This Week’s Insights: Existential questions about what constitutes a “real” culture… YouTube stars who’ve learned to monetize their fans… How MoviePass is changing what it means to go to the movies… Tough talk about diversity of classical music audiences… A study suggests rural audience like diverse work.
- Do You Have To Really Physically “Do” The Culture To “Be” The Culture? There’s a thriving drag queen culture online. But it’s a virtual culture, begging the question – do you have to actually physically perform in order to be of the culture? Or is virtual drag a different culture unto itself? This brings up questions about what the essence of a culture is and what it means to share it or build a community around it. Is virtual culture less authentic than culture in the physical world? “On one level, social media has created a new point of entry to the global drag scene, opening doors for a broad spectrum of talented visual artists who might otherwise be excluded—queens isolated in small towns, barred from clubs because of their age, or too shy or unwilling to navigate the jungle of nightlife. But for some, the growing presence of Instagram queens seems to be skewing public expectations for drag toward looks and fashion, and away from rich traditions of performance (including lip-synching, stand-up comedy, and dance), activism, community building, and so on.”
- The YouTube Stars Who Have Learned To Monetize Their Fans In the past most artists were artists first, and figured out how to make a living. A new generation of YouTube stars has a much more, shall we say, entrepreneurial approach to selling their work. In the new social media world, fans are more than happy to buy merchandise related to their favorites. It adds up. One of the guys masterminding fan merch strategies makes millions from it. He says: “When it comes to selling something, with bands and traditional musicians, it’s not their priority. They’re like, ‘How do I make good music?’ And just assume the money will follow. They will be apologetic about selling merch. YouTubers are like, ‘How can I sell as much as possible to these fans who want to be sold to?’”
- MoviePass Is Changing Our Relationship With Watching Movies: It’s a sweet deal – pay $10 a month and get a ticket to see as many movies in any theatres you want. It’s cheaper than buying tickets one at a time, of course, but it also changes how audiences think about going to movies. By essentially removing financial barriers, movie-going is conditioned by other factors. Fans seem to be taking to the service. It only took MoviePass four months to get a million subscribers. Netflix took 39 months to reach the milestone. Lessons for the arts? (BTW – movie theatre chains hate the MoviePass idea, and MP is a standalone company. Disruption of the business model is, as usual, coming from the outside. The question is whether theatre owners will ultimately benefit from the idea or be killed by it.
- Some Tough Talk About Classical Music And Diverse Audiences: “Working toward greater diversity in new music is necessary and right. The problem is that we’re putting the cart before the horse. Greater inclusivity isn’t an audience-building strategy—it’s an audience-building outcome. Making inclusivity the focus of strategy actually hurts our efforts. All we do is muddle classical music exceptionalism with easily disproven assumptions about musical taste, in the process blinkering ourselves to certain truths about how people use music in pretty much any other context.”
- A UK Study Suggests Rural Demand For Diverse Work: Yes, the findings go against the accepted stereotype. But the study reports that “white and retired audiences in rural areas will happily go and see diverse work – and wish there was more of it”, when they see it. But there’s a problem. There needs to be more support to “create and tour it. Academics at the University of Lincoln found performances in non-traditional spaces that dramatise narratives from diverse communities, rather than presenting ‘culturally foreign’ performances, attract larger rural audiences.”
Leave a Reply