Musician’s own website as definitive source of all info
Musicians spend too much time entering their data on multiple websites. Filling out forms. Uploading MP3s. Uploading photos. Entering dates and venues into concert calendars. Pasting lyrics and bio. All those stupid profiles scattered around the web, which of course will soon be outdated unless they’re constantly updated.
Some outside sites say, “We’ll manage all your data!” — but I don’t want to go to yet-another-website to enter all of my data, and trust them not to go out of business. In fact, I don’t want to enter my info anywhere but my own website!
So, I think the musician’s own “.com” homepage website should be the one-and-only place the musician ever has to enter their info. It should be the sole definitive source for their music, photos, bio, lyrics, calendar, blog, and especially their fan/friend/email list.
Then it’s the web hosting company’s job to spread that info other sites.
How it works for the musician:
- Log in to your own website.
- Recorded a new song? Upload the master-quality audio file
- While it’s uploading, enter the song info: name, copyright, credits, lyrics, sample-start-time, etc.
- Booked a new show? Enter the date and venue info.
- Have a new photo or bio? Enter it just once in your site.
- That’s it. You’ll never need to enter that info or upload that song ever again.
You own all your data, and your web-host makes it easy to get a backup any time, like mailing you a USB drive.
Then your web-host can do the boring copying:
Your web-hosting company gives you some simple options.
Do you want us to send this to... [x] Facebook [x] iTunes [x] Amazon [x] Instagram [ ] Napster [ ] Pandora [ ] Spotify [ ] ReverbNation
You’d give them your account details for the places where you already have an account, or at the others, they could create an account for you.
Best of all: all of this extra service is included for free in your basic webhosting package, as thanks to you for choosing to host your website there. Assuming the standard web-hosting rate of $10-$20/month. They don’t need to take a percentage of sales or anything. The $10-$20/month webhosting fee has plenty of profit margin to cover everything.
How it works on the back-end:
For some websites, the distribution can be automated. The web host sends a server-to-server message to the remote company’s servers, adding the necessary info and files. This is how digital distribution of music already works.
For other sites, there can be some quick simple human labor. An employee quickly logs into that site as you, with your permission, and uploads the song, info, photos or calendar, using the super-fast internet connection.
The trickiest part would be copying the friend/fan list from multiple sites back into your one definitive master database of fans/friends.
Because the company does it for dozens of clients per day, they can do it incredibly fast and cheap, so they don’t need to charge extra for this hands-on service.
But where it gets really exciting is for the company to set up an open API where any outside companies can pull information directly from the source!
That way, any new music websites could launch with instant access to thousands of musicians, with the most up-to-date info, and not need to host any of the audio, images, or text on their site. Everything be pulled real-time from your site using the API.
So if you changed a photo, removed a song, renamed a song, or even changed the name of the band, it would all be changed instantly on ALL sites, worldwide.
Hey Derek,
This is something I have been throwing up to developers for over a year now. We attempted to do something similar to Artist Data, except for songs, but the API's for some music services are not very friendly to 3rd parties uploading data like MP3's, it was a programming nightmare. I think it is possible if you look at sites like TubeMogul for video. The idea that a hosting company would provide this is awesome and something I would love to look at.
In the mean time I think if someone made self hosted Wordpress themes that allowed for a lot of this integration, it would at least be a start. We are attempting to knock one out now and hope that musicians see the power in hosting their own data.
Thanks for the thought chain that has got me going this morning.
That is interesting, even if in this way the risk is that all the social networking out there becomes authomated and a little impersonal.
That would also work for musicians "on the road", quite difficult in these times.
Another brilliant idea. I think we're getting close, too. ArtistData has made life much easier and I recently switched from a custom website to Bandzoogle, which I absolutely love. They're constantly updating their features and set-up is a breeze.
Really insightful idea Derek. I began a blog two months ago and have it on blogger. Was easy etc. perhaps I need to talk to my desigern and see what it takes to just move th blog there, rather than fishing for people and then hoping they go to the web site.
Food for thought, many thanks.
Great idea - does Ariel Publicity do this type of hosting?
Nope. Loosely related. I haven't heard of anyone doing this kind of web hosting yet. — Derek
Hi Derek,
Yup I agree with you and I would go one step further and include a couple of other things an automatically constructed sales page with an affiliate program so fans can sell for the band they love. Plus I would include automatic airplay of the latest track on a online radio network.
My company is working on both such additions as well as integrating with Artist Data. So we are on that route already - see we are thinking alike!!!
Paul
Last month one of my songs got 1859 plays on IACMusic.com, something that would have never happened according to this scenario. Also, one of my videos got over 15,000 plays on Yahoo Video, which otherwise does not get very much activity. So, it is time consuming, but I do think that it is worth the effort to post material on other sites that might be considered off the beaten path.
Hmmmm... that would work except for one thing... paying $$$ for "web hosting" when there are so many free sites out there (like mine at REVERBNATION) just goes against my grain!
Most people pay something for their real own “.com” domain website with no advertising. This plan as described would also involve real human labor: people acting as your assistant to update your MySpace, Facebook, and other sites by hand. So there's no way it should be free. — Derek
This is what you did at CDBABY and HOSTBABY ... it was awesome ... true genius ... I entered all my infos and all my infos and CD sales transfered to other sites. One time fee plus percentage of sales ... not bad ... hope they keep up the efforts with the new management. Unfortunately as I've found out with newer (younger) management and was conveyed to me in my last real job ... make your money and get out ... that's what TUV management (idiots that they are)did to a successful registrar of management systems including getting rid of productive and creative older workers like myself.
If ilike were a hosting company that is the closest I have heard of to this idea. They even have an iPhone app packaged plan. Pretty cool for the upcoming, if not already here, mobile world.
~pete
Yep, ArtistData is pretty good (I probably heard about them from you?) and you can even use them to post those darn updates. I love being able to enter my concert dates (although they still don't accept special characters like ö in Köln, but we manage with Koeln) and have them automatically on MySpace and on my own website.
For some reason I get lots more traffic to my MySpace page (and even my profile on allaboutjazz.com) than my own website although its URL is posted everywhere. Guess that's why they're called "social"...
Hi Derek, that's a great idea. I think every musician should have there own site, be there own boss and sell there own music.
www.ridethewave.ca
John Janes
Great Idea!
This would be a great service - sort of like how CDBaby handles digital distribution now. So it would make sense for HostBaby.
And artists need it - I've seen so many musicians who have different bios at different sites. They weren't different on purpose, but just not kept up to date. A single data source could resolve that issue.
Thanks again Derek....I agree that this is an exciting future!...It would seem to me that ArtistData would charge for these services, but I can't find how much on their site...it can't be free...?
I someone builds it... they will come.
Amen brother! I love the features of Reverbnation in the fact that it updates FB and MySpace but I'd like it more if I could access/update everything from 1 site. Right now it's too easy to miss something on 1 of the sites.
To whom do I give my credit card number?
Dude, this is soooooo the way to do it.
This must be a reality, I do not have time or patience to enter my gig
data and such to facebook, myspace and my own .com
and still practice, record and etc...
I scanned the article, but did you also mention the need for
centralized collection of mailing list contacts?
GREAT IDEA!!
-Wil Key
I just recently paid for an over haul of my site and it looks great. They steered me away though from putting music on my site. They thought it better to link it to myspace. They thought it added a bigger feel. After reading your article, I am 2nd guessing this.
I 'love' hostbaby. Apart from the odd hiccup (from me) they've been human, humane and supportive.
