BUY: The Option Gallery

hello
first of all, this:













for a long time ppl have been dazzled by the question what will be the new business model for music. now, since i know whatever god forsaken business model ppl will find for music in the future, i won't be included in the deal, i say, fuck that. i need my own solution and i figured one out. BUT - i am not claiming THIS IS THE FUTURE. in fact, as you are reading this sentence which comes after the previous one, it becomes somewhat "the past", don't you think...?

._.

humor...

well anyway, in advance let me say: i don't encourage anyone to follow in my footsteps. no one. nothing. not even a single lizard.

thing is, at the age of 33, after trying many options, i kinda realized that unless money is involved, i don't really have a use for an audience. it's not that i don't like you, or don't like you liking my stuff, but hmmm...well...

my stuff ain't for dancefloors usually, and ppl never really get what i'm trying to do. nevertheless, ppl do get the most demeaning ideas as to what i'm about after hearing my shite, which makes me feel rather sick...and...and in the end of the day, i must confess, the audience gives me nothing back. nothing i need, nothing i want, nothing i relate to.

but at the age of 32, well, i kinda realized it: I NEED MONEY!
on the other hand, i will continue doing music regardless of ppl's mercy

SO

the question becomes: why in heaven's name should i let you hear my stuff?
and the answer will be: because you will pay for it

sounds simple, only problem is: why the FUCK will you pay for it?!?
the innocently silly answer: cause it's mine (...?...)

o.o

o_O

O_o

x_O

x_x

...RIGHT...

i mean, i know NO ONE with his/her right mind today will pay for something they can get for free. if you do, then you're a sucker. truth be told, i wouldn't. i'm cheap. cheaper than you. BELIEVE ME.

SO

i guess i'll just have to force your hand. not that i plan on getting rich or anything like that. i just need to somehow make this "releasing music" thing make sense.

" FREAKIN' HOW?" you might ask.
well,
you can get any piece of music for free these days, right?

right

so,
guess i'll have to take that away. since i gain nothing from simply letting you hear it (because my music is so "difficult" for ppl apparently...

...

...while listening to 140 minutes of ambient noise that sounds like an underwater fart through a distortion IS NOT "difficult"). so i guess i have to set my own equation of "profit".

it's a question of availability. you see, if no one has it, no one has it. no one can "share" it. of course, ppl might say, if it's not there, why should ppl care for it?

?

answer: you don't really seem to care much for it anyway, do you, HONEY
if you did, you would do something else...
something...
hmmm...
i don't know....
money jumps to mind...
invitations to play for some honest pay...
yeah..
something that reminds me of my interests...
could be nice...

but you don't
so if you have anything to say
shut up

ok

ok look
the way i see it, this whole idea of paying artists for doing art has two main approaches:

1. economical

in this approach an artist maintains some sort of business model to make art a livelihood. the artist somehow keeps a written or unwritten contract with the audience. the artist follows this contract to avoid the risk of being economically "punished". this sort of approach, when applied to music can come in the form of having a contract to perform in some venue every day or every week, make commissioned music, create club hits, produce music according to specification, etc etc and so on and so forth

the fundamental idea here is that art is a craft. the artist has a talent which is exploited within some greater business model. the artist works for someone's interest. the artist does not work for the sake of art. the artist may be allowed to put some individual message within his/her work, but even if such message is allowed, this message may never be more dominant than the so called "contract" the artist has with his/her source of income. this would be like biting the hand that feeds you. the artist would either get a slap on da tush, or get kicked out the door and to the motherfuckin dogz.

well, this approach really does not fit me. don't want to go into the reasons why, but if you know me already, you'd know "that's not what i'm about". so fuck this

NEXT!

2. cultural

this approach is kind of the opposite of the first one. the idea here is that artists can "make things" that the audience wants, but only the artist can define. the ppl will pay not to satisfy any pre conception of what the artist does. the ppl pay because they know that the artist knows something they don't and they want to find out what it is.

the business model is kind of "flipped" as well. the works of art cannot fit in any existing business model, simply because no entrepreneur can have a clue what that work will be (and neither can the artist, most of the times). instead, ppl pay to enrich their somewhat "intellectual possession", as it in itself carries a potential (not excluding an economic potential).

to put it simple the artist is payed to innovate. to realize ideas only the artist has, in as many aspects as possible: the message or the way it is formulated, preferably both.

this is "the official version" of this approach. but to be fair, in actuality this hardly ever happens. there's always a "fashion code" to determine which innovations are "breakthroughs" and which are more or less irrelevant. still, this approach does exist. in a way, this is how some galleries or museums operate...in principle.

now, i am not saying i'm the most innovative artist around. i am not saying what i am going to do will work either. but since the economical approach really doesn't fit me, i decided to refine a model for future releases, based on the cultural model. to translate the concept of "a gallery" to my music and to the interwebz. i call this "the option gallery". let me explain what it is.

first i need to translate the terminology:

1. the gallery - naturally, i don't offer any paintings or visual works. i'm a musician. furthermore, a gallery is something you can close off. a place you can ask admission to. well, i can't ask for admission on the interwebz. it doesn't work this way. if some piece of music is available somewhere on the intrawebz, it's available everywhere and for everyone who wants to have it. i can't close the doors of the gallery. i can't "demand" that you pay to listen for what is in the gallery. therefore, i guess the gallery is simply this website. it's free of charge, open 24 hours a day, every day. free for everyone to download whatever i put on my website (spasm, reptyl, triptyl, loki, etc). there's stuff i cannot give away due to digital distribution rights i do not have (hellsounds, dragon, retrofit, "v"), but apart from that you are free to take whatever you want. and it's my job to maintain this gallery, and i do it out of my own pocket and with my own free time.

