Entrepreneurship and Art

Comedians' works are streamed and broadcast across Spotify, YouTube, Pandora, SiriusXM, and more. However, unlike music where royalties are paid for two copyrights (composition and master recording), Comedians have only ever been paid royalties on the recording of their performance, not on the underlying literary work (equivalent of a composition). Jeff Price, founder of Word Collections and previous founder of Tunecore, Audiam, and more is setting out to fix that by helping comedians license and collect royalties owed to them for their unlicensed literary works.

Dan, George, and Carly talk about what life post-COVID may look like. Will conferences stay virtual? What about livestreams and concerts? Is it finally VR’s time to shine?

Dan, Carly, and George talk about what it means to be an industry plant, if that matters, and how it impacts people’s perception of your talent or art. They also touch on the complexity of separating great art from bad people, and what it means to be privileged. George learns about papayas.

George, Dan and Carly discuss the much-discussed Phoebe Bridgers guitar smash on SNL and the different standards women and men are held to in the music industry. They also get into Sony’s purchase of AWAL and, while unsurprising, what it means for musicians and the publishing space.

George, Dan and Carly talk about how the rebellious nature of movements like Occupy Wall Street led to the GameStop trading frenzy. The three also share their first impressions of Clubhouse and talk through how they intend to use it — in real time! Some other exciting announcements are made like the new Female Founders branch that Carly will be spearheading.

George, Dan, and Carly talk about why Spotify may never make a profit with their business model, how smart contracts could be the key to social media moderation at scale, and the importance of imbuing ethics into your business proactively versus reactively. Carly forgets how many weeks are in a year.

Carly, Dan and George look back at the year and have compiled their collective top three things for different categories. If you ask George, which no one did, 2020 was the year of reflection, of getting to it, of George’s confusion, of not making much money, of pleasure, of notebooks, of sourdough, of the ‘gram, of disintermediation, a year like no other, of Zoom, of joy, the year TV and movies really came into their own, of consistency as a KPI, of One Direction, the year we learned that rules are meant to be broken, the year people loved the internet, of pour over coffee, and—drumroll please for Dan’s contribution—the year of the rundle. (You’re welcome, Josef)

Carly’s back and migraine-free for E&A’s 30th episode! In this episode, Dan, Carly and George debate the merits of working for startups vs more established companies, what employee retention rates mean for a company’s culture and bottom line, and how the career path trajectory has evolved over time. They also get into the complicated world of unicorn companies, VC funding and useful idiots.

While artists and creators should always be searching for organic, non-paid methods of reaching new audiences, paid advertising is a reliable way to put your art in front of a large audience. In order to reap long-term rewards from these ads, artists need to go a step further in strategizing how to use advertising to build a passionate audience.

This episode covers where to advertise, who to advertise to, what type of content to use in your advertisements, and how to measure your ads,

Peter Lockhart takes Carly’s place and does a dang good job! He speaks with Dan and George about the importance of preserving music as a crucial part of our history and his own career trajectory that has included everything from, but not limited to: Wolfgang’s Vault, Morocco, Biden (yes, the Joe Biden), and now Erroll Garner. The three also discuss the importance of artists owning their music and retaining creative control, and the difference between marketing music versus other products.

Dan, Carly and George get funky in this episode as they delve into mental health, how to be more zen, George’s trough of despair which he has gotten mathematical with, and the importance of getting closer to your customers. They also share their first guest article and announce the next book club book!

Dan, Carly and George share some of their favorite, or at least most watched, movies, and talk about what a Trump media company (heaven forbid) may look like. Carly breaks her creative block, George licenses his first song from RAIDAR, and Dan shares advertising tips for creatives. For the first time ever, there is an overlap in the three things too, and it’s a very well-deserved double mention.

Dan, Carly and George talk about the convergent thinking that happens when artistic and technical genius meet, the difference between pivots and random acts of “improvement,” the unlikely rise of Crocs in the fashion world, and the different distribution models offered to musicians. They also talk about how to be your own hype person and share some of their favorite instrumental soundtracks.

George, Dan and Carly get into social media algorithms, when to fire a customer, lessons learned on the job, and self actualization. George continues his incredible writing streak, and Dan shares some of his new favorite tools while Carly struggles to follow along.