I've just exited a sonicbids session in frustration - they do a fine if brutal job via various promoters - BUT I get stuck with simple things like photo size and halleluiah - hostbaby chomp their way through my grossly oversized photos and
1/ make a copy which they tell me is 'HUGE' then
2/make a 'realistic' sized copy suitable for the website.
3/ then give me the option of deleting the 'HUGE' version which, in turn, allows me to feel technologically illiterate instead of just moronic.
I'll have a look at artistdata but I hope hostbaby can match the ideas.
Yes, I've always taught my clients to use their own website as the one central source of all their info -- all the other sites like myspace and facebook are just extended hooks for driving people to the main website.
As for a third party service - all depends on how its executed. I'd rather see all these other sites (or a thrid party) develop simple import/export tools, so that it all stays under your own control.
--Bill Pere
Founder and Executive Director, LUNCH
President and Executive Director, CT Songwriters Association
IMC Indie Artist of the Year
An Official Connecticut State Troubadour since '95
Director, CT Songwriting Academy
Author, "Songcrafters' Coloring Book: The Essential Guide to Effective and Successful Songwriting"
"One of the Top 50 Guiding Lights of the Music Industry" - Music Connection Magazine"
Derek, This to me, is a brilliant idea. I understand some comments about having everything everywhere to increase the odds. However, if you look at a place like Amazon.com, then that argument does not hold up. That place gives you access anything at the click of a mouse. I wish I had the technical ability and know how to do it myself, believe me I would. It would be such a relief just to write music and upload it to one site and let it do distribution, announcements, comment notifications, blog info., etc. And don't get me startded on beginning a website. You either go cheap and have a run of the mill with little flexibility, or you pay for the good stuff and spend hours trying to figure out how to upload an image and put it in the right position. I don't have time for that, I make music, not code. If you have the wherewithall to do this site, consider me on board. Brett
I won't be doing this idea, but I hope someone does. — Derek
Hey I think it's really a great idea for the band, or solo artist that's on the move. I don't think (personally) that it would be profitable for the non performing singer/songwriter. I'm sure I'm not the only one out there.
Guy
I've found that most non-performing singer/songwriters spend even more time on websites, since they're not on the road. So this would save hours of boring site-maintenance and data-entry. — Derek
That would be so awesome. I would probably have a social life again if that existed. : )
I have a website. But it needs some 'overhauling'. So, please send a really cool, qualified and caring professional this way.
Thanx!
Cheers,
Henry.
www.myspace.com/henrysoul
www.myspace.com/henrysoulplayslive
www.myspace.com/henrysoulacoustic
www.iTunes.com/henrysoul
Isn't this similar to what you are planning to do with Muckwork? Minus the hosting.
Also, Dave Jackson from the Musicians Cooler started a service that walks bands - step by step - through the process of build there own site using wordpress. Here is the link - http://www.marketingmusician.com/index.php?afid=13.
I used it to build my site(Planetcorey.com).
Sorry for all the links, Just thought it would help!
Yep. Muckwork will be able to help do the boring data-entry for people. But if the web-hosting company taught their servers how to do it automatically, that'd be best of all. — Derek
the artist's official .com is great when you're dealing with a web design and web hosting company that can deliver, a word of caution when making this decision is to do your homework and ask questions about their longevity and ask for client referrals, inexperienced companies are a huge risk and you don't want to take that chance, it's unnecessary aggravation and I know this from experience, something I often do is check out the whois.com of the company to get a better understanding of how log they have be registered on-line, there are also business offices that can help you find the public record of the company and of course there's good ole search engines that will turn up any BAD PUBLICITY that's found its way online, sometimes you find that info in the later pages of the search items
Ah!, finally someone says and someone does ... Keep on thinking: the same thing would be valid for SELLING your music online. - Just load your tracks on your server, create an XML file for the catalog and share that protocol with any web store you want to work with ... Additional benefit: the artist has finally the control of the downloads. - And maybe that's the reason why the major player won't ever do it.
YES, this is obviously the next step. I've often felt dismayed because my site has everything out there and yet I've got to spend lots of time bundleing and sending all this data to cdbaby etc.when it's all right there but being protected from thieves by my web host so that it can't be stolen, especially since it has an mp3 and CD store on the site, very frustrating. But I can see where this has to be well thought out. But it's time for something like this to happen.
Definitely right about ArtistData - it's the closest site catering to this idea. I like what Brendan has accomplished and a lot of it has been a step ahead of the curve without infinite resources. The adoption hasn't hit critical mass, as most of their traffic seems to be word of mouth. I tell every artist/band about it..
The "pull" implications of the API raise more questions. Would you authorize every website out there to take your data?
Another fabulous idea! Your creative juices "overfloweth" ...
So now we just need to get the right person/people to get this rolling. Hmmmm???
Yes, it's been needed for a while. I'll buy if I don't have to give up my domain name.
Oh , I was going to point out that Reverb Nation is doing this with apps. But they do not host websites yet. But the info you type in there goes to all your pages. Facebook, etc...
I like the idea because there are too many places to update. What I've found useful and free is ReverbNation. There I can post all my media, shows, what have you, and use widgets on my own site, and social networks to display the content. It will even update my status on all my social networks automatically. My site there is http://www.reverbnation.com/mjmmusicgroup
works for me.
great info,,you are right about the time comsuming thing to upload and register in all imposible and possible places
Surely the way to do this is to create a one stop package and integrate all these features - my company is working on most of the described features - who can add more ideas - lets create the model using the power of the crowd - share ideas and lets make it happen together.
I think that if we use collaboration we can achieve anything so lets go for it - if you're into working on this idea lets talk!
Derek can we bounce thoughts and ideas to you and get feedback!
Paul Saunders
Hi Derek,
This excites me, seeing as I have been wanting to centralize my online musical activities for some time.
I never saw the point of having music on itunes for example that will only ever likely be found or searched for by people who already know it exists, so why send them to itunes? I'd rather they got my stuff directly from me then I can say thank you personally and build a fanbase more effectively.
The ideas you describe sound like they could be something you may be thinking of as part of your "muckwork" project. If so I think you're onto something.
I'm currently updating my site to be as interactive as possible, so I can connect more personally with visitors and share my personal message. I'd rather have people going there to subscribe, purchase, chat and download stuff than from an account somewhere else.
The music sites that allow you to upload tracks are great because of the potential to reach more people, but the intention for me is to attract them to my site and for them re-visit there once they have discovered how great it is ;)
As long as bandwidth issues are minimal and economical it would be very convenient to upload songs & videos once and have them stream from one place to any number of profiles out there.
Thought provoking Derek, thanks.
great idea! between the living of my actual life, my social life, composing, arranging, recording, performing, myspace, icomp, reverbnation, jango, facebook, etc, etc, etc. the days grow long and i grow tired. i loose steam, drive and ambition.
this could work! i'd even be willing to pay for it 8-)
john
I do integration for my 'day job' using XML, SOAP, etc. When one application changes, it sends a message to other apps who have subscribed to the message. I love the ideas of public APIs and even common user profiles.
And of course every musician needs his own website, email autoresponder and even shopping cart.
Derrick you are spot on with your opinions! I can't stress enough how vital a dot com is for an artist. The logical reason however why so many bands only have a myspace is because it's free. There is nothing more annoying and unprofessional than to have to go to an artists myspace page to get details. I've always Maintained a dot com; it's accurate, professional and quite easy to update. Try building your own using blogger.com.
Hey Derek, Great idea.
The part that keeps me from being the guy who brings the macaroni to the Mensa meetings is that I can't wrap my head around the age old problem of how to screen user generated content in a cost effective manner that prevents people from claiming Beatles masters are their own or to ensure meta-data is properly entered etc etc...
