re getting so many examples of content creators making use of CwF+RtB business models lately, that it’s difficult to figure out which ones are worth posting. Mostly, of course, we’re still hearing about the music industry, where these sorts of models are becoming more common, but here are two interesting ones that are in the movie business, where such models haven’t been as common. The first, pointed out by rosspruden is about a Spanish film called The Cosmonaut which has a few unique features surrounding it. Ross listed them out:

1. the filmmakers are releasing their work under a CC license to let others mix and reuse their film.
2. the film is fully funded from fan donations (so the film never needs to turn a profit)
3. profits are generated from sales of scarce goods
4. fans are allowed to invest in the project for real financial profit (not virtual profit), which isn’t allowed according to SEC regulations (yet)

The fan funding element is definitely interesting — though I’m still not convinced that investing for real financial profit really works that well in these situations. As we’ve seen with things like Sellaband’s problems, those can have downsides as well. Money is one incentive, but certainly not the only one. And, with crowdfunding projects, it often seems like giving the crowdfunders financial (as opposed to non-financial) incentives can lead to problems. People get less into supporting the content creators and then start worrying about what they might get back out of it. This isn’t to say it can’t work, but it has pitfalls. Still, either way, it’s definitely nice to see the Creative Commons license on the film, and the plan to let others not just watch it, but remix and reuse the film.

The second example comes from Ryan Estrada, who is involved in a project to create an animated romantic horror-comedy that is using a crowdfunding model as well, with the focus on being able to get “in the movie” in some manner.

This isn’t entirely new. We’ve seen some other movies do the same — and even just the idea of getting your name in the credits (the cheapest option) was something that filmmakers like Kevin Smith have done in the past (though, not for money). However, I think this actually works especially well in an animated movie. One of the (quite reasonable) concerns that filmmakers have expressed in hearing about fan funding movie projects that involve “get a part in the movie” is that this could seriously diminish the quality of the movie if the fans can’t act. But with an animated film, the idea is that you send in an image, and then an animated “you” shows up in the film. That seems to work a lot better, and to build a real connection with the fans.

Again, I’m not saying either of these will be success stories, but they’re two recent attempts at trying something new in filmmaking, and both seemed worth mentioning and discussing here.

Filed Under: crowdfunding, cwf+rtb, filmmakers, movie industry
Companies: sellaband

Prince Discovers That If You Charge People To Connect With You, You Actually Have To Connect

from the well-that-didn't-work dept

If you’ve never seen Kevin Smith’s long, but quite funny, explanation of his week of making a documentary for Prince, it’s quite worth watching — just to get a sense of “Prince World” and the way Prince will have big ideas that he starts, but never does much to follow through on. With that as background, it’s really not surprising to read about the absolute disaster that his recent “fan club” business model experiment became:

The result, LotusFlow3r.com, resembled a galactic aquarium, featuring doodads like a rotating orb that played videos. The promise: fans who ponied up $77 for a year-long membership would receive the three new albums, plus an ensuing flow of exclusive content, like unreleased tracks and archival videos.

A year later, LotusFlow3r has gone dark, thousands of Prince’s fans are very annoyed and Clay has been dismissed from Prince’s kingdom almost as abruptly as he was invited in.

The mess got a lot more attention lately when a supposed “glitch” (uh, ok…) started automatically charging fans credit cards for membership renewals, despite the fact that the site had gone dormant and people had specifically asked not to have their membership renewed.

There was a point, a few years back, where it looked like Prince would be the first rockstar to really embrace these sorts of new business models. He definitely was doing all kinds of experiments that involved getting people to pay for scarcities, often while giving the music away for free. And many of the experiments looked like they were done in a way to better connect with fans. But it quickly became apparent that Prince was missing a big element in all of this, in that while he wanted to connect with fans and give them a reason to buy, he also wanted to be massively controlling about it.

The one thing that artists who are successfully embracing these models are discovering is that, in part, you have to go with the flow, and see where your fans take you. Part of the connecting is listening to the fans, rather than just telling them how they must enjoy your works. Prince has never been particularly good at that aspect of the fan relationship. We’ve talked about the value of improvisational business modeling, where you do regular experiments — and Prince certainly does that, but at no point does he seem to pay attention to how the fans react to the improvisations.

In the end, he seems entirely focused on his own whims, and while that may be entertaining for himself, it appears to be pissing off an awful lot of fans. If you’re Prince, and you’ve got fans to spare, perhaps that’s fine. But it’s hardly a model worth emulating.

But there’s a bigger point here as well. If you’re trying to use a CwF+RtB-style business model, you have to actually connect with fans in some manner. You can’t just leave them high and dry. Is that difficult? Sure. Does it take work? Absolutely. But isn’t that part of the point? The value that’s built up from genuine connections is what makes these business models work. Taking people’s money and then leaving them feeling empty handed may be the way the recording industry used to work, but it’s not the path forward.

Filed Under: cwf+rtb, kevin smith, prince

The Christian Science Monitor's Bold (And Successful) Experiments

from the doing-it-right dept

Reader cram points us to a paidContent post by John Yemma, the editor of The Christian Science Monitor, in which he makes a lot of great points about digital strategies for news publishing.

