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[Ted Belmont]

You do know that her blog post was written several months ago, yes? Do you have a link to somewhere she talks about this specific issue? I did a little searching and couldn't find anything. Her Twitter feed does include retweets of people being critical about her offer.

I'm not saying playing for free isn't a problem in the music industry (and really, the whole bar music industry is a piece-of-shit mess), but I just don't see it in this particular situation.

The original article I linked has a rather dismissive response from her. She also updated her tumblr today with a picture of said article in print, next to a review about a book that mentions her as one of the pioneers of crowdfunded music, with the comment, "Bam."

[patito]

It's the free market at work, why pay people when you can get people to work for you for free.

[Rico]

I've read the article, I just don't see it matching her desire to "be the one fucking over the proverbial 'little guy'."

[Brentai]

Why do all the "pioneers of crowd funding" seem to be already independently wealthy people?

[Ted Belmont]

[Joxam]

Eh, I think that's actually the nature of the beast and not anyone's fault. In order to have acquired the type of fanbase needed to successfully fund this kind of thing you have to have been pretty fucking successful already, IMO.

[Rico]

You already need the crowd for crowd funding?

[Brentai]

You already need the funding to have the crowd.

[Royal☭]

Again, there is an issue of she asking a "professional-ish" musician to play on stage for free with other musicians who ARE being paid. Remember, she's asking for horn and string players. One does not become "professional-ish" with those instruments by jamming out like on guitar or drums.

Steve Albini says it pretty well (in spite of the over the top headline)

I have no problem with bands using participant financing schemes like Kickstarter and such. I’ve said many times that I think they’re part of the new way bands and their audience interact and they can be a fantastic resource, enabling bands to do things essentially in cooperation with their audience. It’s pretty amazing actually.

It should be obvious also that having gotten over a million dollars from such an effort that it is just plain rude to ask for further indulgences from your audience, like playing in your backing band for free.

Also, she's married to Neil Gaiman. I'm sure if they looked they could drop a few thou' to pay some musicians.

[Ted Belmont]

Just in case you missed out on pledging for the SolForge kickstarter, or if you want to increase your pledge after the fact, they're still taking pledges through their website until Friday the 21st.

[Thad]

Amanda Palmer to pay musicians after all.  Great to hear.

I haven't weighed in on this yet, but here's how I see it:

I know musicians who play for beer.  Because that's pretty much your only option if you want to play big band jazz in Phoenix Metro these days.  These are guys who can't NOT play big band jazz, and so they're willing to do it for free because they love doing it so damn much.

But every single one of them would rather be doing it for money.  I mean, no shit, right?

I think Palmer made a bad call here.  I think she's looking at these backup players as fans instead of pros -- people who are just thrilled to meet her and that's reward enough in and of itself.

And fans they may be.  But they're also musicians performing onstage with a band that is getting paid, for a lady who could afford to pay them but (initially) chose not to.

I don't think Palmer's a bad person.  I don't think she set out to screw anybody.  I don't think she meant any harm.  But I think she made a critical error in how she assessed the situation.  And I think it's pretty clear she's realized that, seeing as how she's changed course.

I think some of the attacks on her were really nasty and vitriolic, and I think that's not cool.  But I also think the basic criticism that you should pay your performers if you can afford to pay them is obviously, self-evidently true.

Anyway, all's well that ends well and I hope it's been a learning experience, not just for her but for anybody else who travels this path in the future.

You should pay people.  Even if they're willing to work for free.

Short of some kind of charity thing, I guess.

[Shinra]

This is basically how I view things on this controversy, but I feel like if Bono or Lady Gaga had done this, nobody would have even batted an eye. Amanda Palmer got as much negative attention as she did because she was an easy target, and it was a great excuse for people who were completely unfamiliar with her work to step onto the stage that is the internet and call her a cunt for what was admittedly a poor decision. Some serious things were said about her as a person (even in this thread) under the assumption that she was a rich lady trying to jilt people out of money.

I'm glad things worked out in the end.

[Brentai]

You don't get to wag your million-dollar vag at the internet and then cry when it informs you that you're being a huge bitch.

Bam.

[Mongrel]

That also goes double if you're selling yourself as an avatar of fair dealings.