Rick
musiciancoaching.com
Hello Derek,
I have hostbaby account about 1 year. and Myspace and Facebook as well.
All you say is great. It is really save my time.
waiting for hostbaby 3 !
Great ideas, as usual.
Before getting into it, I was thinking that it was going to be an article about how, as artists, we should basically just worry about making sure that our official sites are up-to-date, and not be so concerned with updating every little stupid profile that we don't even remember that we have any more. I was thinking that, in this age of too many social networking / music hosting sites, we should not concern ourselves with too many of them, as all this work just takes the life out of us.
Perhaps there will be a return to the band/artist official site being a special thing?
I hope so, too. It just seems unsustainable for musicians to keep all of these social-networking sites updated. — Derek
I completely agree!!!
I think only previews of news, songs, videos... should be spread around the worlds communities.... with backlinks to their own homepage. Why giving all away for free. Its an musician sickness! You only can live from fans who are paying for your content, music, videos .....!
Yes, yes and yes, I use ArtistData, but still have to upload shows manually to ReverbNation and SonicBids, as ArtistData doesn't do that. And to my site on Hostbaby. So I'm entering show data a total of four times -- on Hostbaby, ArtistData, ReverbNation and SonicBids.
Well, once again. There is the curve, and the there's Derek! Out there, just beyond it. I have begun to lament that this is not happening yet more and more with each day. I'm sure this blog is helping it happen. Thanks for it Derek, but, you knew that already-din't ya?
Sincerely,
Randy
Always good ideas coming out of that head of yours. I was under the impression that when ilike and myspace merge this will be one of the features they will use to set them apart? Had you heard any definitive word on that?
Don't know anything about it. Sorry. — Derek
As you can tell, I'm just starting - with no site yet, but spent quite some time uploading music to multiple sites.
What I wonder is, after all the uploads and thousands of plays, how much do artists really make online? What's the bottom line? Except for getting your music out there and being popular, is money being made? I'm I being myopic?
I've been doing this for years. I was on mp3.com (way back when you could generate revenue from plays) but it just only went so far and then fell apart. So I got my own domain and put my music there. Now as far as promoting, I really haven't done much and I need to put more energy into that part of it. But I do have a place to do it. =)
Ceige
Yes, this is exactly what I was talking about. But short of "Hostbaby" doing it (and you know well where all my "real" websites are), it may be up to the "programming musician" to develop these widgets on their own. Thanks for the lucid expression of the idea's outline, Derek, and the very direct answer to my "ponderings" posted as comment to one of your most recent.
Makes sense. My facebook and myspace page always fall by the wayside because I just don't have the time. Super valuable info as usual.
Thank you for this. My tracks are sounding better already. :)
Gwen Laster
Oh, Man. Sign me up! I spend a lot of time updating all the sites I'm on, it's hard to keep up. Aimee Street, Broadjam, Facebook, Myspace, Sonicbids, the list is so long that I had to make a spreadsheet with all my passwords! And this is mostly a hobby for me, I can only imagine what it's like for performing songwriters do when it's their livelihood. My own website serves mostly as pointers to all those other places. There seems to be a trend that some of these sites are starting to let you 'connect' to all your other places.
Finally a subject that I feel compelled to respond to. I quit trying to open up and maintain all the wonderful free music sites that come along every day. There may be a few of them left out there in perpetual limbo but I refuse to service them. In fact I refuse to Twitter-My-Face or any other thing except my personal good ol' .com site. All those others are just a form of Bill Gates' BIG BROTHER.
A great idea Derek. It certainly touches a nerve with me, having now uploaded my song catalog to several different music licensing libraries one song at a time, each requiring bio, lyrics, time, writers, publishers, three different vibes, three different "sounds like." + a song description. It's such a time drag and I could never depend on someone else to accurately input this data. But if it were all in one central location, where the info is always the same, that would be awesome. Here's a thought.
What if the online content equivalent to MIDI was created, essentially creating a universal content sharing language that bridges any hosting site protocols, in the same way this was created for the musical instrument industry to access all the great synth and sampling data from all the different manufacturers, while operating from one central control data source, rather than have to play or track each device separately? In this case, your personal website is that central control source. This way whoever comes with the next coolest Twitter, FB, etc.that you must be a part of, there's no need to again upload from scratch all your content to them, transferring fans, etc. they (and you) would just have this "MIDI" widget and once you sign up with them, their site "sees" and has access to your content instantly (and maybe the "MIDI" widget even allows for instantly putting the new site's "skin" on your content). Taken one step further, what if there were the equivalent to Soundscan tracking all your saleable content via a universal encoding language (like ISRC codes for MP3s) but is automatically tracked anywhere on the web, has whatever shared revenues worked out with any site other than yours that is selling your content, and automatically spits out a digital monthly (quarterly?) statement of exactly what content was sold and from where as do the performing rights organizations statements I receive from BMI?
there is such a system created in middle of europe. its http://www.openmusicsource.net. but not with the worlds big social communities. i think the big social communities want the musicians to come back. so they can sell more advertisings ;-)
Derek, you rock.
Thanks for the mention and pushing this issue. I think you're right. While we're not planning on building the website component of this, the application platform that we're building should support much of what you're looking for. We invite all artists to partner with us while we make sure we build a platform that fits their needs!
Thanks again, and anyone who has any questions or interest can email me directly at bmulligan@artistdata.com
Brenden Mulligan
founder
ArtistData.com
...and 1 more thing -
Sharing data with multiple web sites is great for the musician that only does 1 thing. Most working musicians wear multiple hats and work as front person/feature artist in 1 band and side men in other bands. The data is complex - what pics - mp3s - dates etc go where?
My prayers answered....There are so many sites out there and all the promo How to....sites are telling artist to sign up to as many as possible. Well thats all nice and sweet advice til you accually start doing it and trying to maintain it. I think its an awesome idea. What can I do to help?
This makes perfect sense and things are moving quickly in this direction. From my experience, REVERBNATION is at the forefront of such development (with some direct syncs with FB, Myspace and Twitter). The time I spent updating my various platforms, and platform-specific promotional efforts, is time I'm not spending on the next tune.
Hi Derek,
Great idea, I have my own website (www.chrisboonemusic.com) the hosting is super cheap but I have to go through my wife's computer which has DreamWeaver on it to make changes of shows to the website..and as far as uploading music and photos, I have to pay the website designer to do that...myspace is way easier to use any thoughts? Also, I hear that myspace is not doing so well business wise?!
*Bash* *bash* *bash*
That was me bashing my head against a wall as someone always entering data into many sites :-)
I am on ArtistData as well, it is pretty sweet I must say. Although as it doesen't talk to Facebook that well, I still have to enter info all over the shop.
The website idea you have suggested Derek is splendid.
I think ArtistData will get there too, great stuff!
http://www.donkeybox.co.uk
(Get's on with bashing his head against the wall)
You are so right Derek. Mike Ricci is a lovely bloke at his fine site, www.allaboutjazz.com.
I carefully & correctly typed in four URLS. When I checked them I was told, "INVALID URL!" I logged out in much pain, losing about an hour's work. I was too tired to go back & probably fail again..
Valuable drum in that bright head young man!
(Drum is OZ for info).
yes, PLEASSSEEEEEE. SOMEONE DO IT!!!
OK I was on the edge of my seat thinking you had this done and I was going to have all the things you described and cut my work load in 1/2. Then I read the end of the article only to find out that it's not a done deal and I still have to update everything all the time. How about if you program it all and sell it to HostBaby.com? It's not competition if you sell if to them right.
