Hi Ryan, On Mar 18, 2013, at 6:22 PM, Ryan Tanaka <[email protected]> wrote: > The landscape as it stands now is very freelancer oriented -- one-time gigs > here and there, short-term contracts -- works that are made very quickly, > with speedy efficiency, and lowered cost. The things you see on Youtube > these days tend to reflect that kind of intensity, and it's become acceptable > for works to be a little rough around the edges, without any deeper meaning. > But the practice of recruiting talent with the long term goal of *developing* > their art towards a broader vision tends to be missing at the moment. > "Artist Development", as its called, has been gutted out of the picture in > the aftermath of the tech industry's quest to "remove the middleman", so to > speak.
Fascinating. I didn't realize that Artist Development was a well-honed process in the artistic world. The "Valley" mindset is that you: get your basic degree hustle to get your first gig work to pay the bills during the day while polishing your art at night make or find your big break My vague understanding of Hollywood was that it worked the same way, and that "the industry" wasn't really of any help. Is that wrong? My interpretation of the "Valley" approach to talent is that we're simply shifting the balance of point 4 away from "find" (you win the lottery because someone takes a chance on you when you are unproven) to "make" (you can build your own brand cheaply enough you don't need someone else to pick you). Would you disagree with that model? What are we missing? > The tech sector right now seems to be obsessed with the quick-returns of > social media -- though that model will probably collapse some time soon > because it's become over-saturated and people are now starting to realize the > vapidness of a lot of these so-called "innovations". Yeah, social media is already "way over" as an investment opportunity. Mobile apps are the current bubble. :-) > The good news is that the leadership seems to be aware of this (I read a lot > of articles by tech leaders full of lament as of the late) and that real > innovative concepts are projects that might take 10-year spans or more. My personal opinion: most of the tech leaders lamenting the lack of innovation are full of BS. :-P Yeah, there's a ton of activity focused on froth and getting-rich-quick. That has ALWAYS been the case. And there's still people working quietly behind the scenes doing amazing stuff that will fundamentally transform the world down the road. In fact, a lot of them are hiding in plain sight, but because it doesn't LOOK like world-breaking innovation nobody's paying attention to them. Duh. > What a lot of people don't realize is that art works the same way too -- that > artists need the same piece of mind as other people in order to give them > focus that they need in order to hone in on their craft. You've completely lost me. The most cutting-edge artist I know personally is a homeless marine vet who invented his art in prison as a (partly-successful) attempt to maintain his sanity. Sure, large corporations like ten-year business plans, but from everything I've seen that sort of thinking tends to *reinforce* mediocrity. Up here in the Valley, the people we expect to change the world are those insane enough to live on the brink of chaos and survival as part of a startup. "Peace of mind" isn't exactly something I associate with entrepreneurship. > I've always felt that all the Valley has to do is extend their culture of > meritocracy onto content producers, and the rest would probably take care of > itself. Will it happen? Maybe. They have an opportunity to replace > Hollywood as a whole (in its weakened state), or at least give them a run for > their money in terms of producing quality content. The tech and startup > people I keep in contact with right now are mostly among those looking to do > that. Ah. Perhaps you're talkin about "having a stable platform to target" rather than "a personal guarantee of stability." Is that what you mean? My man Horace Dediu calls this the app-ification of storytelling. http://www.asymco.com/2011/12/12/hiding-in-plain-sight/ > What these signals point to is Apple defining the TV as an iOS portfolio > product. This means integration with iTunes, including an app store. This, in > turn, means unleashing developer/creative talent through new monetization > opportunities. This means new user experiences in discovery. This means > FaceTime-like communication through the TV. This means many other things but > mostly it means that the TV will be a platform product. The idea it that individuals with a passion and a story to tell ought to have a lightweight way to: create their art market it to a size-able audience make enough money to sustain their efforts Is that what you mean by "extend their culture of meritocracy onto content producers"? If so, then from my perspective that is exactly what the Valley is trying to do (eventually). But the only way we know to do that it is to, as you put it, "remove the middleman" -- that is, replace a costly gatekeeper with a cheap platform. Is that not what you want? -- Ernie P. -- -- Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community <[email protected]> Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
