Tommy Lee & Me
Getting by with a little help from his friends?
Fortune magazine recently covered a new venture being led by veteran producer Scott Humphrey where everyday consumers (Guitar Hero hacks like me) can collaborate with rock stars as they make their albums. In September, Humphrey launched a site called Public Record, a site where users can contribute ideas to Tommy Lee as he works on his new album.
Every week, Lee posts his “stems”, which I came to find out are stripped down parts of songs such as vocals and drum tracks. Fans can then submit their own ideas or generated parts which Lee chooses and incorporates as he sees fit. He owns everything that is submitted.
In addition to providing Lee a way to generate interest/awareness for his new album – he maintains that he’s planning to actually use fan-submitted tracks for his new album. So he’s saying there’s a chance…
There are other sites including MixMatchMusic, Jam Glue and Indaba Music – all of which provide the opportunity for user generated ideas/content – primarily with album promotion in mind.
Promotion aside, the article admits that the business model, or revenue opportunity, for these sites remains largely undetermined. Uniquely, Public Record is offering a piece of the action – a cut of album sales. “It makes my brain smoke.” Lee opined. Oh my…
However broadly you happen to define UGC, I continue to be surprised by the equally bullish and bearish, ever-changing, but still vigilant projections related to UGC’s ability to generate revenue.
Not-so-recently, Juniper Research projected this to be a $7 billion business by 2013 with most of the revenue coming from advertising with social networks taking over dating as the largest revenue generator. In 2007, the research report projected 730 million users by 2013 with the Far East and China leading the way with users participating via mobile.
Slightly more recently, eMarketer projected that US User-Generated Content creators would rise to 108 million by 2012 with revenues (ad revenues) up to $824 million – or 1.62% of US online ad spending.
According to marketers polled by iMedia Connection, 68% bullishly predicted that traditional media was “in trouble and would lose spending to user generated content.” According to AdMedi Partners, an equally bearish 69% said that social media networks were “overhyped” along with a 49% who also said that user generated content was “overhyped”.
With most models relying on an ad revenue – a performance-based model that allows users to bet on the come with the marketer seems remarkable.
Or as Tommy said, it makes my brain smoke.
posted by Jason Ulrich on October 11th, 2009 at 9:26 pm Permanent link to this post
2 Responses to “Tommy Lee & Me”
First THC, then PCP and now UGC. Tommy’s entire career has been defined by short-term promise followed by ever dwindling returns…
Point: Miller