This is the promise of the Semantic Web, scheduled to arrive any time now (according to TBL). Just needs an ontology like Mark described it..
sorry, one more:
isn't it better to do the following thing as to spend hours in updating your accounts:
one idea:
keep a perfect own ".com" homepage and give an info on your myspace.... accounts saying "actual infos, songs, videos, tourdates...." on our offical homepage under www..... and take the time playing concerts and marketing yourself with streetpromotion (spread real flyers....)
just an idea!
This is how I've been doing it more or less since day one. People ask about your MySpace, EPK, etc... and I send them directly to my website. All my released albums are streaming from my site, all my unreleased albums have free downloads of demos or rough mixes, and I have several shows available for download. There's tons of photos all well organized, bio, contact, and so forth.
A musician's website should be his home on the web literally. Everything else is secondary. SOnicbids EPKs are overrated and have been no help to me. Networking sites are fun but in the end only a supplement to your site. YouTube is the most useful of all because it's exclusively for video. I still use Hostbaby for my site. The old one, don't like the new one. Still using CDBaby for now even though they've been steadily turning into Sprint since you sold it. Their new pricing is a bullshit rip-off and their customer service is a joke. Looking forward to seeing what you come up with next since you haven't turned corporate.
What a great idea Derek. Reminds me a little of what Tono's did, which was a great place for Artists to assist each other composing music, and promoting their own works. We also had our own bio, photo, music in that programming. We had to pay $9.95 each three months and they had over 120,000 people in their network. I must admit we are all over the Internet, but referencing marketing back to the albums at CDBaby.
I would be thumbs up if this could happen, it is time consuming keeping everything updated.
U R totally correct in your thinking. Thank U for your suggestion.
Frankye
Good Rising! Great Awakening! My first reaction was,"hey, that was my comment yesterday!" Then I realized that we are all one and that all of us indie musicians are going through the same ordeal!
Yes, I am in the process of, as I commented yesterday, of making my "new & improved" website the central hub of my digital life. It is the only way to insure that I have a REAL life!
I have been getting decent results without paying for services for 10 years. This year, I am investing funds into this project so that I can have more time for playing music. And this time around, I want to have INCREDIBLE RESULTS!!!
Maybe one of us will figure this out and post it here real soon. I used to use Dreamweaver. Too many codes. Now I am using joomla.com. I recently learned about yola.com and wicks.com for building your own sites. they also do hosting. sonicbids was too expensive for me, so i dropped it. I will look into artistdata.com. fanbridge.com works great for email service, but it costs money even tho they say it is free....they will enter in your data for free, i think....
I'd like to become my own ISP. Is there a way to bypass paypal and have the cash go straight into your own bank account? This is my next frontier!
CAN YOU SELL HOSTBABY3 TO SOMEONE ELSE??? LOL!!! Thanks Derek!
Hey Derek,
I love , reading your articles, always great and innovative. I would expect the music industry to catch up with your ideas; however, it needs to be trustworthy like CDBABY, so for now, I prefer to enter my own data, thats my job while the real musicians does the music.
where do i sign up???
i am so bad at admin
i call it BADMIN
Anything to make this easier. I hate running a website much less having to update several sites at once. Just trying to hook gigs and write is exhausting enough! This is a great idea who's time has finally come!
The "Problem" with most artist websites is--they're poorly done. They hire some "hot shot" webmaster to design their sites and all this alleged "webmaster" can do is: 1. Use a black background. 2. Use contrasting text colors that render it unreadable. Particularly for the vision challenged. 3.CRAM the site with so much useless, superflous information one would need a PhD in computer Science to find their way through the convoluted cybermaze.
In conclusion: Having and "servicing" one's own website is akin to having one's own lemonade stand in the middle of the 18 wheeler lane of the Interstate. Salient question for Artists: Do I want my own lemonade stand? Or do I want to sell my lemonade wholesale to lemonade Distributors? With International marketing expertise? And the "skills" to market my--Lemonade?
yes yes and hell yeah :)
something that has always been peculating in the back of my head, all those uploads to all those sites, then trying to keep track of them all and then current oi vi its enough to turn my hair grey lol
i've always maintained that all things should centre around the artists own web site and this above all else should be kept current lol and hence the challenge begins.
:)
I think MySpace should do this type of hosting.
It would get them back in the good graces of the people who were their base to begin with: musicians.
Instead of trying to be everything to everyone, they ought to do just one thing well, clean up their site design and make it a place that musicians care about again.
I am so tired of all the busy work of uploading, etc to multiple sites..This is a great idea.
Thanks Doctor Sivers
Great Idea, wanted to do something like this for an indie record label years ago, the cost prevented it from happening. It will be great if someone can execute the idea effectively
I began marketing my music online in 2003. I became really discouraged in 2005, when sales numbers were almost nil, and my hit numbers were just a shade better.
Basically, I became very disheartened and discouraged; so much so, that when I received an e-mail to renew my domain name, jamesranka.com, I let it go.
So now you can guess what happened... a year later, I noticed my sales numbers at CD Baby were really doing much better (I'm talkin' MUCH better) and I got the marketing fever again.
I rushed to email the newly-formed Hostbaby and I was shocked to discover a company in Thailand had bought my domain name!
WHAT?
Is this legal?
I was beyond angry and determined to get MY domain name back.
Long story, short, the company in Thailand still owns my name (the thought of that reality makes me sick).
This Thailand-based company has allowed my original site to be accessed and seen, but they have destroyed its integrity. When people are directed to my old site now, they have no idea someone else owns it-- they think I have let the weeds grow and no longer live there and they give up!
HUGE MISTAKE!
NEVER, NEVER, NEVER ALLOW YOUR NAME.COM DOMAIN TO BE AVAILABLE FOR SALE!!!
RENEW, RENEW, RENEW: Better still, pay for a 10 year guarantee.
So what is hostbaby waiting for? Why on earth would they miss this opportunity?
rada
Yep- ArtistData rocks for managing all artist calendars from one site, and your suggestion is the logical extension of that idea. I would love to see someone run with this idea... BandCamp possibly? They're another great service I'm currently using.
How about adapting a microformat (http://microformats.org/about/) to music related data and then creating a service that ingests the microformat from musician sites/feeds and reformats the data for social site APIs?
It okay with me to go to several sites. It helps me to stay busy, but I realize that too much time on this computer is nonsense. As David Hooper stated on his page, our time should be to enhance our craft. I have decide not to be on this computer everyday. I want to play piano better than I do now. The man stated to the lady I would love to play piano like that. After she question him about what he'd love to give up there was no answer from him. So, off this computer to get some rest. I've already practice those songs. (smile)
I see potential for users to direct something like this, like they did on Twitter by inventing hashtags (#denvermusic, #socialmedia, etc). They created a standard from the perspective of the way we work, in the absence of a way to organize tweets. These keywords could provide the foundation for porting data from sites to any platform. I, for one, would like to enter show dates once and have it fed to the various outlets. How complicated could this be? #who #what #when #where #price...`
This is a great idea. Would only work if the distribution of the data to other sites was automated as it would take way too long to do it manually but this technology already exists for most social networking (ping.fm does abit of this as does eventbrite for facebook event creation etc) but no one has done it all in one place as you are suggesting. That would take the market!
Alex
I would absolutely pay for this. Currently I have not found a site that updates ALL these items: Bio, Profile Photo, one main Mp3 file, link to my website. Four things, that's all I need to update.
Photos are the worst - every site has a different size/ratio and placement. I don't think I've been able to use the same one twice anywhere.
