An artaculous revolution?

The other day I came across a new social networking website. Yes, I know, ANOTHER. But I noticed that this is for artists and artists only. So I checked it out – it’s called artaculous.com:

‘A new place for art & culture – the online art revolution starts here’

This ‘networking for artists’ is definitely not a new thing. For several years I have been a member of nextcat.com, whose tagline is ‘it’s all about who you know’. The idea is to connect with people in the industry, both with your area of expertise, but also studios, collaborative connections and so on. Anyway, I haven’t had much success there, especially not compared to more general sites such as myspace and facebook.

Artaculous was launched in November 2008, has spent this year working its way into the the online arena and as of July this year they are boasting about 4,000 members. They have some good ideas, linking in sites such as twitter, but doesn’t go as far as inward rss feeds (such as for the blog), which is annoying. The interface is nice in some ways, very clean, but some things don’t quite happen as you’d expect. I have only just set up my profile there, so these are definitely just ‘first look’ remarks. It does look promising, and I’ll be happy to spend some time there. Decent people and organisations are getting on board there also, I even saw SOUNZ from here in NZ has set up their profile.

I wanted to introduce it to those of you who may be interested, and also to see if any of you have had any connection with the site, I’d be very interested to hear from you. So, an artaculous revolution? We’ll see. Enjoy exploring.

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Twitter

Hey guys, I’m now on Twitter … “what are you doing?”!

Check me out:

Ryan @ twitter.com

Ryan

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Masters deadline closing in … and other bits!

Hey everyone, well if you’ve wondered where on earth I have got to over the last few weeks, I’ve entered turbo drive and have been working day and night on my Masters portfolio. I am SOO looking forward to getting it in. I’m just finishing off an orchestral piece “Ardor” and just have one other piece to finish. Still lots to do but everything seems to be on track.

By the way I got two more recordings of my pieces lately, so I’ll post them in the new player on the homepage and on MySpace. Haven’t even had a chance to listen to them yet but will do soon.

What else have I been up to? Good question … been working with my orchestra  – they are starting to sound really good, we have a two-day workshop in a few weeks which will be great. Am playing in an Oratorio (see the next post) and have been rehearsing with Auckland Symphony who are off to china in two weeks.
Anyway must get back to work.

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Online Music Marketing & Promotion

Hey everyone,

Thought I’d just let you all know what I’ve been reading up on lately and have got very interested in. … Online music marketing and promotion, specifically relating to indie artists. I’ve subscribed to two podcasts and read a few books all which I thoroughly recommend. Before I mention the podcasts, note that you can subscribe through going to the site or just find it through iTunes.

The first podcast is Online Music Marketing with Jay Moonah. He is based in Toronto and has so many great ideas, tips and guests which make his podcasts fantastic. Examples include search engine optimization for artist websites, financing and fan incentives, using flash and videos, through to using MySpace and last.fm, through to owning your own (web) destiny.

The second is Artist Empowerment Radio brought to you by Bob Baker. He is absolutely full of knowledge on many areas and is “dedicated to helping creative people of all kinds get exposure, connect with fans and increase their incomes through their artistic passions.” I’ll get to his books soon, but his podcast covers similar topics to Online Music Marketing, but also leans towards Artist Empowerment, such as feeling good about your music, taking action, growing your career etc.

I’ve also been reading some books that I’ve found very interesting and full of great stuff. Three by Bob Baker (all books and much more available here: www.bob-baker.com):

“Branding Yourself Online”
“MySpace Music Marketing”
“Unleash the Artist Within”

And one by David Nevue (lots of resources and book available here: www.musicbizacademy.com):

“How to Successfully Promote Your Music on the Internet”

I won’t go into the books too much cause the titles kind of explain it all, but they are all definitely worth a read. There definitely was alot of information in them that I already knew (as most people would find who have an established MySpace account … for example), but there were always many more exciting things to discover. Both their websites are full of articles and resources also, so definitely worth checking out.

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MySpace

Flipping heck! MySpace is amazing. I’ve always heard about it, and maybe about a year ago I signed up for the normal MySpace, but didn’t do anything to it. Then maybe a month or so ago I changed to MySpace Music and started getting friends, and put bio up, and just doing everything you do. And lol, its wicked. I’m hooked. Have been getting emails from all sorts of exciting people. Anyway soon I’ll get some music up and things will continue to grow which is awesome.

SO VISIT www.myspace.com/ryanyouens AND BECOME A FRIEND.

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