Divergence Of Opinion (or how to not tow the company line)

It seems that some dissenting opinions are beginning to crop up (or at least I'm becoming aware of them) in regards to the dialogue about core fans / true fans / direct to fan. As I mentioned in a previous post the singularity of opinion was making me nervous. I found myself saying things more or less verbatim that I'd heard from others with very little empirical evidence on my part to support those ideas.

It sure *sounded* reassuring to say "Direct To Fan is the future!" "Custom bundling is the future!" "Analytics will save us!" It is still about great music, community, contextualization of shared experiences and FUN. Oh... that and one more little thing: finding your audience.

The links below will take you to a couple of long-ish posts, but both are very rich as are the comment sections.

Brands Plus Music Blog (click to read the post)

Fingertips Music Blog (click to read the post)

The Long Tail Of Fandom