[Zaratustra]

This is basically how I view things on this controversy, but I feel like if Bono or Lady Gaga had done this,

Opening for Bono gives you slightly more exposure than being name-dropped at Warren Ellis' blog.

[Büge]

http://www.kickstarter.com/blog/kickstarter-is-not-a-store

Creators must talk about “Risks and Challenges”

Today we added a new section to the project page called "Risks and Challenges." All project creators are now required to answer the following question when creating their project:

“What are the risks and challenges this project faces, and what qualifies you to overcome them?”

We added the "Risks and Challenges" section to reinforce that creators' projects are in development. Before backing a project, people can judge both the creator's ability to complete their project as promised and whether they feel the creator is being open and honest about the risks and challenges they face.

This is interesting. Hopefully it will force potential creators to actually outline why they're using Kickstarter and not some other option and give projects some more transparency.

We've also added the following guideline for Hardware and Product Design projects:

Offering multiple quantities of a reward is prohibited. Hardware and Product Design projects can only offer rewards in single quantities or a sensible set (some items only make sense as a pair or as a kit of several items, for instance). The development of new products can be especially complex for creators and offering multiple quantities feels premature, and can imply that products are shrink-wrapped and ready to ship.

I guess too many people got burned from this problem?

[Shinra]

Some kickstarters would offer packs of items for retail outlets, like 100x Cds or whatever. It sounds great if you're a small indie shop that wants to sell the newest music, but I imagine somebody drops 1k to pick up some inventory on the expectation that the project will follow through and then the bottom drops out and nothing ever gets made.

The main problem with the Kickstarter donation reward system is that it encourages people to think of Kickstarter as a retail outlet where users are getting in on the ground floor rather than acting as small angel investors trying to get a project off the ground. The former kind of thinking implies a guarantee that merchandise is forthcoming, but many projects fail before they're ever completed, or may need multiple rounds of fundraising or end up getting delayed... I think the Pebble is a great example of this, where the device turned out to be more expensive than originally projected and has been repeatedly delayed because of issues with shipping and customs (as some of the watch parts are only made in China by one supplier) and I imagine if anyone bought multiples thinking they'd be the first store on the block to carry them, they're probably out a lot of money and feeling pretty pissed off right now.
 
I think the other problem from the donation reward system is that it encourages smaller kickstarters to offer substantial rewards out of obligation. There is an impression that your kickstarter won't be successful without good rewards (and it's true to an extent -look at how badly the PA kickstarter flopped. It had the crowd, but insultingly shitty rewards kept the users away) so as a result a lot of smaller kickstarters are spending so much money on reward fulfillment that they're getting close to nothing out of the kickstarter in the first place. Unless the kickstarter only exists to create a limited set of goods for sale through the kickstarter alone, this is not an ideal scenario. Given that I don't think most businesses starting on kickstarter are solely targeting the kickstarter audience, I would assume for most smaller kickstarters reward fulfillment is going to remain a serious problem.

[Büge]

I thought PA made more than twice its projected funding.

[Royal☭]

As far as rewards go, Kickstarters need to start thinking of themselves like NPR. When donation time comes around, $150 for a duffle bag and a coffee mug is a rip off, but nobody gives $150 to NPR because they really want a duffle bag and coffee mug.

[Mongrel]

As far as rewards go, Kickstarters need to start thinking of themselves like NPR. When donation time comes around, $150 for a duffle bag and a coffee mug is a rip off, but nobody gives $150 to NPR because they really want a duffle bag and coffee mug.

Can't agree. The most successful Kickstarters have all been laden with bountiful loot, especially with big stretch goals. Maybe that's not what some would consider "appropriate", but it's working and it's becoming the established pattern.

More importantly, Kickstarter is essentially the investment equivalent of micro-finance. And while angel investors are ones who fund things with a higher risk because they like the project or think it's a good cause, they still expect a return - that's why it's called investment instead than charity.

The biggest concerns at this point are people with a poorly managed project that still manages to look good in the Kickstarter, but which won't meet it's goals or even be done. In the worst case, these will be total scams. Kickstarter has already shown it won't police those. In fairness, any policing of Kickstarters is difficult - you can't force a return of money on a true failed investment (nor should you), and it can be difficult to separate the criminal from the merely incompetant. There are some measures that can be taken, but for such small projects it's not as simple as just mirroring real world securities regulation.