Kanye West’s New Venture Will Fail. Here’s What We Can Learn From It.
(UPDATED) Kanye West recently announced via twitter that he is hiring for a new creative company. Named Donda after his late mother, the company will purportedly have 22 divisions and in his own words “Galvanize thinkers and put them in a creative space to bounce their dreams and ideas” with an aim to "pick up where Steve Jobs left off.” Kanye’s ambition certainly seems as big as his inflated ego.
The amount of projects that very successful people enter into that you never hear about again is insurmountable. People who have gained success in one arena often have a desire to widen their empire, and grow what they believe is a talent for entrepreneurship. But because they have found success in their chosen field doesn’t mean they can conquer all.
LIGHT THE FUSE
If you look at the companies that rule the world today, they grew from a small spark of an idea. They were cultivated and nurtured by individuals until they sparked the imagination of others. Kanye wants to buy all the talent he can, because he believes that is how you achieve your goals, but it is not the talented that you want to get on board, it is the people. The people who are going to use your products, the people who are going to tell their friends you need to use their product.
Facebook, Youtube and Google were not built from a highly paid think tank, but from the ground up. Google didn’t even have a proper domain name for the first year. Even MacDonald’s and Taco Bell started on a street corner, one store at a time.
When you get the brightest and best in a room together, as Kanye obviously wants to do, it becomes so insular; everyone is fighting to be heard and wanting to impress everyone else. It is the people who don’t care about fame, or building the next big thing, or hanging out with the right people, the ones that actually use the product – they are people who make or break it.
KANYE GOES SOUTH
When you try and buy your way into the market you don’t become Google, you become Google +, or Bing for that matter. It just doesn’t work.
Record labels have forever tried to buy success for the bands and this is why the business has crumbled. They would sign everyone they could that resembled the current success story with the belief that with enough money thrown behind them, they would catch fire. But it is the individual’s ability that creates and nurtures the opportunity of success, not the team around it.
Look at Adele’s or Mumford and Sons success, or The Alabama Shakes – who are slowly working their way into the consciousness of the nation. They are born out of something real that resonates, not what a boardroom feels is real and will connect.
The flip side of this is Lana Del Rey, who’s daddy is a wealthy business man and obviously funded her career. When it comes to the crunch, as with her SNL performance, she can’t deliver and the people don’t subscribe. You can’t fool all the people all the time.
KNOW YOUR PLACE
Whatever your business or your musical project let it find it’s providence, its own path. If you strip it of its potential by beating every opportunity out of it before it is ready, it will be too abused and broken to succeed.
Kanye’s project will have so much capital behind it, that anything that gets even a smoldering of success will not be enough to pull it out of the hole it has already dug. Major labels used to look for a minimum of 100,000 sales before it took an act seriously, now they are cartwheeling if they get 10,000. Kanyes company is setting itself up to be just like the old corporate model, which if you haven’t noticed, doesn’t cut it anymore.
Optimism is fine and all, but sometimes realism is what connects the dots.
Robin Davey is an Independent Musician, Writer and Award Winning Filmmaker. Follow him on Twitter @mr_robin_davey
RD — youse a hater & whatnot…
As much as I think that DONDA sounds a lot like Entertainment 720, I have to agree with tone bloke (great name btw), and you are just being a hater & whatnot…
It’s not new knowledge that financial backing is nice but doesn’t always lead to success.
A bit naive to cite Adele simply as an example of something ‘real’. Sure, she has a real talent, but it is no coincidence that she and Duffy emerged at the same time, with some of the same songwriters, as the record industry in Britain was looking for ‘the next Amy Winehouse’. Simple formula: look for a white girl with a decent ‘soulful’ voice and a bit of songwriting talent (difficult to say how much because nearly all their songs are co-written), put them together with good co-writers, producers and arrangers, and hype them for dear life.
I’m not sure I agree with this.
Henry Ford was admittedly not the brightest man. Though his capacity to delegate, surround himself with the right people along keen instincts helped establish one of the most successful corporations to date.
I’m not comparing Kanye to Ford in a literal sense here, but Kanye’s access to money, information, people and talent is something to consider.
What defines success or failure? Kanye is already successful as an artist and an entrepreneur so if the venture does fail at least he would have inspired others to achieve their dreams.. and who knows what can come out of failing.
“Know your place”~~Interesting…
I cant quite call Robin a hater, but I’m wondering where the motivation comes from to even a write such an article?
If Kanye used realism as his guide, he would have not gotten nearly as far as he has. sometimes you need to dream (and not be afraid to fail).
You bring up a fairly good point, but you don’t have nearly enough info about what DONDA is actually going to do to make an article slamming it.
Good to have you at Hypebot, Robin.
I’m starting to look more moderate every day!
Poor article, starting with the fact that you can’t possibly know what kind of business it will actually turn out to be from the simple info posted on twitter by Kanye.
And what exactly do we “learn from” your article ? Weak.
^ BINGO
Haha thanks Clyde.