Brendan, I think you have a great start with Artist Data. If you guys add those four things, it will be a hundred-fold more useful to me and artists like me who are strictly studio musicians. Keep up the good work. --Donnie
In the corporate tech world, nothing less would be acceptable. (although it often is)
The idea you've described here has been implemented for many online content provider networks already... it's just a matter of time for that to propagate to us musicians as a convenience.
Creating an API (basically the WSDL model with open web services that enact operations to provide specific data on request) would be the way to go for sure.
One major thing to consider in every such endeavor is standardization. What are all the fields required? For mobile, established on line sites, AMG, BMI, etc. CDBaby definitely did a great job of getting a release "out into the world" in a variety of ways.
Once we have a set of standards for file formats, data fields and types, protocols for updates and so on... this will be a no brainer to build, the right way.
One step into this direction is to standardize on an XML export format, similar to RSS, or extend RSS. This would have the necessary fields for artist/band information. Various services and apps could then subscribe to this information and present it in various forms.
Exactly! Hopefully whatever web-hosting company makes this happen would be wise enough to use such an open standard API that it's adopted by other web hosting companies, too. — Derek
Derek,
That is already possible with RSS. I automatically update Twitter, Facebook, etc. with a variety of services, one good one is Twitterfeed.
I stopped updated myspace, facebook a while ago expect for the sole purpose of driving traffic to my .com to get email subscribers of my own.
Dan-O
RSS is good for info, but doesn't yet fill Facebook, Myspace with things like photos and music, and doesn't yet get your music up and selling on iTunes and Amazon. — Derek
Artist Data is absolutely Amazing and I can't believe it's free!!! I joined about two months ago and I am their biggest fan! It made life so much easier for me especially because I'm in two bands and I'm the one who is making sure everything is up to date. Now Artist Data does that for us! Maybe it was you Derek who originally spurred the idea into existence. Thanks so much to whoever it is!!!
I would love it if I could just put everything in one spot. I ALMOST have what I want by using ReverbNation and their various widgets wherever I can, but there's still some work involved keeping Facebook and MySpace updated. The social networking space is so fragmented - one group of your fans likes MySpace, another likes Facebook, another likes Yahoo Groups, another hates mailing lists, etc. Maybe the answer is a middleman who could take whatever you post on your site and hit all of the social media "sites de jour" with it.
Thanks for this great idea.
I have my own web site, andrewmarino.com but have not done anything with it yet.
Now I have an incentive to design a music section and also an art section for my paintings.
This is what we have been working on for the last year and a half at SAYVEE (http://www.sayvee.com). Should be here soon...
The risk of completely focusing on the website is potentially losing opportunities to interact with your fans elsewhere. I agree completely that the website is definitely where artists should be now, and it will be a nice replacement for the wasteland that is myspace.
That being said, I think this degree of updates is already here. Reverbnation allows me to upload all my music to my online distribution sites (iTunes, Napster, whatever). It also allows me to create and place widgets on my sites, be it my main website, social network, whatever. One status update goes via the band's twitter, facebook, and myspace update. Sure, you would have this plus the website already, but I really don't see it that hard to login everyday.
Plus even with facebook, twitter etc being updated automatically, I still need to actually CHECK them to respond to comments, etc etc. Consolidation is certainly the way to go now adays (as opposed to the "be everywhere" philosophy of two years ago), but I think overconsolidation to one website is a bottleneck.
One stop shop to save artists time to focus on music is right on! At MusicNomad.com we try to do that by researching music companies so artists just have one place to go to get qualified and ranked resources in 30 plus artist related categories to help them manage their career. It's free for artists BTW. As an independent musicians advocate the site is my way of helping musicians. There is a lot out there to help musicians but if we can provide more centralized tools like the one you describe, musicians can focus more on their music and building their fan base.
Yes you are on point again derek i am having a problem keeping up with all these diferent sites it does take up too muchh of ones time your idea is straight onn n i hope some one kick it off it would be good for all musicans walk good
tony culture
Great idea! Keep me posted.
Peace,
Vinnie Zummo
Hey Derek,
Another great idea. You're just full of them. I'm on Taxi, Broadjam, CD Baby and all the update sites. It is impossible to manage so none of them get adequately served. Plus it brings up another question which I've pondered recently. What am I getting through Taxi and Broadjam but ripped off. The $5 submission charge adds up fast and how do we know if someone even listens or passes it on. I've had a few thing passed along and some included on projects, but nothing major. How do I get them to my site? Anyway I'm going to see what Go Daddy offers...Jack
You're right once again, Derek. I found it particularly difficult for me, an independent artist residing in Africa, to manage all those "social" web profiles. Slow Internet connections, high costs... After a few months of try, I ended up more confused and discouraged. I decided then to concentrate my efforts on my own website, making it the center of my web presence.
Now, if there's a service (even a paid one) offering to create and update profiles on the social networks I choose and according to the data I upload to my website, hey, I'll have a try! I'm checking out ArtistData. Looking forward to trying out MuckWork. Hope you find some time to set it up and eventually launch it.
Peace and blessings.
YES. And in the meantime, We're trying to get RSS-feeds to do this stuff for us. Artist Data is the best so far, but we're still working on it.
Wordpress open source and a few people pushing may be the way to go, or maybe Slabster?
R
Thanks Derek...now you tell me! :o)
Great idea! Just updating the ten or fifteen or so websites I'm on takes so much time I just stopped doing it.
What a wonderful idea! How I'd LOVE to see that implemented.
HELL YEAH!
this is what I've been miserably moaning about for ages. Please Please PLEASE somebody figure it out!!! and soon!!!
x
Hi Derek,
your idea is brilliant again though it sounds much like what ReverbNation is offering.
Derek - Your posts are always at the top of my read list when my laptop and I have our daily date.
A website that is out of date is death to any business/performer and I'll freely admit that I've not been keeping mine up. Too much feeding all those little mouths of data points.
I'll be interested to see where this thread takes those folks that are hosting or planning to start a comprehensive hosting service. I hope they all have a subscription to your thoughts. They'd learn a lot!
Juliana
Derek,
I respect your mind more & more each day")
This is what I have in the signature line on my outgoing emails:
www.lasoulrecordz.com
www.myspace.com/lasoulrecordzcom
www.facebook.com/dionne.delone
www.youtube.com/lasoulrecordz
www.cdbaby.com/cd/yvetheoriginal
www.cdbaby.com/cd/yvetheoriginal2
It's just really overdone.
I'm contacting ArtistData today.
Thank God for your thought process.
Really.
Y.V.E.
(Young,Victorious,Everlasting)
"Real Fa Real Female Swagg!"
I just signed up with HostBaby. I hope they do this. I agree that it is a must for the future. Thanks Derek.
Brilliant Derek! (as usual)
I do this to some degree with Facebook by placing an http link to my band's own website whereever possible on the page. (I do this at Myspace and elsewhere too) I do regret setting up a personal Facebook page and wish I only had a page for my band.
Your idea makes so much sense! Musicians spend too much time posting stuff online when they could be practising and going to gigs.
This wouldn't be too hard for a hosting company to do. The technology is there with sites like ping.fm and tube mogul. It's just bringing it all into one place.
Customer service really is the commodity of the future. Save me time and I'll pay money for it.
Musicians really need their own domain name and own mailing list. Back when mp3.com went down lots of bands lost so much hard work they'd put into in building a fan base on there. But if your fan base/list is kept on someone else's site---they're not yours.
