If you’re an aspiring professional artist, you are a business. 

I would like to present a business model idea for you, one that involves our idea of business itself. Just hear me out on this one. I promise that despite the run on sentences, it's very much worth listening to.

What if there was an alternative belief system we could adopt when it comes to our individual success than the one instilled in us ("In order to be a successful artist, you [a product] have to compete with other artists [products]")

What if, by simply changing that perspective, it could create an alternative way of operating a business (aka you, the artist): one that utilized resource exchange, collaborative effort, the preservation of individual energy and health, and that intrinsically human ability to build off of each others’ creativity and success? This strong human ability to reinvent each other’s ideas often results in increased opportunities to grow and evolve, and it is an extremely powerful tool that helps artists (and the industries they make up) succeed. Not just financially- but on a personal and emotional level.

Could a non-competitive, community-oriented label thrive within the music industry… and even revolutionize it?

In order to do so, that change must have its roots down in the way the labels function with each other. It's been reiterated that what we want as artists, and what every human on some level wants, is to pursue our passions AND make a healthy, meaningful personal gain from it- and that want, that desire, must extend down to the entities that control the industry itself if we want to see it manifest.

MadDispatch responds to that need for positive change, and adopts an alternative incentive, one that by desire follows a business model that also acts in good interest of its consumers (yyyyyeah how many times have we heard that before). At face value it seems there’s no functional way to operate like this by the standards of our economy. But if you dig deep into the philosophies behind capitalistic truths, then you discover that there’s a code that can be cracked. 

Said code to be cracked: how to find a monetary gain in group-oriented success- we won’t be able to survive if we don’t have enough resources. We need stability in order to grow and be healthy as humans, and so do the communities they create. 

By bringing this idea into reality, the idea of obtaining a wholesome profit off of one another’s achievements and gaining strength from each other's strengths, we begin to see Ms. Code crack. 

The beauty of humanity is that we can change the state of the world we live in by changing the way we function. It’s vital for us to recognize that part of ourselves as a species, recognize its value, and use it to our own evolutionary advantage. With that in mind, the incentive to change the way we function as an industry can be sparked… but rarely sustained due to the lack of resources and support given to businesses that hold these alternative social ideologies that is needed in order for them to gain momentum and consumer trust. 

MDR proposes the theory that there is not only a healthy and impactful way to spread positive ideologies as a business, but a method of doing so that also holds an inherently large amount of potential for profit and success. 

If we recognize that it is the unity of the motivations of the industries in the US (most currently hold almost exclusively capitalistic values) that holds the most power over its environment, why not try to change those motivations? 

Here’s my pitch:

A Record Label is the perfect candidate for sparking behavioral change in the community of commercial monopolies that control the behavioral changes of society itself. Throughout human history we have consistently seen instances of art’s role in influencing the way humans perceive the world around them, and therefore their belief systems. A widely recognizable example is The Renaissance: it sparked a major change in societal values and trends, shifts in world views, and advanced our development as a species. So did every cultural movement that resulted from art’s impact on society. 

We conclude from this evidence of cyclical patterns that it is a part of our human nature to be moved by art. When nature is so widely viewed as more powerful than nurture, and it is believed that our nature is to compete in order to survive, and it can never be changed (which is the argument at the root of capitalism), we need to recognize that art has the best chance of changing this narrative and dismantling the assumption that the self-destructive aspects of human nature have more power than the results of nurturing a truly cooperative society could have. 

Recognize art's aptitude and start there. 

As members of the music industry, we can put value on the success of the people and businesses we exist in the industry with- instead of trying to eliminate that success and immortalize competitive mindsets. We can justifiably commercially value it because we know that the exchange of resources throughout communities enhances individual growth. If we apply this theory to industrial entities, then the objective becomes this: Exchange the resources that support one's success in the music industry with the artists and labels we might have otherwise been pitting ourselves against. By prioritizing and optimizing methods of creative resource exchange, we can start an extremely effective system for the advancement of the music industry, and for strengthening artists' abilities to make an impact on humankind's collective improvement than they've had now or in the past. 

While this is a massive goal, it's an extremely important one to pursue.

End pitch. Let me know what you think. 

MadDispatch is in it with you. We’re taking that risk, and testing this theory. 

Our message to the American economy: If we must work with capitalistic values in order to spread this ideological change, then let’s promote and start businesses and industries that hold the ideologies we want to have.

At the end of the day I can’t convince an entire economy to believe anything all by myself. Convincing needs teamwork and time. And MadDispatch, this record label/ movement/ community/ blog has just been started. We need to build our brand integrity, and build the evidence for why this mission- to as a system adopt an alternative way of operating businesses- is a mission worth supporting.

But until then, we're asking the questions and starting the conversation.

Ultimately, MadDispatch is the celebration of art's role in the betterment of society. It is belief in the artist's ability to change the world, with a plan to put that ability to use. 

We’re more than a business, and as an artist you can be more than a business too. 

My fellow creatives, we can be a cause.

xoxoxoxo

maddispatch