May 2009

Cheap tools and online interaction have flipped how things get made. Instead of launching a book or film and hoping it finds an audience, artists can now find an audience and collaborate their way to a product. Is that good?

Here’s something the Internet has taught us about media: failure is cheap. With abundant and inexpensive tools to make, distribute, and market news, books, movies, or music, the cost to succeed is nearly zero.

Here’s something else we’ve learned: when the cost to succeed is nearly zero, just about anyone can compete with just about anyone else. That’s why Aston Kutcher can take on CNN or a small studio in Yugoslavia can compete with Pixar. When everything is flat, the risk of falling over is nil.

While removing the barriers to the means of production has the obvious effect of making everyone a producer, what has been less obvious is how the relationship between the producer and consumer of media has changed.

Media used to be made at what could be described as the “front end” of the process. I produce a song or book and release it to the market where it is consumed and talked about.

A product leads to a conversation…

But now that my cost of experimentation is zilch—and networks enable me to be in constant communication with people who share my interests—the diagram can just as easily be flipped and start at the “back end.” I can talk about and share my ideas with you, and once we have a collective vision of the “thing,” I can produce it (to then have you consume it).

A conversation leads to a product…

Furthermore, if the thing I produce (or we produce) is dispensable (like songs or stories), you might consume more of it and the process can stop being linear altogether…

Changing how we create

This change in how—and when—media is produced and consumed is the essence of “product to process,” an idea that emphasizes less static production and more iteration among the participants. Product-to-process suggests that we’ve shifted from a monologue to a dialogue and part of what constitutes “the product” is sharing the actual making of it.

Fans of comedian Ze Frank immediately understand this concept. Frank’s success is based on the constant negotiation among him and his fans/followers/friends about what kind of comedy should be produced: when, where, how, and for what reason.

Writer Christian Lander stumbled onto “product to process” as he blogged about Stuff White People Like. His posts drew so much attention (an average entry generated more than 600 comments) that he was a) able to source new topics from his fans and b) use his posts, traffic, and fans to negotiate a “traditional” publishing deal. Process first, product second.

Visual artist Koldo Barroso sees the shift. A children’s book writer and illustrator, Barroso has begun a collaborative storytelling process (a phrase we particularly like) on his blog, creating the story and pictures with input from, and in tandem with, his fans. The end result will be a picture book that isn’t “inspired” by Barroso’s fans as much as it “includes” his fans, an accomplishment that simply wasn’t possible before networks and the evaporation of interaction costs.

Changing how we consume

As new tools continue to improve the fidelity of our interaction and the quality of our output, not only will the process continue to morph, but also how we consume things. When you participate in inspiring or creating a product, what exactly are you buying? And for the people who “orchestrate” the making of something, what exactly are they selling?

For Heather Armstrong, the über mommy blogger known simply as Dooce, the explicit answer to “what are you selling?” is: advertising (to her sponsors) and books (to her readers). But the implicit answer is different. Because she’s involved in a regular communion with her fans (many of whom inspire her postings and responses), what Armstrong truly offers is community; what her fans consume is interaction.

Then there’s JibJab, the jocular eCard purveyor from LA. For years, what you bought from JibJab was clear: clever cards with zesty animations. They produce, you consume. But recently they added technology that allows people to personalize animations with their faces. Buyers now pay a premium to insert themselves into the action and, essentially, “finish” the product. Years ago, a greeting card that was “unfinished” would have been returned. Today, we pay extra for it.

Finally, a more intricate pattern of consumption is Threadless, the peer-produced t-shirt manufacturer from Chicago. What do fans of Threadless buy? Most obviously, tshirts. But tshirts are really just the currency of the Threadless marketplace. What people really buy is tastemaking—the opportunity, through voting, to decide what cultural epitaphs are enshrined on people’s bodies for a season. Threadless is this generation’s MTV, only their videos are experienced one frame at a time and must be rinsed in cold water lest they run.

