Google/Groupon
When Google starts from scratch, it’s a disaster. Like Google TV, Dead On Arrival, have you been reading the reviews, even the tech superstars can’t figure it out and Sony’s already lowered the price!
Then there’s Google Wave…
But when they acquire a company, watch out.
Look at YouTube. A category killer as well as a cultural phenomenon. And then there’s Android. Which is growing phenomenally.
Now Groupon?
People want their Groupon. Tie it into Google search and watch it truly blow up.
This is like when a label signs an already successful band, as opposed to starting one from scratch. Then again, there are a lot more zeros involved. Supposedly $5.3 billion, with a $700 million earnout
And you’ve got to give kudos to the investor, Eric Lefkofsky, who surely picked a winner. A winner that paid more dividends than Lady GaGa ever will.
That’s creativity, that’s truly something new.
GaGa is just a rehash of what came before. Elton John’s outfits on hyperspin and music that sounds just like everything else. The Beatles sounded like nothing else. Imagine trying to break the Beatles today! You’ve got to add beats, you’ve got to work with Dr. Luke, you’ve got to synthesize your voice…work with will.i.am, he knows how to do it!
And Groupon did not achieve this success, nor this buyout offer, via the mainstream media. If anything, the mainstream media was last. Cataloging the Gap Groupon offer success long after the company had achieved traction. And isn’t it fascinating that Groupon accelerated into the stratosphere so quickly. It caught fire and then..!
GaGa caught fire that fast. And that’s one of the upsides of the Internet. If you’ve got something hot, something that’s got mainstream appeal, you can reach everybody so much faster. And if you want to credit one person for Lady GaGa’s success, give props to Perez Hilton, he spread the word, he wouldn’t give up.
So anybody with any creativity, anybody who wants to get rich quick, is in tech, not music. All we get in music are the uneducated wanting to make it on bravura.
But what if those taking chances in tech got traction in music? What if the rights holders stopped saying no and started saying yes? Then what?
Spotify might become ubiquitous and sell for billions.
But that’s not that bad, the rights holders have an interest in the company.
And if it’s Spotify, suddenly people stop stealing and the RIAA is no longer the enemy and everybody goes music crazy.
You’ve got to unlock the innovation. Not only on the business side, but in music too.
If one more jerk tells me that radio sells records… Yes, it does! But it’s so formulaic and laden with ads that more and more people are tuning out and it’s hard to break something new and different. Something new and different has to be broken online.
One can argue quite strongly that copyright is holding music back. That the fat cats who controlled it in the last century don’t want to let go and therefore innovation is stifled.
We’re never going back to the past, can we at least move into the future?
And I don’t want no pussyfooting. You can’t succeed in tech by playing it safe, by taking baby steps. If you could, Sony and Microsoft would rule digital music. But they don’t, because they were so worried about rights holders, they forgot about users. And it’s all about users.
The users used to be excited about music.
Now they’re thrilled with offers on Groupon.
Shopping has become exciting!
Music is boring.
And don’t get me started on concerts…
