I was just referred to a quite dated article on Acheron by Sunnyjim... It was originally featured in Tyrone but is available now at:
http://www.acheron.org/articles/ar-tyrone-03-money.shtml

I found his "opinions" to be very pessimistic in nature, not to mention not very well developed. But I am curious, what does everyone else think of groups such as ACiD promoting themselves with clothing, or CIA with stickers? Where does the general populous stand with artists charging for ANSI graphics? Or what about tracking musicians who venture off and press 500 CD-ROM copies of their own music?

Do people really think this is "selling out" ?

-R

> "Next thing you know they'll be acid t-shirts, posters, porno mags"
So long as sinned isn't allowed to pick the content, an ACiD pr0n mag would be cool

> "Most artists sell logos for about 2-10 dollars"
This is why most artists are hungry

> "What i'm trying to say is that many artists would draw you art for free"
You get what you pay for

> "Ok ok, now this might not exactly happen, but what exactly is the point of > spending 16$us (22$canadian) for a hat that says acid on it. "
The price of being e-reet

> "Your walking down the street in your acid cap, and you see a crack addict, ... "
Who cares about the opinions of a crack addict? Fuck em :)

Nothing at all wrong with making a couple dollars. In fact, if you are planning to make a career out of art, it is somewhat necessary.

-darkmage[iCE]

I think almost all the stuff that goes on in the scene that involves money is completely innocent, and not really worthy of fussing over.

When guys sell ansis, it's not like they're altering their art to make more money.. all it is is accepting a commission to create a work of art, and it's a good way to weed out the people who really want something from an artist they respect from the people who just want whatever ansis they can get.

Stickers and hats are just tangential things. If people respect the group or even just scene art in general, and they want to have something to display that respect, then why not supply it for them? No one's making a fortune on any of this, if anything just taking a little for the time spent to arrange it, or even applying the proceeds to another cause.

The person who sells cd's is just getting something back from the music he's already created. I guess this is the most arguable point.. what if his music changes for the sole purpose of selling more cd's? I suspect that this is rarely the case.. but I guess it's not out of the question.

selling out is not making $5 here and there. selling out is being sponsored by nike to draw ansis, and i don't think that's ever going to happen :)

(unless i can get ibm to sponsor the blender)

>Why dish out 25$ us (33$ can)
>for a cdrom filled with old artpacks, demos, and

why? collecting that shit up might take years with slow modem. when you are working, and get that 25$ or much over per hour isn't it more rational? and hey, who gave all that room for different scenes to use =)

about solo/group releases,
as lice said; The person who sells cd's is just getting something back from the music he's already created.
exactly, think about how many hours we have been used for training our skills and made different stuffs for free? and in the same time others have worked for $. the author needs little $'s to produce better stuff, too. isn't it better to support scenepeople rather than multinational recordcompanies who actually are the ones ripping us. =)

what pisses me is including (and especially selling) scene productions on cd's whether it isn't not the original author(s) doing that cause
many groups doesnt want that but their words aren't just heard. how about acid or ice, are the packs in cdrom.com cd's? the situation here is depending on groups and their politics, not the individuals.

the problem is bigger in demoscene, the partycd's are a joke for people waiting to get profit's for their contributions that the arrangers are selling after the parties. it's same usually with
compoprizes. there's always people breaking stuff up and the money needed to fix that comes first from.. you know.

i don't like to see my stuff on cd's that are for sale. it's just a principle - anything to do with $. the copyrights of the scene have also been on my mind, can we handle 'em?
can everyone make profit with your picture if it doesnt have the (c) - sign?

>"Most artists sell logos for about 2-10 dollars"

yes, when you make a logo for a company (ofcourse you're required some status of being professional) you'll get 500$-x000000$ depending on customers size and stuff like that. if you'll have a career of ansiartist with even 10$ / logo you'll have nothing else but to starve rest of your life =)...

guess i'll add my two cents.. i can tell you from personal experience, there's nothing at all wrong with ansi artists charging for artwork. think about it, a good ansi takes hours of work, why not get something back for that work? and trust me, unless you're lord jazz you don't make much of anything selling ansis. it's more like "ooh, someone bought an ansi, now i have cigarette money" .. and as far as acid selling hats and shit.. fuck it, they look cool :). promote what you love folks. i think every group should have merchandise, stickers and shit. maybe someone should screenprint some shirts that say "ansi artists do it better" or "syntax error for president". why not, i say?