George, Dan and Carly celebrate the first week they have all published a new piece in ages (accountability jars work, folks). They also talk about the link between MTV and podcasts, the best and worst of email providers, Antifa, and Carly’s plans to become the resident E&A research writer.

George, Dan and Carly talk about different media revenue and business models, the job to be done of local media, how to avoid innovator’s dilemma, and how the pandemic has changed our routines, wants and what we value.

E&A’s first intern, Josef, joins Dan, Carly and George to talk about what George is like as a professor, lessons from other podcasts, and high profile music copyright cases. They also get into royalties and record contracts, including Kanye’s, the Oracle TikTok back door deal, how important value statements are, and RBG’s legacy.

This week Carly, George and Dan get into what leads people to cults, what an exit strategy can tell you about your product-market fit and values, and George tries (unsuccessfully) to validate the idea of making gimp bracelets or macrame instead of writing and publishing articles.

In this audio article, Dan makes the case that artists should drop the traditional music release cycle and instead adopt a business model more akin to media companies. By releasing content more consistently, artists will have more revenue-generative opportunities and more meaningful connections with fans.

George offers his gift of culinary wisdom around blue cheese dressing. If you’re looking for the more marketing and music-focused discussion, skip ahead to around the 38:00 minute mark, but don’t tell George. Dan, George, and Carly talk about how to involve fans in the creation process, the network effect of different platforms, and barriers to creation.

This week, E&A partnered with the Boston Managers Group to present a National Independent Talent Organization (NITO) panel featuring some of the biggest names in the live music world. Click the buttons at the top of this email to watch or listen to the panel and scroll down to learn more about NITO's mission to support the live music industry during the pandemic.

Dan and Carly go rogue for a special duo episode to talk about transatlantic travel, letting your metrics guide you to new learnings, setting up social media ad campaigns, and how and why they made the choices they’ve made around E&A’s personas.

Carly, George, and Dan discuss Quibi’s failures, how to make business education better for all students, the dopamine hits of battle royale games, and Carly’s interview with Cindy Gallup.

We’ve got a mini-episode for you today, recorded during George’s weekly office hours where he invites listeners to hang out on Zoom.

George, Carly, and Dan talk about their productivity tools, core competencies vs competitive advantages, why people must wear pants (and masks), and public performance rights.

How to build an audience from nothing, Ben & Jerry's vs. Häagen-Dazs, Hey vs. Apple, Live Nation's baffling announcement, and Carly's new "How to Build Your Own Personas" article. 

In this episode, we announce the new Entrepreneurship & Art slack channel, answer a listener question about Intra-band Agreements, and George shares his love of Doritos and the Cockney accent.

Carly, George, and Dan discuss the viability of making a living from streaming royalties, "seeing the elephant", and the latest E&A articles. Also, George goes down a YouTube a rabbit hole, and we discuss our unjustified aversion to Joe Rogan.

Carly, George, and Dan discuss the Black Lives Matter protests, George’s interview with Zoë Keating, Dan’s panel for the Recording Academy, Carly’s upcoming persona article, and how we encourage each other and hold each other accountable.

Copyright law, quarantine hair, investing, music distribution, Alec Baldwin, and pickles. Just another day with Carly, George, and Dan.

Carly and Dan try to convince George to do Karaoke. George explains why “Stop, that tickles” is an important phrase to know in different languages. More importantly, they discuss new revenue opportunities for independent musicians including private live streams and fan subscriptions.

Carly and George get jealous about Dan's new t-shirt. They also discuss Little Richard's passing, the first "Ask Us Anything" segment, "nudge" tactics and behavioral economics, and pivoting to video.

Carly, George, and Dan talk about the Women of Sex Tech Conference, Travis Scott’s Fortnite activation, their Bandcamp shopping hauls, and they discover a new use of the phrase “in other words…”

The following is a letter George Howard, Music Business Professor at Berklee College of Music, wrote to his students after they learned that the college would stay closed for the remainder of the academic year.

by George Howard: "I’ve long held that the good business person and the good Buddhist both look at the world unencumbered by past biases. In this way, business people avoid innovator’s dilemma-type pitfalls as well as keep from falling prey to Dunning-Kruger (mis)assumptions."