The talk of how the internet have changed our society and business work can’t be understated. In so many way, some we haven’t thought of yet. One of the most interesting opportunities the web brings is the easy and fast possibility of Self-Publishing. With the internet as our new open tool, a band, game developer or author doesn’t have to rely on a bigger company to (maybe) get published. The big record label might fear this more than others as medium to smaller bands have a platform to do distributing and marketing themselves through sites like MySpace, Spotify and IMEEM, they can reach out directly to their fans.
The role of the publishers, labels and big media companies have really changed. With all the new technology available for everyone and just a little bit of knowledge and common sense everyone can make it on their own. Okey, you probably won’t get into retailers like Wallmart and such, but with the web, you can have your own shop, opened 24/7. You can reach out to new or potential fans with your Myspace page, mod an open source game-engine to make your own game, and distribute you homemade video on Youtube. For those who aim to break it to the top you still need the knowledge, contacts and financial support for the big boys. But they should still be a bit affraid I believe.
One of those smaller studios or self publishers, can become quite the threat for bigger players. Example from the gaming industry is Valve and Blizzard. They began as small developers and are now both milion if not bilion dollar companies. Still, its the never ending loop, when small companies become big and they have to addapt to stay big and they often lose their soul. And with it their core fans. And it can take away focus from that spark and the creativity which made them big. Then companies grow to be really big, it becomes more business and the people and company have to addapt to survive. It sad in many ways but thats probably the price they are willing to pay.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkYFjTG67Us[/youtube]
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