A year ago, we ceased publishing the daily, 100-year-old Christian Science Monitor newspaper and launched a weekly magazine to complement our website, on which we doubled down by reorienting our newsroom to be web-first. Our web traffic climbed from 6 million page views last April to 13 million in February. Our print circulation rose from 43,000 to 77,000 in the same period.

This is the sort of bold move that might be the last hope for some struggling publications, and it’s also an example of CwF+RtB. Magazines still hold value to readers as an attractive physical item in a way that newspapers don’t—by connecting with fans online and then giving them a better reason to buy the print product, CSM increased the readership of both.

Those who defend newspapers out of nostalgia often cite the relaxing Sunday newspaper as a reason the medium should survive, but what they fail to realize is that there’s no reason that experience has to die along with the cheap daily rag. If there is genuine demand for it, publishers will supply it, and smart publications will shift their focus to improve that aspect of their product, just like CSM did.

Yemma also warns against putting too much stock in “digital razzle dazzle”: multimedia for multimedia’s sake, deployed with little or no thought given to its purpose or effectiveness. The editorial and design aspects of print news have been evolving for decades; digital news must go back to first premises.

The multimedia debate needs a new question: How are we using technology to create a more relevant product? We’re not going to “save” media by out-featuring each other. We can and will re-cement media by using the technology to deliver the experience consumers want most: intelligent, meaningful news that’s accessible where they are in the moment.

Hopefully it isn’t too blasphemous to say: amen to that!

Filed Under: cwf+rtb
Companies: christian science monitor

Jill Sobule Goes Into The Studio With CwF+RtB

from the rock-on dept

Singer Jill Sobule was one of the more high profile musicians to successfully embrace a crowdfunded album using a tiered approach, successfully raising the money for her last album in less than two months. Sobule was kind enough to participate in our own CwF+RtB experience and even wrote up a nice guest post for us as well. In talking with both her and her manager, what came through was that the two of them really were working hard to understand this new world and how to thrive in it — so I’ve been excited to see what they would come up with next. Of course, that’s a bit misleading, because Jill’s been constantly communicating and connecting with her fans via various social networking platforms, but now she’s launching a small scale, but fun experiment in recording her next album: which is that she’s selling a very limited number of tickets to spend time in the studio with her and John Doe (and apparently some surprise backing musicians).

What’s cool is that the different ticket offerings are well targeted for different types of fans. There’s an all day pass for musicians who want to experience the entire process of making a professional album. There’s a “creative patron” level that skips the morning setup, but picks up with the afternoon session, and finally there’s a “music lovers” level that focuses on just the actual recording part. The goal of the offering by itself isn’t to get rich, but to add some cool, valuable, scarce reasons to buy that also serve to better connect with fans. It seems like a cool experiment, and I’ll be excited to see how it turns out.

Filed Under: cwf+rtb, jill sobule

Roger Ebert Gives People A Reason To Buy

from the after-connecting-with-fans-for-so-long dept

Last month, we wrote about Esquire’s incredibly moving profile of Roger Ebert as part of our discussion of a segment of that article concerning Disney taking down the video of the tribute show for Gene Siskel that Ebert did right after his longtime sparring partner passed away. If you liked the Esquire piece, you should also check out Will Leitch’s touching personal story about Roger Ebert, which shows how incredibly nice Ebert had been to Leitch very early on in Leitch’s career (and how Leitch screwed it up in a regretfully rebellious moment).

What comes through in both pieces is how utterly nice and decent Ebert seems to be. After the Leitch piece ran, Ebert tweeted to Leitch that “all is forgiven.” For decades, tons of people have connected with Ebert through his old television show, and through his movie reviews, blogs and columns. More recently, he’s been connecting in a big way via Twitter as well.

And now he’s trying something different. He’s giving his fans a reason to buy. While we often talk about the whole CwF+RtB business model in the context of replacing traditional models — such as for music, books and movies, it can clearly work in other areas as well. Our own curiosity led us to try setting up our own CwF+RtB offering — which was a fantastic success (and, yes, we know we need to replenish and offer more — hold on, it’s coming).

So we’re always glad to see others jumping on the bandwagon and trying similar ideas as well. In Ebert’s case, it’s The Ebert Club, which is a yearly subscription that grants you additional access and benefits for a mere $5. A lot of what you get is available for free, but there are some good scarcities in there — including private discussion threads and early access to special Ebertfest events including a special meet-and-greet with Ebert himself.

It sounds like they’re looking to do more as well, so it will be interesting to see what comes of it. There aren’t any tiers — it’s one price fits all — though I could see room for a tiered offering down the road as well with additional benefits (private film screenings with just club members?). But what it’s really showing is that this whole concept of connecting with fans and giving them a real (scarce) reason to buy goes beyond what you might expect — and opens up all sorts of new possibilities elsewhere as well. And, considering that Leitch’s “falling out” with Ebert was over Ebert being the king of “old media,” this sort of venture seems very, very new media.

Filed Under: cwf+rtb, fan club, roger ebert, scarcities, subscription