2. the gallery visitors - that's you. simple, but there's a twist. it's "you", but it's "you" in plural. you see, financially speaking, a single visitor to the gallery is equal to me to all the visitors combined. if one person has an mp3 version of a song i did, i must accept the possibility that everyone will have it too. i can't sell music to one person, and expect it to be kept in safe hands. this basically means, that i can either sell a song to one person only, or to everyone. i can't separate a group of ppl that has rights to listen to my stuff, from ppl that don't have such rights. i mean, i can say "you son of a bitch, you didn't buy the right", and join the rest of the musicians still living under a rock. HOWEVER, what i can do is set the price so high a single person will not want to share my stuff, and i will explain this option later.

3. paying admission - WOHA! i just said everything in the gallery is for free, so where the fuck can the term "admission" be applicable here? well, i didn't lie. everything available in the gallery is available for free. including free snippets of songs i finished and have not let anyone listen to. these snippets will be like a "coming soon" catalog. you can hear what it's about, think if you like to hear it in full...but...it will not be available in full form. if you will be interested that my gallery will purchase this new song i made, THEN you will be asked to vouch that you will pay admission once the gallery indeed purchases it. i will later explain how this will work.

4. purchasing an artwork - a little thing that galleries are kind of known for is that they offer works for sale. you can purchase the work, and keep it all for yourself. now this is a tricky one. i just said that i can't separate those who have "the right" to listen to my works from those who do not. indeed, i cannot. BUT YOU CAN, and that's the trick. if i have a song i finished, i have the ability to choose not to let anyone hear it. and this is the only right i can control. i can choose to give up this right and let everyone hear a new song, or i can sell this right to someone else. of course selling this right to someone else is much more demanding of me than simply letting everyone get a new song, and the price a potential buyer will have to pay to purchase this right will be higher accordingly. however, there's a problem. once i put a new song in my gallery no one with a right mind will want to purchase it. still, paying a high price to purchase a work you only got a snippet from, that's just crazy.

BUT FEAR NOT!

i found a solution for this as well, and will explain it later.

5. a work on display - when a gallery has a let's say a painting, the good thing about it is that you get to see it in it's true form. you can inspect every brush stroke, most of the times there's an inscription, sometimes even a little story to explain the background of that work. well, once a new song has been "purchased" by the gallery, i will give you all that. each song i will put in the future will feature all the stuff i already put on my site with the web release of loki, and quite possibly, even more. you'll have the song in FLAC format (meaning cd quality), a lyric and commentary video on youtube, a FLAC quality remix kit. the shit. you will simply HAVE IT. now, while i can choose to remove a work from display, this will not be in my favor. i'll lose my credibility with you, while everything i already put on my website could easily be distributed for free all over the web via other third party channels. so i don't have much to gain from not keeping my part of the deal. as for you, well, as i will explain later, you won't have a way to back down from your "admission fee", so everything's cool on all sides.

ok,
enough terminology for now

let's say you think this idea is cool
let's say that
yeah...

but
how it will work?

well, it goes like this:

1. i finish a song

2. i post a new page on my site with the following items:
(a) a one minute mp3 snippet of the song for download
(b) some quotes of the lyrics
(c) a commentary video explaining the message of the song
(d) an open fund for that specific song

3. now you take action:
(a) you have the option not to listen to the snippet, or listen to it
(b) you have the option to put 5$ on the fund. this money will not be taken unless the fund reaches it's goal amount (meaning, no money will be taken from you if the song is not "purchased" yet by the gallery). each person contributing to the fund will have the option to be credited on the site within a list of contributors for the song purchased by the gallery.
(c) you have the option to purchase exclusive rights over the song. now, since a potential buyer will want to hear it in full BEFORE deciding to purchase this song, this potential buyer will first need to hear the finished track. therefore, in advance any potential buyer will have to match the fund goal amount, just to get to listen to the full song (the fund of course will be canceled, and no one else but this potential buyer will be charged for anything). then, if this potential buyer will want to purchase all other rights, he/she will have to pay the full amount. otherwise, the song will be added to the gallery for all to have for free. this is the financial risk any potential buyer will be taking, to match the risk this potential buyer will simply leak the song. the purchase itself will be followed with a written contract signed by me, which will include penalties on my part, if i fail to keep my side of the deal. in both cases this potential buyer will have the option to be credited as the person who either bought or funded the purchase of the song of the gallery.