Not answers, but questions

For artists, the shift from product to process (and back again) is both mesmerizing and bewildering. Creatively, this new model can feel just as limiting as it does liberating. What happens to artistic vision? To surprise? To auterism? And commercially, things quickly become byzantine. What happens to my publishing deal if I pre-release my stories online? Who’s my publisher, anyway? Should I produce a limited edition book through Blurb and a mass-released version through Chronicle Books? Or the other way around?

There’s no easy answer to any of these questions. Really, like the switch from product to process, we need a switch from question/answer to answer/question. The answer is: things have changed. The real struggle now is asking the right questions.

Here are a few starters: Why are you important to people? Why are they important to you? And what can you do to make that importance more obvious?

Illustration: Recuerdos by Alberto Cerriteño, used via CC

A series of our Tweets on the new nature of media, followed by some interesting @replies.

“We are the media” is one of those phrases that is perfectly sensible while slightly confusing.

One way to look at it is that everyone is (or can become, cheaply) a publisher. Your blog’s features are the same as @nytimes

If everyone is a publisher, then “the sources” that @nytimes or @howmag once relied on are now going direct to readers.

Some publishers: @drawn @grainedit @booooooom @designmilk @bookoven @designobserver

But even @wardomatic @migy @skottieyoung and @templesmith are publishers. They create media just by tweeting their daily thoughts or work.

Now, if everyone publishes, we need filters. That’s the 2nd part of “we are the media.” Some of us are publishers & some of us are filters. (Some are both.)

Filters used to be editors, people who were paid to be at the front-end of the publishing process and decide what’s in or out.

Deciding what was in or out was a necessity based on fixed size: a magazine or paper is only so big. Some things must go.

But now that anyone can publish we need those editors at the back-end of the process: to filter. People who filter are curators.

Some filters: @michaelnobbs @carinberger @taralazar @thecreativepenn @ftoolan @illusionists

We ARE the media. But like the staff at yesterday’s publishers, we have different roles, skills, and contributions.

@troygilbert: @Storybird: Evolution of communication: 1-to-1 (talk), 1-to-few (groups), 1-to-many (oration), few-to-many (broadcast), many-to-many (web).

@troygilbert: Agree. The tricky part has been sorting out the the many-to-many. That’s why we like @umairh’s “organize something” manifesto.

queenjustine @Storybird I’ve been wondering if we’re moving toward true meritocracy – whereas “media” sometimes (often) fan flames and create illusions?

@queenjustine: media is a loaded term. But in this context, appropriate since individuals now have power to fan flames/create illusions too.

queenjustine @Storybird Isn’t that a form of corruption? Happens with group-think and bureaucracy, but not millions of individuals acting alone.

@queenjustine: poss talking about 2 dif things. But, u r right that “we are the media”=meritocracy. How/if/when it’s corrupted is separate.

queenjustine @Storybird so interesting! Thank you for the thoughts. Adds another dimension to my mental model of media utopia…

@molly_oneill @Storybird Interesting thoughts. But I’d argue that editors are more than merely filters. We are nurturers of writers/artists & of stories.

@molly_oneill: in the context you’re talking about—absolutely. In the context of “organizing” the sea of media, less so.

@molly_oneill @Storybird Perhaps you are right. The thought of trying to edit the whole internet makes me want to cry. Carry on, then!

I first saw the “Tiny Art Director” after following a link from boingboing a couple of days ago and it made me laugh out loud — like, really laugh out loud. Although I type ‘lol’ like the rest of us quite frequently, it’s rare that reading something online makes me laugh hard enough that it’s audible. The Tiny Art Director did, and after talking to a few friends about it, I realized that I wasn’t the only one that reacted this way. I love that such a great reaction was elicited from just a small glimpse into the process of a parent and child collaborating on something… although in the case of the tiny art director, I suppose I’m using the term collaboration rather loosely

We ♥ Hungarian illustrator Irisz Agocs, the goddess of cute + watercolor + whimsy.