I also like the idea of entering DATA once but the closest I have so far is my Reverbnation page that would auto upload my stuff to MYSPACE, FACEBOOK, TWITTER and my own BAND WEB PAGE http://www.darrylhillbluesband.com simultaneously. Reverbnation also hosts my site in partners with bandzoogle and they make it quick to design on a fly infinitum and I can edit any info to keep it up to date from anywhere. I also have a solo page for session work or Teaching outside of the band and have links to all sites embedded into the band page. So it does seem to be the mecca point somewhat.
I don't think the problem is getting data propagated to a myriad of sites, I think the problem is that there are too many places to go to get the info.
What if an artist simply did a better job of marketing their ".com" site and forgot about the rest? The biggest problem I see with most artists is a complete lack of understanding of marketing (not that that's a bad thing...unless your in the business of marketing yourself). If you make your site *the* destination, your fans will always know where to go to find information about you.
Only having the "free websites" sends the message "I won't spend money on my career path...but I expect you to take me seriously anyway".
Use those other sites to direct people to your "real site". They are signposts on the digital road.
If an artist truly sees value in those other sites, a simple RSS feed reader on those other sites will allow someone to propagate the information as they see fit.
Need to get your calendar posted to other sites, implement WebDAV on your site and share out the ICS file. You still control it but you only need to update one file to make changes to (potentially) hundreds of other sites...and you can manage it with free open source software that adheres to the ICS format.
That way when MySpace or Facebook closes down because they can't make a profit, the only loss is a feed reader destination. All the data is still safe at the artist's website.
My years in an ad/promotions agency has taught me this simple truth about marketing: you can spend a lot of time & money on shotgun marketing (ready, fire, aim). The campaigns that work are skillfully targeted and use the existing channels to tease and entice, while directing the consumer to an "official" landing place...and giving them a reason to return often. A technique agencies call incentivizing.
Just a few thoughts you've stirred on this rainy Friday afternoon.
Excellent idea. Of course until it's eventually bought by a company who tries to 'improve' it anc completely messes it all up.
I couldn't agree more. Calculating ROI on these sites is next to impossible and without these analytics, it feels like a giant waste of time. A friend/fan convinced me I "needed" a FB musician page, but I found it to be cumbersome (especially the event feature) and limited.
I use Artist Data and find it to be an invaluable tool. If they added a web hosting feature, I would definitely be interested. Right now, I use bandzoogle because it's feature-rich, affordable and makes updating from the road a cinch. I'm hoping they partner up. Thanks for the great blog!
Great blog. Over and over again, Derek has some great advice for us Indie musicians.
There are so many social networks out there. It's nice to have a central location like the band's own website to go for the pertinant info.
I am committed to making my band website better. Thanks, Derek.
I've thought of nothing but this for the past few months. For me, it comes down to a central conundrum about where this is all headed:
1) Will we take ultimate responsibility for owning, and hosting our own music and content, and then use great services to move it around the stream?
2) Will the individual services themselves (MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, etc.) continue to be pre-eminent, and sometimes seemingly even more important than the content itself.
3) Or maybe the very idea ownership is transforming. And when all the content is everywhere in the stream, and universally accessible, will the notion of hosting origin, or even ownership, look like something very different.
Are we to be musicians, capitalists, or just kids in a playground choosing to share, or not? :)
Derek give thanks for this, where can I find it
This is an excellent idea, and I am shocked that no one has implemented it yet. Something like http://ping.fm/ but targeted for musicians.
Thank you Derek...Great info as usual!I do use hostbaby
Max
Hey Derek
Chris from Bandzoogle.com here.
The big issue is that the vast majority of musician sites just don't have open APIs to send data. It would be great if things were more open, but it just isn't that way at the moment.
Even dedicated "information sharing" sites like ArtistData can't sync with sites like Facebook (note how it is "coming soon") or SonicBids.
Until there is an open standard, updating every single external site just isn't possible.
Many of them never will. That's why it's important to have a nice backend optimized system where real people can log in on behalf of the musicians and transfer their data for them. Especially if you set up a remote-desktop on the server, for example, the bandwidth would be incredible, and definitely save them time. — Derek
I've been using ArtistData for just under a month and it's already saved me 50 hours. At least. I LOVE it and I'm sorry I didn't start using it years ago.
I disagree for these reasons:
1. Money:
I have lots of time but no money so what your saying would not benefit me.
2. Poor Service: No matter who says it and offers to do it they still won't quite do it the way you want them too, & a website that does do that might change owners and the new owner wouldn't do the same job.
3.Major Bands sites are free and get more traffic:
Myspace and Facebook are free and get more traffic so much more that even though Weird Al has his own website he has started up a facebook and a myspace.
4.Google is already doing this:You can find any info about any band by googling the band so what you are offering google already does.Any major band website sends the info to google.
Thanks for the offer Derek but I see your just trying to make money.
I do admit though it does seem like a fair deal.
Yes, this would be great! I have calculated that I spend at least five hours each week just to update my accounts on various sites. Time is money, so all this work is actually worth at least USD 200 with the salary I get at my ordinary work. Paying USD 20 monthly to get this type of service would be good business for me :) - We still need to have personal contact and communication with our most important fans and friends, though.
Well , first , it was interesting the COLOR in soft fade yellow you used on this email is the SAME i;ve used on my own website for the past 5 years.Good on you for your good taste.
I agree with the whole concept.
with MY webhost he's expensive and unfortunately set up my site so that the ONLY thing i can upload myself without PAYING him is my calendar dates.
That is why now my official website is hoplelesslly out of date, though i'm about to update again soon for the first time in over a year.
So that's a drag and I'm not sure what to do about to except get him to open up to allow me access to upload music and photos.
We put this together BEFORE my space happened and all the others and frankly , as good as the site is so much other stuff is free now.
however , it is STILL where i dierect most of my traffic as it has the most content.
Thoughts? SGW
Said in a grandmotherly voice, "From your mouth to God's ears."
Great idea, would change the game.
Nice!
Now someone go out and execute:-)
hello like i said before your idea
of the cd baby foundation since the day one was good trusting cd baby of my personal info ...with out the transfer of my file to cd baby and barcode i would exist in this
universe...of music business...
The idea is good and it's, certainly, programmable.
I don't think you need an API from the companies. The fact is that, you can import email accounts from hotmail, gmail and others from facebook and several other services.
So, it should be nothing to come up with the necesary POST information and ask for username/passwords of those accounts.
Actually, it could be done with a bash script using links, don't you think?
A PHP script should be a challenge but doable! Let's hope somebody does it and posts the code somewhere ;=)
It's still a good idea! I like it!
Great idea! But what about adding new friends (i.e. promoting your music)? You'd still have to do it yourself, right?
I could not agree more than the fact that each musician needs to have their own hub. Your one stop where people can find out all they need to about you.
I'm so happy to finally have my own site, designed by friend. So its simple and easy to navigate. Now I'm only obligated to update one site!
I don't see any advantage to keeping more than one site updated. I have a myspace page and refer folks interested in hearing samples of my work there. Now that it is set up, it requires minimal time. The ten songs capacity is enough.
It has been my experience that having several web pages isn't really beneficial. What is beneficial is a musician/band hitting the pavement, booking him/herself, and making a great impression while gigging.
Awesome Idea Derek! ...whose time has come, or is already overdue...
Seems excellent to me ... I have not looked up ArtistData yet, and am just wondering about the costs involved. Yes, it is ridiculous having the pressure of putting data up on different sites. Thank you for yet another lead Derek.
With the rise of Myspace several years ago, musicians found that they get much more traffic there than on their own site--and, it's free. So, the personal band page became redundant. Now FB and Twitter are all the rage, along with the also-rans you mentioned. So, what we have here is a full circle. Back to the personal page, everything gets updated from there. Sounds good for the busy, can't-be-bothered budding star, but also strikes me as cold, impersonal, mechanical.