misfit / ice / jbodie@hotmail.com

Since i havent been able to draw much for cia lately I decided it would be best to continue giving to the scene by giving away some nifty CIA stickers for FREE!@ Thats right capitalist pig-dogs! FREE! Power to the people.. and the US postal service! To obtain a few* nifty FREE cia stickers, send a Self-Addressed Stamped Envelope (write your name/address on an envelope, stamp it, dont seal it and put it in another envelope that you send to me, get the idea?) and send it to:

A. B.
93 Greenpoint Ave, Apt #1F
Brooklyn, NY, 11222
USA

If you live in another country then.. well, it's probably too bad unless you can get your hands on some US air-mail stamps.

* Inclusions of pr0n and/or doodles will probably get you a few extra stickers!@#

I think this whole debate parallels music pretty closely.

My experience comes from the punk scene, but I figure other "underground" music scenes are probably pretty similar.

Some people will say a band "sold out" as soon as they start getting popular. I'm of the opinion that it's only selling out if you compromise yourself for the money.

And no one complains when bands sell T-shirts and patches and stickers, so I don't know what that's about. :P

i think that whole tyrone article is total bullshit. all my opinions were already expressed by other people. i just wanted to show my pretty face and say whoever wrote that is a stupid kid. :)

i wonder what the yearly salary is for an ansi artist ;)

jezuz.

people pay for ansi but the whole scene sees it right?

i might not be too hot on group merchandise but its no big deal... i doubt rad man makes all that much cash, and hey, even i want acid gear. [not because of the group.... just cuz its acid =D ]

not sure about not caring about the ansi scene and still trying to sell shit to em. but who really cares.

fuck da scene.

Radman told me that all the money made in Acid Gear is used for artpacks.acid.org, that everyone treasures so much. The rest is used for cheaper prices on the next round of acid gear. I can't find anything wrong with that.

Has anyone really successfully made a lot of money off the scene? I guess the potential is there, but I don't think anyone has really tryed to capitalize on it. Which really says a lot of our scene. I like knowing that were all about art. Period.

Just think if the scene was commercialized.

Leo

I have some worries about a president or senior staff making money off what is basically just a name.. (a name that has been made popular and marketable by artists who don't get any share of the profits)

for instance, i start ansi/vga group PiMP. Lord Jazz, Maestro, Kamikazee, Deeply Disturbed draw for it. The group becomes popular due to its powerhouse artists. Due to this extreme popularity, I can sell PiMP paraphenelia to the scene and make a profit. shouldnt the artists get a share?

All this I am curious about, as an artist.
As a consumer, though, I dont really care.

Just my opinion...

I agree, argon, all of the artists involved should get a share in the profits (I'd be pretty pissed of my group leader was making a profit off my hard work). Say iCE were to sell a complilation of all the icepacks on a cd. There are well over 560 artist who have contributed over the years. If you devide the profits that many times, each artist would be lucky to get a few bucks.

Of couse, rather than splitting up the profits, and if everyone agreed. The profits could go toward bettering the group as a whole, like enhancing a server, or something else everyone in the group could enjoy or use.

Leo

Even though I have banners on acheron.org, the most I make every month is around $20US -- and over a year that just may cover the costs of hosting acheron.

art scene does not pay.

i mean all you could get off profits is a 2 dollah hooker and like half a rock. wtf?

oh and does anyone want to request an ansi? i am taking pay requests, $100 and up. serious offers only. bwahha.

bwhahaha... hwhph0h0skelfgm.,..

splitting the profits? what the HELL are you guys talking about...? how much would you expect to get? say a group (somehow) makes $100 a year. say it has 25 members. every member gets $4.. a YEAR. most people don't even stay in a group for a year.

as diez said, the art scene does not pay.. if you want to get paid, get a job.

i remember when me and my friend coded a bbs door game called 'world class soccer'. we made $75cnd. got people sending in money from brazil, germany, england, and all over north america. we claimed that 'the registration fees will help us create better versions of the game'. guess what.. it all went towards our pot fund.

that's the only time that i ever made money by drawing ansi.