Dragon Egg by Kurt Huggins and Zelda Devon of Teetering Bulb.

We have two customers at Storybird. Buyers (families and friends who make or buy short visual stories) and sellers (narrative artists who supply the “visual” in “short visual stories”). This post examines the artistic, commercial, and marketing opportunities of the Storybird platform for the seller.

PS: You can jump over all the writing and get to the list.

We’ve learned from artists that one of their greatest challenges is creating a direct relationship with consumers.

The vast majority of illustrators, animators, or concept/comic artists (a group we shorthand as “narrative artists”) work through publishers or studios and don’t own the format, distribution, or marketing of a product. As a result, they rarely interact with mainstream consumers.

Some of this is changing thanks to the internet. By managing their own marketing and distribution, a growing number of artists are leapfrogging the middleman and creating a side-business selling printed goods or DVDs through a combination of blogs, Twitter, and markets like ETSY—increasing their reach, output and profit margins.

Their challenge, however, is that the current approach doesn’t scale smoothly. For instance, in order to sell art cards or PoD book, an artist has to a) create them, b) market them, and c) distribute them. Easy as ABC? If you’ve ever tried to do all three of those, month after month, you’d say “no.” Making, shipping, and promoting goods takes enormous effort and leaves little energy for the next project. (Which is why publishers and studios exist in the first place.)

Effort aside, the other hurdle is one of formats and platforms. If you compare the scenario above to a software developer who writes apps for the iPhone, their realities are quite different. For the developer, once the app is written it can be marketed, purchased, and used all on the same platform. That’s because Apple’s app store—like MP3’s + iTunes + iPods—combines the format, the market, and the player in one. Marketing, distribution, and consumption are synonymous (and often instantaneous).

The design of Storybird mimics this architecture. Like an MP3, it’s a format: we refer to it as a “short visual story,” but you could also call it “simple sequential media.” Like the iPod or iPhone, it’s a player: you use it to consume the format (in this case, whole stories or ingredient art). And it’s a market: it provides a platform for the trading and marketing of the art between the buyer and seller (and, in the process, aggregates and concentrates an audience).

This combination offers new advantages to the narrative artist while removing many of their current artistic or commercial barriers.

For example:

1. Publish, share, and sell stories instantly. Got a character that’s been buzzing in your brain? A story that won’t go away? The moment the ink is dry or the file is saved it can be circulating among your fans and creating new customers.

2. Publish, share, and sell art instantly. Create characters and scenarios that are designed to be remixed. Watch what rises and how people use them. Spin out new characters or build an entire cast around the stars.

3. Build evidence for mainstream distribution. Animators: treat Storybird pages like keyframes. Get your story into the market and build your audience. Pitch the studio with 20,000 fans behind you. Ditto for illustrators.

4. Connect and collaborate with your fans. Get immediate feedback on ideas and test new characters and scenarios. Run contests: a lucky winner gets to write the story that you illustrate. You judge stories that use your ingredient art (or your fans do).

5. Build the brand. Create whole stories and character art, art cards and posters, contests and collaborations. The only difference between you and Disney is that you won’t have to wear animal suits made of polyester.

This isn’t to say that Storybird replaces an artist’s reliance on other platforms (Twitter, Blogger, Flickr, ETSY, etc) or traditional middlemen (publishers, studios, distributors, etc). What it does is amplify the effectiveness of those channels and relationships, making it easier for artists to create, sell, and engage.

For instance:

Sell the coffee AND the beans. Your publishing deal is for the book. That’s the coffee—the finished product. But why not sell the beans, too? Release some of the characters into the Storybird ecosystem and sell them as ingredients. Not only does it increase your revenue, but the fans who use the characters invariably find out about the retail book. In other words, using the beans for homemade coffee doesn’t replace the desire for store bought—it increases it.

