mathr / blog / #

They Call It Investing Not Exploitation

Here's a counter-example. On Monday I worked on some audio tools for about 6 hours. On Tuesday I recorded 80 minutes of material, including set-up time maybe 100 minutes total. On Wednesday I spent about 8 hours (would have been less bar some unfortunate crashes) editing it down to 24 minutes in two tracks. On Thursday I spent 20 minutes making artwork. Then I uploaded it to the internet (30 seconds to start the process, and about 5 minutes to finish the process, I could do something else in between). Here's the financial breakdown:

• artist royalties: £0
• songwriter royalties: £0
• label "finding and signing" costs: £0
• studio fees: £0
• studio musicians: £0
• sound engineers: £0
• producers: £0
• unspecified others: £0
• video clips: £0
• public relations: £0
• tour support: £0
• marketing campaigns: £0
• promotion for radio play: £0
• art for the CD box: £0
• posters: £0
• store displays: £0
• concert tour: £0
• distribution costs: £0

the creative process is priceless, it must be compensated

Well, here's my compensation calculation: (£0 - £0)/£0 = NaN, which is indeed priceless.

I hope you like the New Dog Old Tricks EP that resulted.