Argon brought up a very good point. Hey, I was in acid once! WHERE'S MY SHARE OF THE WEALTH RADMAN!

Argon, YOU DA MAN!

Root88 is correct.
I'm pretty open about ACiD's finances. Every year I take a personal loss of ~ $2500 USD in bills related to the scene (the majority are of which are phone bills.) These sort of things are paid out of my own pocket.
All "profits" made by ACiDgear are deposited into a seperate ACiD DBA account which go towards future investments in the next years round of clothing. Not for booze at ACiDcons =)
Is there anyone else who thinks that this is considered commercialism or selling out? Or was that Tyrone dude on his own.

-R

maestro: as it turns out, radman actually loses money. therefore, wouldn't you have to PAY YOUR SHARE? :) let's see.. $2,500 a year, divided by.. how many people have ever been in acid? let's say 250.. you owe radman $10.

When I first started drawing ansi, everything I drew was free, 100% original. After I got better and people started asking me more, I sold out..:) I started charging 10$+ an ansi, and started doing comic rips to make things easier for myself. :) Nowadays I've gone back to drawing mostly 100% original, free ansis for people, though :)

Argon

i think argon had a good point, but it's not like radman is making off like some kinda bandit. what if someone made a drawing program (i guess aciddraw'd be a good example) or even a bbs program. the coder makes all the money. i highly doubt that any coder ever split up all the money for the people who drew the art for it.

and yeah, ansi is what made acid elite today. but the above mentioned had no part in paying for the production of the acidgear. i have no idea how much radman pays to get it done but i do happen to work at an embroidery shop (heh) and usually for a swearshirt it'd cost a company 13.50 to pay for one hoody, and all the embroidery (you do get a better deal if you buy it in bulk). anyways, i doubt somms or anyone really gives a rats ass what radman is doing.

in any case, gutter emag will now be selling drugs. please email me filth@gutter.com (or check our webpage www.gutter.com) for price ranges and thinks of the like.

again, fuck it. it's not selling out if you maintain your artistic integrity. it's a fucking hobby after all, no one's making any money off this shit but we still do it, year after year. why? cuz we love it (or maybe we're all hopeless dorks :). that's what it's all about. i'll be the first to say, through all the bullshit we spew, we keep coming back, and i love the scene. there was a period in my life where all i did was play around in this virtual society called the ansi scene, and it got me through a tough time in my life. sure i've drifted away from it more than a little, i still dig it.

let's start a new thread.. anyone else been affected by the scene like that? i'm sure you have.. :). take care.

misfit

RM> All "profits" made by ACiDgear are deposited
RM> into a seperate ACiD DBA account which go
RM> towards future investments in the next years
RM> round of clothing. Not for booze at ACiDcons
RM> =)

Hey, I thought we voted for beer and hookers?! ;)

RM> Is there anyone else who thinks that this is
RM> considered commercialism or selling out? Or
RM> was that Tyrone dude on his own.

We have to keep in mind the article is rather dated.. I'm sure all of us at one time or another dealt with the issue of "selling out" and then we grew up and realized we CAN sell our art and in the process still keep our artistic integrity, or at least we can do a buncha comic rips and get pot money.. either way, it's a win-win situation..

So, stay hard make some more t-shirts and white hoodies, and try to save me the duty on my acid toque this time chummer.. ;)

hi-row

Hehe. I was just being a punk. I have mucho respecto for RadMaN. Hell, if I was him I'd be marketing the hell out of ACiD productions. I'd have a COMPLETE clothing line by now with shoes and accesories too! Pull in the school boy/school girl and make totally fresh and stylish backpacks! Hell, why limit yourself to clothing type products? Acid is based in California right? SNOWBOARD AND SKATEBOARD GRAPHICS! ALBUM COVER DESIGNS! STICKERS! Or how about an ACiD Productions paper publication focusing on computer art? EXPAND! EXPAND! Come up with an ACiD mascot, a character of some sort that you can attatch to your company name to make it sweeter to swallow (attatch mini comics featuring your character to all of your products). It's a strong marketing technique and you really can't go wrong (unless your character is Simon, the balding and overweight child molester). Create an identity for your company, (what is your company all about? what does it stand for?) an identity that your target market is comfortable with. This will make it easier for them to put their trust in you and your product (which means more MONEY! YEAH!).
Get your company involved in the community!@ Sponsor shows and events that are related to the type of things your company does and believes in (just be careful, sponsoring an all night lesbian sex-a-thon at the local strip joint could prove costly eventhough most of US would love you for it). DAMNIT RADMAN! GET OFF YOUR ASS AND SELL OUT! I'd be living off ACiD Productions revenue by now you unmotivated bastard.

