Observations

I spend a lot of my time just trying to figure things out in Second Life. I feel most people don’t really observe what is happening and then react to it. They seem to have a hypothesis and just pretend it’s real.

Let’s ask some questions and then I’ll share what I’ve observed.

Why do venues pay fees?

I’ve play a lot of show for tips only. There was a time when I said I would not seek or accept a fee, but after someone insisted I do so… it’s kind of hard to turn you back on money.

I’m sure some venues pay fees just because they respect the fact the artist deserves to be compensated for their time. That seems reasonable enough. But if it were just a matter of fair compensation, why would there be different fees?

Why are some artist worth 3k L$ per hour and others worth 6K L$ per hours? Are the 6K artists twice as good? Not from what I’ve observed.

In most cases the higher fee is paid to the artist that has the biggest draw. The venue owners are buying visitors. Note, not customers, but visitors. While the more visitors a venue has the more likely it is to receive tips, the fact remains that in 99.99999999% of the time, these tips the venue collects doesn’t even cover the fee they pay the artist that draws the crowd.

Since there is no sound commercial sense to paying a huge fee, I have to conclude the reasons are more abstract then profit motivations. If there are 100 fee-paying venues, they probably have 100 different reasons they pay fees.

What conclusion is safe to arrive at with this observation? Well, don’t sweat the fees. They only amount to a few dollars either way. If a good venue offers you a “tips only” show and some strip club offers you 4K for an hour of your time, I would recommend the good venue (if it was an “either or” situation). People go to a music venue because they are interested in music. People go to a strip club because… well your guess is as good as mine, but I think they are less interested in music. Your support group has more long-term value then some fee will ever provide.

Music Management in Second Life?

Yes, that is a question. For those of you paying attention, I’ve had some dealing with being “Represented” and at this point I can claim some informed opinions about the experience, base of course on my observations.

I’m not a Rockstar in real life, and if I were… that would be my little secret in Second Life. In reality, the Rockstar bar is set pretty low in Second Life. What passes for Karaoke in real life passes as entertainment in Second life. Now there are some people with actual talent in Second Life, but it would be far simpler to list the acts that suck then the act that are amazing.

While you need almost no talent to become a performer, there are still people that lack the most rudimentary talent to make the leap into Second life rockstardom. Those talent less few take up Second life careers in music management.

When you combine insecure, and questionable talent with the utterly talent less brood of music management types, making all kinds of promises, you have a volatile mix.

Now if it seems as if I’m painting all management types with the same brush, perhaps I am. There are probably a few management types that are simply helping out artists they really believe in.

I can only speak with any authority about my specific situation during my short association with “Mars needs Puppies”, or “Many nobodies pretending”, or “ Moody needs Prozac”, whatever MNP really stands for.

I gave it a try… it didn’t work. Should I say more? Probably not, but if you know me at all you must know I am going to say more.

I’m often accused of being arrogant. I don’t see myself that way at all, and frankly those that point a finger and angrily grunt out “ARROGANT” confuse me. I see myself more as very secure about my music. You either like it or you don’t. If you like it, I think you have remarkable musical taste and if you don’t like it…well, you probably enjoy your gold medals from the Special Olympics. Different people like different things. I like my music; I listen to it all the time.

From the “Get go” I met the Queen of MNP and she gave me a laundry list of things to do, and if of course didn’t do any of them. We should have both parted ways shortly after that first meeting. But we didn’t. I think we were both trying to give each other a fair shake.

I know by the end of December I was trying to figure out a polite way to end the…relationship. I feel Moody was probably doing the same. I was not going to be one of her submissive “Do what I say” type artist, and if you wonder why I was so resistant to her suggestions, well frankly, they all sounded stupid. Perhaps that is how I earned my arrogant tag, questioning Moody.

But this is not about my checkered past, but rather the value of management in Second Life.

Most venue owners are easy to get along with. Communication is pretty simple in Second Life. I seem to keep my calendar full without representation. I’m pretty sure most artists could do as well without representation.

I think when I agreed to work with MNP I was expecting some kind of comprehensive plan to help me attain my goals. That is what management does in real life. I didn’t get that. What I did get was a few gigs that paid a fee (last one being in a strip club…good going Moody), and being followed around by MNP Pod People.

My experience with management in Second Life indicates to me it’s pretty much pointless. At least in my case it is. What I want is pretty simple. Play my music and try to find people that want to listen to it. I don’t really need representation to prop up my ego, because believe it or not, it’s not about my ego. It’s about my music.