
Show Notes
Last week our TED Talk introduced Artist Corporations (A-Corps) — a legal and economic structure for creative work. So far there have been: * 200k+ views of the TED video * 600+ artists and creators joining the waitlist Listen On a special episode of New Creative Era (embedded above), Josh Citarella grills me on the nuts and bolts: * How A-Corps would work * What doesn’t work about the status quo * What solo practitioners would gain on day one Play the episode above. Help us shape the law Your challenges and desires will help shape the law we take to legislators. Support this work by sharing more about your own practices here: Squads paving the way While we work towards manifesting Artist Corporations, it’s important to recognize the squads, groups, and artists out there doing the work right now. Just in our universe there is: * Concept — An ironic network state collective that released a sold out zine earlier this year. * Do Not Research — A collective Discord that drops work and publishes material together. * Elysian Collective — Writers pooling reach and profit around themed anthologies. * Future Commerce Press — A new media publishing empire releasing work across formats. * Hard Art — A collective of artists across disciplines led by Brian Eno. * Network Archives — Dozens of musicians come together to share their experiences releasing work online. * Other Internet — One of the most influential web-based collectives of the past decade. * Play — An award-winning food-themed, LGBTQ+ zine and collective. * Serving the People — A global creative network. * The Dark Forest Collective — Sixteen internet writers who collectively publish work and share profits together. * TIAT — An SF-based new media + tech collective. * Underground Art and Design — An art + tech collective in Brooklyn. * Wondaland — A creative collective led by Janelle Monae. * Worst Generation — A hip-hop and digital collective out of South Carolina. These are all collections of people releasing work under a shared umbrella, using splits and shared economics to distribute the rewards. This path is available to any creative person right now. Artist Corporations will let those groups go even farther together. Join the waitlist Want the A badge the moment filings open? Your early interest will help us make the case to lawmakers: Questions? What do you want to know? Thoughts? Questions? Leave a comment and let’s chat.
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit metalabel.substack.com
More from New Creative Era
This week on New Creative Era, we explore the process of how Artist Corporations became law in Colorado. In the first-ever solo episode of NCE, Yancey walks through the detailed process of what it took to turn Artist Corporations into law, including lessons learned and news on what’s next. Read the companion essay at ystrickler.com.
We are back. Not yet in our usual weekly cadence (that resumes after the summer), but back for an episode and an overdue catchup after the longest gap we've had in over a year. Josh, ever the jetsetter, talks about being part of the Whitney Biennial and Venice Biennale and a 4:30am call with the European Parliament. Yancey, ever the striver, talks about the latest on Artist Corporations and the path ahead, as well as all things DFOS.
In the finale of season 02 of New Creative Era, Josh and Yancey take stock of everything we've learned across 12 episodes exploring dark forests, private online communities, and the forces shaping culture online and beyond. We trace the genealogy of the web — from Web2's gatekeeping revolution to the attention economy to the subscription era's rebundling — and arrive at the present moment, where people are retreating into private spaces to build something new. We both share a list of what we hope for and fear from a dark forest era: sustainable creative ecosystems, the return of editorial vision, new organizational structures, and a more sincere internet — alongside the risks of digital country clubs, culture wars on steroids, rent-extracting platforms, and the same extractive patterns repeating themselves. It's not nostalgic. It's a path forward.
Back with part two of our special AMA episodes fielding questions from our NCE DFOS space. This episode covers everything from nationalism to Section 230 to open source software and everything in between. How far will the dark forest take us? Listen in as we debate and discuss IRL.
This week Josh and Yancey sit down in the same room for the first time to answer questions from 250+ people who found their way down the rabbit hole into the New Creative Era DFOS (link here 🤫) after last week’s audio easter egg. In week one there have been more than 900 chats and an organic book club already started. In this episode, we answer five questions from community members covering community governance, paywalled vs. free spaces, the real source of enshittification, and even how much it costs to run Metalabel.