From Bruce Springsteen To Beyonce, Artists Donate Tickets To Fight Poverty With Global Citizen
A variety of forces in the music industry, from big stars to big brands, are coming together to support the Global Citizen Ticket Initiative. Global Citizen is an education and advocacy project working to end extreme poverty around the world. The Ticket Initiative uses drawings for tickets to music concerts as an incentive for participants to learn more and to take action to end poverty.
Technically Global Citizen is a website and app developed by the Global Poverty Project. The Global Citizen Ticket Initiative is an extension of the Project's work with musicians via events like Global Festival 2012 which sought to pressure governments to follow through on lofty promises. Tickets for the free concert featuring Niel Young, Foo Fighters and The Black Keys were distributed through a lottery which required specific actions for entry.
Global Citizen Tickets Initiative Intro
The Global Citizen Tickets Initiative seeks to make this model an ongoing thing with a wide variety of artists contributing tickets to be made available via lotteries. To be eligible to participate in the lotteries members of Global Citizen accumulate points by taking such actions as:
Sign the End of Polio petition (3 points)
Sign a petition to support family planning (3 points)
Participate in Live Below the Line and fundraise $20 (20 points)
Email Senator Harkin to help eradicate polio (5 points)
Pearl Jam's Manager Kelly Curtis Came Up With the Idea
The Ticket Initiative was an idea developed by Pearl Jam manager Kelly Curtis who linked up with the Global Poverty Project and beta-tested it at Global Festival 2012.
Now they're getting numerous star to donate 2 tickets to each concert from their "personal stash" with seating in press and radio-contest winner areas. Global Citizen members use 10 to 20 points to register for each lottery for specific shows.
Coordination has included "reps from competing promoters Live Nation and AEG and competing agencies William Morris and Creative Artists."
It's a great way to encourage involvement in Global Citizen and, to some degree, it's possible because, as Kelly Curtis stated, "It's such a non-political, easy thing…You can't really say no, or you'll be shamed into saying yes."
Hopefully the easy and nonpolitical acts of musicians can lead to political pressure to help address the hard issues of extreme global poverty.
Get Involved
To find out more and get involved, check out the Global Citizen Introductory Guide designed for people with all levels of knowledge of the issues at hand.
Hypebot Senior Contributor Clyde Smith (@fluxresearch/@crowdfundingm) also blogs at Flux Research and Crowdfunding For Musicians. To suggest topics for Hypebot, contact: clyde(at)fluxresearch(dot)com.