final details will be explained in the future, but for now i can tell you the prices:

each fund will require at most 85 ppl paying admission (5$ each).
why 85? well, it's simple. as you probably know 8:5 is considered "the golden ratio", one that is most appealing for the senses. furthermore, if you multiply 85 by 5, you get 425, meaning i will receive 425$ for each song i release, which in israeli currency roughly translates to 1300 NIS, a hundred times the number of the devilz. i simply don't feel that after 17 years of music making, i should release a song that not even 85 ppl would find worthy of 5 dallaz. i can make it, i can love it, but there's no point in putting it on the interwebz (and the way i see it, these days, giving a song away to a monk in siberia is as dicrete as putting it on mp3db.ru). 425$...this is the price you would pay for an unknown artist's painting, and you are getting a song i did, after doing much more than a student just out of art school, so i think the price is fair. if you don't feel like getting to hear a song you want to hear is worth 5 bucks, then don't pay.

to purchase a song you'll have to pay 10 times the fund goal, meaning 4250$. and why? well, simply because i have to give you all rights over it. i can't make another version of the song, because that would be fraud on my side. unlike let's say, a painting, remaking a work for me is nothing but a push of a button. so you purchase the rights not only for the song i already did, but also for all future versions of it. there's still the question whether or not i'll be allowed to perform the song. probably not. only rights i will get to keep will be:

(a) to play the song in my home to ppl (provided they do not record it or recreate it)
(b) to say that i am the artist who made it.
(c) to keep the mp3 snippet, the quotes of the lyrics, and the commentary video available on the site (as it already had been posted, and in a time where websites take contents from other websites, removing it will not matter when it comes to exclusivity).

there will be no refunds, but if i will not keep my part of the contracted i will be fined. the fine will be written in the contract. i'm thinking something like 8500$, meaning double the price paid by the buyer. of course the buyer will have to prove i broke the contract, and for such amounts, i guess we'll have to go to court. to be frank, i don't believe anyone will purchase a song, but maybe. i will have to formulate all the final details of this option.

however, if a song is added to the gallery, i get to keep all rights but exclusivity. i can later make new remixes of the songs and put them up for download. i can perform it, and anything else i want to do with it. i can remove it from my site, but if i'll do that, well, i'll be shooting myself in the foot for future songs, so what's the point.

still, i will have to change the ways i do things. and by that i refer to a new policy i will be taking from now on: the bunker policy. what "the bunker policy" means is that if you were used to be getting free stuff from me, as visitors to the site or as friends (and i mean all friends), well i won't be doing that anymore. as long as i will decide to proceed with this "option gallery" idea, nothing will leak to anyone. if for some reason a song will leak out in full, there would be no reason for ppl to believe other songs won't leak as well, and i can kiss this idea goodbye.

as for the message thing. yeah, i like strong messages, and that's why i will post the commentary video before the fund reaches it's threshold goal. this will do good both to let me express my ideas, and to raise your curiosity to hear the actual song.

i know that this all sounds very strange to you, but the thing is, i have nothing to lose. existing models never seem to work for me, and if "the option gallery" won't work, well, nothing changes as far as i am concerned. the way i see it, i expect this idea will not fly until there are at least 5 - 8 songs available for "purchase" by the gallery. but when you will see i am not bluffing and that there are songs i've finished which you simply can't get, things might change. i don't expect that all the songs i will offer to the gallery will be "purchased". that's fine. i will make whatever music i want to make, and you will get what you will really want to get, and nothing more. if nothing will be sold, at least it will keep me occupied.

as far as implications of "the option gallery", well, it's quite obvious that i am practically killing the concept of "albums". no more ptyl albums. evolution. i mean, seriously, today albums are quite obsolete. albums are not heard as full pieces by the audience, and mostly, albums are a collection of songs of variable quality. not everything is worth a listen. so there's no real sacrifice as far as i see it.

and as for the price. well, you might be thinking 5$ for each song, that's like 50 bucks for 10 songs... 50 bucks for a fucken album?! that's fucking expensive, right?

wrong! each person might be interested to hear only one new song i put up. this person will pay for that song, while other ppl will pay for other songs. eventually, it just might be possible that you will only have to pay 5$ in all, as other ppl will pay for you, simply because they were more curious than you. if you are not interested at all to pay for a song and don't mind waiting, maybe you won't need to pay for anything as other ppl will be less patient and pay for you. but one thing you will know, and it's that:

(1) there's no middleman - you are paying me directly
(2) you are not alone - you won't pay anything unless there's around 84 other ppl just like you

well, 85 is the minimum amount since i'll be taking at least a 5$ admission fee. still it might be possible that some enthusiastic fan will decide to pay more. in that case less than 85 ppl will be required.

anyway, as for now, you can catch all the music already in the gallery from this page. just click on the "try" buttons to download. i will update the site to look like a "gallery", in the future, once i'll have new songs on offer

so that's all for now.
i will probably fix and change this post several times in the future, so expect changes

love
ptyl