TechCrunch covered start-up Strayform recently and their business model sort of piqued my curiosity a bit. The basic gist of it is that music producers and consumers sign-up for a community where the consumers can basically sponsor the producers.
I don’t know how successful the site is, especially because their branding and general design strike me as a bit, err…underdeveloped, but I think the vision is ballsy to say the least.
Traditionally, content production has gone something like this: with the content producer going through a middle-man of sorts (in music, this would be the studio), and from there it would go to the mass of consumers. In turn, the middle-man would engage in marketing research and use their own expertise to either mold the content producer to meet the requirements of a broad audience or alternatively, find a new content producer who more adequately met the requirements of a broad audience. Of course, there are exceptional cases where the content producer is talented to the point of re-framing the expectations and tastes of the broad audience but those tend to be exceptional cases.
It gets more sophisticated than this – for one, the roles of consumer and producer start to mesh. In that space between, where the middle-man used to be (who was a quasi-producer) a lot of mediation happens – without the middle-man as mediator, the consumer and producers start to play more mediate roles.
In general though, it is a fascinating approach and one that many believe will have a strong role in the future.
Update (9/12/07): Strayform founder Brandt Cannici informed me this AM that their site design was updated. I think they improved the look and feel of the site and I certainly appreciate Cannici following-up with me on the development.
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I’m glad you like the concept. I’d also like to point out that this mediation process allows consumers to be involved in the creation process. Rather than passively receiving a product, they have the chance to see it grow from concept to completion. They can interact with the creator and make an impact on the final product.
I’d like to add that Strayform includes a lot of tools to assist the artist-fan mediation, such as updates, easy-refunds, discussions, and the ability to upload samples.
I have often been told the site design is unattractive. But my thoughts have always been that functionality is more important than aesthetics. The sign has amazing functionality including page customizations, ultra-fast load times, and a complex transaction and licensing system. The most popular sites I can think of don’t look great, ie Craigslist, ebay, myspace. However, bowing to popular demand I am reskinning the site to be more in line with expectations.
Brandt Cannici
Founder
http://www.strayform.com
Brandt,
Thanks for visiting and leaving some commentary. Again, the concept is extremely exciting.
Thanks for pointing out some of the rationale behind the site aesthetics.
If you’d like my two cents once you have reskinned the site, I’d be more than happy to blog about the reskin.
Jiyan
Some of my initial thoughts by the way:
1. The logo has to go – you need something simpler and more impactful.
2. The color scheme is excessive – less colors would be helpful
3. Font under new proposals – is it TRN with italics? It looks a bit antiquated.
Anyway – I’m looking forward to the reskin.
Jiyan,
Thank you for covering us early on and for your excitement about our concept. Based on your feedback we have totally redone the site design. I hope you would do an additional feature on us. If you go through the site you will find there is an impressive amount of functionality.
Yours,
Brandt