I suspect that many artists, when daydreaming, are longing for both fame and fortune. Sometimes the CopyLeft, which feels it's spent too much on music, seems only to want the former for artists, as I've written. I've also argued that the Internet provides new ways for start-up artists to make a name for themselves and even sell their own works outside the traditional major-label universe. I still believe that, but I never said it would be easy.

Take The Scene Aesthetic, two young men from Washington State -- Eric Bowley and Andrew de Torres -- who the Wall Street Journal notes today have become "rock stars on the Web--and virtually unknown anywhere else." Their MySpace page has been visited 2.3 million times and lists more than 124,000 "friends," or links.Their album has been listened to on PureVolume.com 1.3 million times, and a video of theirs has been viewed on YouTube.com more than a half-million times.

So what's the problem?

Well, let me quote briefly from Elizabeth Holmes' story:

Messrs. Bowley and de Torres don't earn any money from the millions of clicks. Fans can't download the music from these sites, but they can listen or watch free as many times as they like. So while the pair of vocalists are scraping by and sleeping on fans' basement floors, their band is getting the kind of recognition in the virtual world that few acts can dream of offline--all without a major recording label or radio play.

They've done it--they've developed a devoted following. They're famous, in a subset of our culture anyway, the Internet. Those who embrace the "Wealth of Networks" view of life should think they're happy; they have produced something that others value and are enjoying, and they're getting recognition. What more could they want?

Maybe to be able to afford a hotel room after a show.

Of course, some in the CopyLeft have argued that paying for music itself is dead; artists should make their money from performing. Well, The Scene Aesthetic is trying. Recent gigs took place in the Wilton (Conn.) Teen Center, Todino's Pizza in Bloomington, Ill., and Blue Ridge High School in Pinetop, Ariz. (I didn't know Pinetop was big enough to have a high school.) Between tickets and merchandise sales (apparently their T-shirts are more popular than their albums, not surprising since their album is available for free online but their T-shirts aren't), they and the two other bands they tour with gross about $600 per gig. Now you see why they crash on the floor of fans' houses.

Bowley is excited about his success and he should be. When I was his age (20) I was in a group that toured the Southwest. We performed at schools, social clubs, malls, anywhere we could get a gig. We made enough to buy pizza and beer, and yes, we crashed on the floors of people's homes. We felt we had hit the pinnacle of success, just being able to fill the van's gas tank and move on to the next gig (you don't want to know what that van smelled like by the end of the tour).

The Scene Aesthetic may have more going for it than my old band. If so, the artists in it deserve to reap rewards for their creativity. The tool for reaping that reward is IP. I have friends in bands that give away their music online; that's a fair way of promoting it. But what will The Scene Aesthetic's fans do if they don't post their next album for free on PureVolume.com? What if they move beyond MySpace and set up a commercial web site with 99-cent downloads or mail-order CD options? Will their fans pony up? Will they accuse Bowley and de Torres of being sellouts? Will they just shrug and search for a new good band on the free sites?

Have we created a generation that thinks music should always be free?

posted by Patrick Ross @ 2:35 PM | Markets: Business, Investment & Innovation

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