Build a brand pyramid. Fashion houses are masters at brand pyramids and pricing: premium prices for haute couture, upmarket fees for boutique labels, and simple cuts and prices for Target. A Caldecott or Hugo-winning illustrator can build the same hierarchy, reserving prime illos for their premium publishers while creating “downmarket” characters or products for their Storybird shop. Product managers call this “channel management.” We call it savvy.

Engage, explore, and amplify. Singer Imogen Heap releases a regular podcast to showcase work in progress, but also to engage fans with contests and collaborations. Writer Jeff Jarvis blogged his way up to the release of What Would Google Do?, often testing his ideas post-by-post and refining his thoughts based on reader feedback. Storybird—linked with your other platforms and partnerships—lets you do the same: prototype ideas, reward fans, and build momentum towards your next project. It’s process AND product rolled into one.

By combining the format, the player, and the market in one system, our aim is to make Storybird an indespensible commercial and artistic tool for narrative artists.

The jist? We’re building something that we hope will make you want to play.

Art from Paul McDougall/Crashed Car, which also appeared in Sneak Peek #1

Light Eater by Koren Shadmi

Every artist should own Scott Kirsner’s book Fans, Friends, and Followers. It’s a practical, well-researched, and easily read guide for cultivating an audience and business model, chock full of examples and interviews with filmmakers, visual artists, writers, musicians, and the like. You can download a sample here.

Kirsner, a writer whose work appears in The New York Times and Variety, also runs the CinemaTech blog, a frequently updated and often useful set of posts about innovation in the film industry.

Recently, Kirsner hosted a roundtable on how filmmakers are building fan bases and we found, by substituting a few nouns and verbs, advice that is applicable to any visual artist. You can listen to the audio here or download it here. Good background material.

As a public service we highlight below some of the key points that emerge in the discussion. Nothing earth shattering, but a good checklist to compare yourself with.

In no particular order, and saving the three most important for last:

Own your blog. Drive everything from and to it.

Participate in social networks. Be present.

Deliver a constant stream of bits to your fans. Frequency counts. As a corollary…

Work “sharing” into your everday routine. If necessary, kit yourself with tools that amplify your work. For instance, a blog post should automatically be added as a note to Facebook and be tweeted.

Be other places. Guest blog, run contests on industry sites.

Give your fans something to do; participation deepens the relationship. They cited a singer who ran a contest to find a backing singer for a new track.

Bring your fans with you. Going to a festival or have a signing? Flash mobs baby.

Attention isn’t action. One thousdand followers may translate into 5 people who actually “do” something when you need it.

Cultivate the 5 people who do something.

Look for new spaces to participate. Getting in early enables you to secure a niche and grow as the service grows. (cough*storybird*cough)

The three most important ones:

Be Google-able. Own a phrase that’s easy to remember.

Own your list. From day one, start building an email list. Regardless of what happens to Facebook or Twitter or MySpace, your list is your list.  It’s how you activate your base and stay in touch.

Promotion is half your job. Almost 50% of your time should be spent promoting. (Note: having friends, fans, and followers means that they can help and reduce YOUR role to 25%.)

Photo: Anberlin Groupies by hnnhlh14

Robert Sikoryak’s Masterpiece Comics, his ongoing parody of classic literature using classic comic strip memes, comes out in a September anthology through Drawn&Quarterly, but you can download a sample now featuring Wuthering Heights. “Eek! Heathcliffe!”

Sikoryak was recently interviewed on WFMU’s The Speakeasy with Dorian and spoke about the anthology, his ongoing public performances via “Carousel,” and his distaste for the term “graphic novels.”

You’ll also find his adaption of Camus “The Stranger” in Ivan Brunetti’s Anthology of Graphic Fiction, Cartoons and True Stories Vol 2, which is conveniently available now. There’s a great promo for the book and an interview with Brunetti at Parson’s blog.