If you don't work your social networking sites, you don't meet anyone. There's no personal contact. Maybe the theoretical working musician doesn't have time for that, and won't do it anyway. But most of us you're talking to here, I suspect, and more small-time than that. I've met wonderful people that I've played and recorded with on Myspace, that have become valued, real-world friends. That's worth a lot to me.
I would so love this!!!! Happy with Hostbaby, so I hope very much that they jump on the idea and do it fast.
www.reverbnation.com is the next closest thing to what you are talking about. I put everything on there and my site and all the others get updated. They are cool - check them out!
I'm really surprised the BandZoogle/Reverbnation merger didn't already have this in place!
It really is a waste of time to update all those social networking sites, especially when bands don't use them for what they are designed to do ... Drive Traffic to Your Website!
Myspace, Facebook, or even Reverbnation should not be used in place of a website, and should definitely not be used to make the sale.
Forget those "merch store on site" widgets and stick to Basic Internet Marketing 101 ... Use the outlying sites to entice consumers to click through to the actual sales page on your website!
Man oh man, would I transfer my website in heartbeat if somebody offered this service. The company that does do it ought to add visual artists, as well.
Yes. I am very happy with Hostbaby and I like things to be simple, so having one place to store your info, songs, news,pics,just makes it easier for the listener to find out about you.
love it, derek. waiting w bated breath.
In my head this idea does not work at all. It's in my personal interest to keep all my online musician information as up to date as possible. For $10 or $20 a month there is no way a third unrelated party is going to have the incentive to manage content like I do. This is also assuming what is there online at present would be improved for fans/consumers by such a service. Looks to me like musician/techie folks are the ones spending vast amounts of time on the net anyway. As long as people can reach me or another manager either in person or by the (OMG old fashioned) telephone technologies, I'm happy. I would never trust a third-party-large-company with managing my online presence other than perhaps a domain name host that I can manage myself or have a personal manager take care of in my absence. I realize the idea here was to make managing online content easier for us; I'm just not convinced that for a low fee that anyone else would take as much interest in this as I do.
Another great read. I love your stuff!
Your ideas are how i originally thought the internet would work for music.. But as usual - its hard to be a true net geek and remain a true artist - to choose the latter usually means having to pay for the services of the former.
IMHO - The pursuit of money has slowed the rate of internet efficiency. Its nature is the free exchange of data.. but human nature is dominated by greed and that's reflected in the unnecessary complexities we've created on the internet.
ONe day i'll find my way back to simpli-city - in this virtual metropolis.
Cheers, mate! :-)
hi. As usual, another great idea from you that announces the future! How can you help not love this idea/ Time is so limited, we have so much to do and to put forth. Can this really happen???
Sounds great!
While reading the first couple of paragraphs, I was thinking "ArtistData. ArtistData..."
Then... I scrolled down to the end : )
I should have known you'd be hip to them--and that you'd have taken the idea to the next level!
Thanks for sharing,
david
------------------------------
dju@davidullman.net
http://www.davidullman.net
Dreaming Out Loud Records, LLC
P.O. Box 18038
Cleveland Heights, OH 44118
330-347-7247 (Cell)
Singer-Songwriter / Folk-Rocker / Sad-Bastard-Balladeer
221 gigs (and counting)...
STILL BOOKING FOR 2009... Happy to come to your town (if I can crash on your couch:)
"RSS is good for info, but doesn't yet fill Facebook, Myspace with things like photos and music, and doesn't yet get your music up and selling on iTunes and Amazon. — Derek"
Oh yeah, true. RSS works only for updating my blog posts to twitter, facebook, etc. automatically.
The more I thought about this today the more I question the role of facebook and myspace at all since 80% of my .com traffic is from Google, 15% is from referral traffic through link exchanges with other webmasters, and 5% is direct. I get link 1 or 2 referrals from facebook and myspace a month. I just don't get social sites like I do SEO and old school webmastering.
Dan-O
Derek,
I'm not sure I understand the where line is between "hosting your content on your own website" and "having a service that does it for you"?
What consitutes 'an individual musicians' .com website' vs. a hosted site or pages that provides sharing services.
Does it depend on having FTP control over your files? Does Hostbaby qualify? CDbaby? Wordpress.com? Box.net? Amazon storage?
Bandcamp? Soundcloud?
And if a webhosting company did all the sharing with other services, whether it be automatically or manually, aren't they "hosting" the content too? Kind of just like CDbaby does with digital services.
It sounds like a combo of Hostbaby.com & CDbaby.NET Hosting with automatic serving.
Just no CDbaby.com store. In the new idea, all individual artists websites and all the fed services become the stores.
As soon as a hosting service offers these services as you described... I'm signing up!
And anyone who bitches about paying $20 per month for a service that frees up valuable time (that could otherwise be spent creating, recording or performing music) is not understanding the the true value of their own time.
Shundahai
Rokk
a.k.a.The Lord Of The Starfields
This will be great. Thanks for the idea.
I'm working on my own web site now,for the most part do what you talked about and want to do lot more!
CD Baby is still part of my music,I like sound click ideas too, better sound for my music plus mp3 sells out the web site.
so I will split the the music between them,I do not go on the road anymore because of my health!
Good stuff! artistdata is cool beans.
This social media stuff needs to be kept in it's place, it's becoming a sea of wasted energy for true artistic minds.
Blessings
Well spoken Derek! I can really feel your passion as an musician here!
This is also essential for taking control of who is really 'the channel' here - the artist!
The aim must be to create standards for database hosting which serves the artist, and not the 'cream skimming industry' we see positioning themselves all around us on the Net.
Have a great day everyone!
S i g v e
Good ideas turn quickly into money if all parties (websites in this case) can come to a standard agreement about "Artist content."
It's still the wild west out here on the web! The best approach will be a personal choice but having a choice will be profitable to the first provider. In the mean time build a site you can expand scale change and most of all have fun with! One day all these "free" sites could just begin charging for use and access to your hard earned fans friends photos and brickabrac. Work on something you can keep someday it will be RSS ed API ed etc ed. The ability of a social site to connect to your site is what THEY should work on SO you sign up once and the basics stay updated. Social sites are great tools that require Interaction. Any dormant social website is just that dormant no matter how current the info RSS feed is saying.... www.MoTowNRocK.com
Definitely agree - otherwise too many hours are wasted online replicating the same information!
Well, as one tries whatever to ease work and save time, one shouldn't ignore the fact that one's website should speak louder, clearer than all others. Great to read again, Derek.
Charles
I agree Derek, it is the ideal solution, thank you CdBaby
I completely agree!
Hey Derek, This has been one of my major gripes with "web 2.0" for years. Every day new sites are popping up & the pundits are saying "You need to be on this site to succeed," whether it's Twitter, Facebook, whatever. In the beginning when it was just MySpace plus my dot com site, it wasn't overly time consuming. But as the list of "must-join" sites grew so did my impatience. I even blogged about it a while back: http://www.clarkplaysguitar.com/blog/?p=36
Other musicians have chided me for "wasting" my money on my dot com site, but to me, nothing else will give me the peace of mind & content control that your own dot com site provides. When I see a venue or booking agency, promoter, or whatever that does not have their own site I always wonder about their professionalism, commitment, and capabilities. So I am in total agreement with you. In fact we may have talked about this issue a little last year at Bob Bakers event in St Louis.