seriously talking, as hirez is more professional day by day is anyone thought about copyrights of the works they produce ;who can spread the works and where. so noone cares about their works =)?

hirez is a fucked up format, anyone in china can print a million posters of our works and sell 'em.
i wish that would happen =)

Posters from 800x600 JPEGs? :P

I was about to say... That was almost off-topic, but poster-size images from 72dpi JPEGs probably isn't the most marketable thing to do.

-R

So, IS there anyone that sells "The Year In The Scene" CD's or something?

Hmm... ftp.cdrom.com sells all sorts of CD's, and is covered with scene files. Does anyone know if you can buy a scene CD? I bet they could do it legally through some loophole. Like saying they aren't selling the artpacks, merely the CD that holds them.

Also, I know the demoscene sells CD's from the old hornet archive.

vengeance uses his works (640*480) for cd covers and they work fine =)

maestro has a point (can't believe i just said that :).. dude radman, you should do something like that. take acid to another level. i wouldn't worry too much about having to pay royalties to past acid members or something, you have as much claim to that name as anyone. whatever you do (clothes, cd covers, ads, rave flyers, whatever) with a name like "acid" you'd be big in the rave scene :). i know i'd sure as hell buy the shit. go for it bro.

misfit (iCE / ACiD (for about a day and a half)

Well you know you can always copyright protect your art. Basically the arguement here is a unvalid one. Scene leaders are usually the guys that run the ftp/server for the group. Having your computer as a personal whore to the scene demands some sort of payment. So why look down on them when expenses are trying to be paid for? I mean how many of you little leechs have benifited from mre's ftp :) Yanno money doesn't grow on trees or at least not in Texas, If you want continue servers and websites ect ect shouldnt some type of repayment goto the individual that has put there $$ out for it? ..There are exceptions tho such as argon's claim, but radman puts up the money up front ie all that rad acid gear you buy he already pays for it before he sells it to you why the hell are you questioning his god given right to earn money off of it? Money pays the bills and most "groups that last" Have to pay bills every year.


An it's not like someone is forcing you to buy it? now are they ?

you get this scene cd's all wrong, sure they sell collections of our works...

but think of it in another direction, what they do is merly spread the word, and give us more exposure, besides that, people who make history don't ask for money of history books don't they...
just the fact that its on another level dosn't make it any diffrent, those cd's uselly don't make any money, for example i bought the dream 2 cd's (2 discs, with the best demos, intros, hirez and music from 96-98) and i gotta tell you it costs less then a audio cd and it had a nice layot, it was nicely putten in dirs, in a very orginised way, the way i see it those cd's are more like a tribute to the scene...
we werne't in it for the money...
we code, draw, write as an hobby, we are an underground scene...
(i doubt ascii or ansi will go well in mainstream anyway :)) but besides that, those cd's uselly don't make any profitble money, as it was putten out by the imphobia dream "made for the scene by the scene"

I agree with BD on this one.. I don't see a problem with various people trying make a buck out of the scene as long as it has some good founding in reality. Sure, Radman and myself have banners and god knows what else on our sites, but they're only there to cover the costs of running operations like artpacks.acid.org and acheron.org..

if acid makes a well designed t-shirt with a BIG logo [not the little badge sized things] right smack dab in da middle, i will buy.

accccccccccceiiiiiiid!

"with a name like "acid" you'd be big in the rave scene" -misfit

yes indeed

"with a name like "acid" you'd be big in the rave scene" -misfit

yes indeed

I think thats a good point, People would buy into the name 'acid', not because of the computer art doodlers, but just cuz it says acid.

Leo

is there an echo in here?

is there an echo in here?

is there an echo in here?