The past is a great predictor of the future. And if you don’t learn anything from something maybe it is not always the writers fault.
And I thought there was a lot of motivation to be taken from this piece. If you look at it as affirmation that slogging it out for a number of years pays off much bigger in the long run then throwing lots of money at a fledgeling idea, then it is a very hopeful piece for independent artists. Surely all the people hating me are haters? Whats the definition of hypocrite again?
i cosign.
See my reply to kelland below
I get your point now, but the way you tie it in with the title and the tone of the article is what got the reaction, but at least you have sparked an interesting conversation..
Maybe, but in this case it is (the writers fault).
This article is hate spew. Any ‘motivation’ drawn from points you make here is taken at the expense of Kanye’s yet to be launched venture.
You say: “If you look at it as affirmation that slogging it out for a number of years pays off much bigger in the long run then throwing lots of money at a fledgeling idea, then it is a very hopeful piece for independent artists.”
Why don’t you just write a hopeful article about that then? Why use Kanye’s popularity and people’s hate to deliver a ‘very hopeful piece’?
Well I wrote this within the context of kanye because it is current news and something that would appeal to the enquiring minds of hypebot readers. Agree with it or not, its just an opinion. Not a hateful one, that really is a stretch, certainly no more hateful than your comments. If you believe it is then you are as complicit in hate as I am. However I would frame it as opposing viewpoints in a discussion.
Hey I am not really a fan of Adele but her success is undeniable and a large reason for that is social word of mouth.
Always amuses me when I get called naive, when someone describes success as “A simple formular” Oh if only it was that simple, then Kanye might stand a chance.
Thanks for the thoughts
Everyone has a dream, thats why Hollywood is such a transient place, trouble is you need a plan and a brain too.
All this criticism Davey, one hopes you are learning to accept it before dishing it?
You may-be something of a word-smith but a little humility,also,goes a long way to earning respect from your peers!
Arthur, cm’here you big Dude and I will give you a hug.
Negativity will get you no where. Hate is hate. Don’t be mad Kanye wants to surround himself with those he feels can change this world. At least he’s making an attempt and putting his scratch where it itches! You’re the madwriter!
I’m not mad??? I was just voicing an opinion.
What a way to kick an idea…Forget that it’s Kanye for a minute..If I were a 18 year old kid I would be confused, to make a blanket statement as to why he will fail is just crazy. Why start? Why even try to make music, you will fail? Or maybe not! Because you do NOT achieve world wide success that doesn’t mean you failed. To even close a business means it’s closed not always dead. Since Steve Jobs was used by Kanye, I will use an example as to why he might just succeed. Steve Jobs was fired from his beloved company Apple and had a boat load of money to spend. He started NeXT and he came across a company that a Mr. Lucas(Star Wars) wanted to get rid of that was filled with uniquely talented people. It was called PIXAR, with Mr. Lucas gone Mr. Jobs almost gave up all of his money to keep PIXAR and NeXT going, NeXT has gone on to the after life and PIXAR gave Jobs a board seat with Disney and created new products and services. Not to mention he was paid handsomely for his gamble on the company.
You see, we live in an extremely creative time right now and the new industries and jobs will be created by those creative types. Kanye will have some success maybe not what he envisioned but he will have success. He has drive, ambition, and talent for recognizing talent. The execution is what is most important.
Someone should do a Kanye version of this : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzxIg5p_HBs
LEAVE KANYE ALONE !
I think it’s funny that you so arrogantly state your position on Kanye and his aspirations. It’s blatantly obvious that you didn’t write this piece objectively. The entire purpose of this article was to articulate(as best as possible) how much you dislike a man you’ve never even met and know absolutely nothing about. You are bitter and it shows in this article. You have overwhelming negative response to your article. Maybe you should take from that and learn from it. Maybe you won’t, hopefully you will.
In defense of the writer: The title is bold and mentions Kanye, because if it wasn’t controversial, none of us would have read the article. Hopefully someone was able to read past their anger to glean something worthwhile.
A reader’s opinion: “Know Your Place” is an unfortunate phrase to use in reference to a black entrepreneur.(or black (fill in the blank). Really, it’s just a bad idea. You can argue that it wasn’t directed toward Kanye, but it doesn’t really matter.
Other than that, the article is just kind of the same old…anyone who has been an indie artist for any length of time pretty much already gets this. You can throw money at projects and hope something sticks. Hell, check out how congress deals with almost every major problem it faces. Big business does this all the time.
But something with soul, passion, and substance that also happens to have money behind it? Serious winning combination. I don’t think Kanye will fail. I think at this point, he’s too big to fail, and he won’t need a government handout if he gets in too deep…he’ll just put out another killer record, go on another ground breaking, record breaking tour, and feed Donda with the proceeds.
Important note: He didn’t say HE was the next Steve Jobs. That *would* be egotistical. He said he wanted to build a creative company with people who think differently, to pick up where Jobs left off. I think that’s knowing your limitations, which is the opposite of egoism…not to be confused with “knowing your place”.