I hope HostBaby will jump on this. The other idea I offered them is to have an easy way to set up a "members only" section on the web site. The response I got seemed to indicate that they thought it was a great idea, but would not happen for years, if at all. I know this stuff all takes time, but come on! If any entrepreneurs reading your blog would take these ideas & run with it, I'd be there in a heartbeat! $20 a month, a wizard-style site with essentially what HostBaby offers now, plus your idea from this blog, & a members only area, that would be unbeatable!
Clark
Hi Derek:
Thanks for all your points. It helps us grow! At present,I don't use a host company which may have many benefits. I have my own website for the past several years. I get about 350,000 hits a year. But, there is always room for improvement. Thanks for the various tips.
It is very time consuming, yes.
I agree with the need and marvel that is hasn't been done correctly yet...including Artist Data.
They currently don't support updating FB band pages OR interfacing with Reverbnation...ok...so myspace and twitter...
I'm better off embedding reverbnation widgets as they handle anything you want plus FB & twitter.
Without RN and FB Band pages, Artist Data is not very useful at all.
First thought: Cool idea.
Second thought: How long before the malware demons sneak in there and corrupt it as they did to MySpace?
I rarely visit MySpace as many sites with 'custom' skins have nasty little bugs that place cookies and key-stroke readers in my computer.
I like the one-stop shopping concept. Why send viewers to other sites when you can provide all they want (or all you want them to want) on your own site? I use a web generator (Coffee Cup - it ain't 100% but I find it works for me) and it takes me just a few minutes to add gigs, etc. A little longer to update music as I have not learnt the easy way yet.
What I could use is a cheap and easy email merge application (that does not use MS Outlook) so I can send custom emails to fans.
Hi derek - so happy to see this discussion and know you're not the only one with this problem.
But I have to disagree about ArtistData - I've just deleted my account. The idea is brilliant but I've found it cumbersome to use if u live outside America.
At the minute Reverbnation seems better - the widgets are great to use - and it has fan sign up facilities which will hopefully allow me to stop using another service to do mailings.
and it has some connection to that infernal Facebook pages (please do a blog on that one!).
One last thought - the artist website should maybe be replacing Sonicbids too- all the info in one place.
Thanks for all your insights Derek
Fil
Someone may have already responded in this manner but your ideas go hand in hand with your "how I tweet" post, i.e. having seperate acounts fans and close friends.
Everything you have talked about on your wish list is available with a website using WordPress.org with a hosted web account with your own domain. My company specifically builds sites using WordPress. Your site can look like a regular website with a static front page or the front page can can be the blog style page. WordPress is open source and is completely free as are the plugins for such things as event calendar, subscription service, "Share This" which sends your posts etc.to other social media sites and there are plugins for EVERYTHING. You can easily upload music and videos. Sure you will have to pay for web-hosting which usually costs about 7.00 a month but worth it to build up your own serch engine love with your own domain. Here at www.newtricks.me of course we recommend that you get a WordPress designer to set up your site with your own custom graphics and all of the plugins so you get it just how you want it. Then you can maintain it yourself. You can build it yourself but unless you are a designer it will not have a polished look. But it is VERY EASY to maintain once set up. We love WordPress Check it out.
I know and love WordPress too, but it doesn't do things like upload your photos into Facebook, upload your music to MySpace, list your concert calendar in the database at MySpace, or get your music up and selling on iTunes. — Derek
Hi Derek! I have never heard tat just ".com" sites offer sending your music info to other sites. I thought we just create sites, maintain them and promote on our own. I know CDbaby, TheOrchard and some other music hosts DO send releases to huge number of sites.... Am I not right? I wonder?
and justb another thought: no one would translae your site into Japanese, for instance. that's why I use Japanese sites to create pages for me )))
Derek,
It seems like you haven't presented how this will solve the problem of filling out a fan's complete contact information. For example, FaceBook friends can choose to let you see their contact info...but MySpace friends can not. I need a way to simplify the process of completing all this partial info from different Social Networking channels into a complete fan profile...especially since the easiest way to contact potential fans you don't know online is through MySpace (a la Making April). Any ideas?
Also, if we had a couple key widgets/apps the rest of this can already be accomplished via widgets...it doesn't matter to me where I go to upload content as long as it gets populated through the rest of the chain. Right now, a couple of the networks want to be at the top of the content hierarchy...even if they really aren't.
Brian
We made the decision to have our own website right from the start and what a great one it has turned out to be. It gave us the ability to target the search engines scientifically. I can only say learn how to do this yourself and it will pay the biggest dividends and exposure for your band and music.
Best,
Leftee
ThreePeace
Hi Derek,
You are a great source of information to me. "utility informer" is what I call you when describing your informations to friends.
Thanks for the education.
Benedict
Awesome info, Derek! I'm just now working on a personal site, have my domain ... thanks so much for all the great information!!!
Therese
Smells like teen start up..
Thanks, Derek! Awesome information! I realize you had to move on from CD Baby, but I wish you never did. It's just not the same!
All the best,
Frank
Me as fan, I don't wanna got to a thousand web sites of my favorite band to find when and where they're playing next. If it's not at myfavband.com then I don't care surfing for the info.
"Easy" and "simple" are the two words that sell.
Exactly! And for someone else, if it's not at MySpace then they won't surf for the info. Or if it's not at JamBase, etc. — Derek
yes... and I'm glad to see that industry pros are starting to re-adopt the home page as the default place to check out a band and using myspace less.
Until there's an app for that - I recommend getting an intern. Someone from your local high school or college who wants to learn the music business.
You feed them and give them the benefit of your knowledge in the business. And they do the time consuming data management stuff.
Some of my clients set it up with local colleges that the kids can get college credit for their work. Or you can give them voice, guitar or whatever lessons.
The point is - you can get help.
Your Coach,
Debra
Hi Derek--
My site, WheresTheGig.com, handles all of the "Running The Band" and schedule items of your proposed system, including interoperating with Google calendar, MySpace, etc. It's a free service I provide to our community of performers and musicians. There are over 1,000 users currently using it. Feel free to check it out and give me you comments. There's a short webcast of some of it's features at http://wheresthegig.com/demo-videos.html
--Ethan
My band uses wtgig.com as well as ilike. Both great sites for multicasting our performances and organizing your bands. My band would not be as successful without wtgig.com I can't talk that site up enough.
~pete
:)
Derek - your original 3.0 idea is brilliant. So it will probably never happen!
Too much in-fighting amongst the indies...
Hopefully someone will work on that soon.
We've been trying to centralize our information at militaryspecialmusic.com and allow RSS feeds to do as much of our work for us as possible, sending updates to our outside sites like Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, Last.fm
We even went so far as to put it all on ONE PAGE, giving fans an immediate one-stop for Military Special.
I agree, and was duly shocked
Aleee
Wow! Derek. You just continue to come up with some great ideas. That would be a musician's dream come true if their was a company/system in place to do all the long drown out work and provide this type of service for a reasonable price. I would be the first to sign up. Great Idea.
I was naively hoping someone already did all that and have been searching for them. Oh well...that answers that question. Bummer...
This is great. http://www.bombplates.com also comes close to this.
What about the security issues of allowing someone else access to have access to your myspace/facebook/twitter/etc accounts.
Your webhosting company is the same one that has root-level access to your entire website (server, email, everything), so it's hoped you would trust them! If not, you can obviously change your password on those other sites at any time. — Derek
Interesting to read these comments as I have been thinking along these lines and working on an exact solution for some time now.
One thing to note though, I don't think that $20/month would cover manually updating artist profiles on various sites on their behalf. This would be very difficult to manage. In order for the solution to be viable everything must be automated, and all the music sites, social sites, etc must play ball.
That's exactly why I have my own website that gives me what I need. Great post and very nice blog.