From Fan Economy to Artist Economy

Jakob Wredstrøm

Thank you for letting me know.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Okay, let's start in three seconds.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Hey guys and welcome back to the Sound Connections Podcast. Today we have John Lister in the studio. Welcome.

John Lister

Thank you for having me, Jacob.

Jakob Wredstrøm

So John. I have said many times on the podcast that even though I've spent most of my life in music, I actually don't know that much about music. Like my focus is more on other things than the actual music. And I haven't listened a lot to rap or have been very involved in sort of the rap community and fellowship and that whole genre per se, other than just like a bystander. So we're going to dissect that a little bit today. And also what community means, which for me is also a difficult concept when it comes to the digital sphere.

John Lister

Play.

Jakob Wredstrøm

John, just to set the scene, who you and what you do and what company do you work for so we sort of can understand the conversation today.

John Lister

Yeah, perfect. So my name's John. I'm well, I'm an artist myself, but my main work is with Rap Fame and we're basically an app for amateur all the way to pro rap artists and sort of anyone who wants to be a part of the community and the platform, you're welcome. And what the platform does is it's a mobile sort of recording studio with a big sort of like community focused element to it. We run competitions, we run events, we do all sorts of different stuff and like different ways that artists can like monetize and I'm really happy. To be here and to like chat to you more about that just chat about music in general like it's a really cool opportunity for me I'm glad to be here.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Because it's not a small app. You guys have had millions and millions of downloads. But it's relatively new. As far as I can see, it's had a quick growth. So what's the story with the company?

John Lister

It was started by a few co-founders, so Elena, Dan and Dima. They have a history in of like mobile apps, in like business, that kind of stuff, but they all had like a massive passion for rap music, like going back to like when they were kids and like listening to Eminem, listening to like NWA, like all of those like people sort of from back in the day. And they just sort of pulled their resources together to start an app because there wasn't really any anything around, like you can use music software to record, like Pro Tools, Logic, all of that. Before Rap Fame, there wasn't really an option to just have someone grab their phone and just be ready to go and just record something. And from there, it of just ballooned and skyboard into an app. We've had like 30 million downloads across all platforms. We've had, I think, at least 200,000 five-star reviews on various app stores. And it's a really place to be. The community is great. We've run sort of competitions of all levels, one's for people who record on their phone, one's for people who record in studios, etc. It's a really interesting sort of dynamic community. We've got a global platform. We've got an English speaking region, we've got multiple other language regions all around the world. It's a crazy place and it's really cool.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Let me just understand a tiny bit. Obviously, you head of community and you talk about community. How does that manifest itself on the app?

John Lister

So on the app, obviously, you know, off camera, we spoke about a bit about, online versus in-person community and, know, in-person community, might think of like a run club or something like that, or, know, a book club, but, you know, there's a really massive world of online communities, like Reddit's one of the biggest platforms in the world at the moment. But specifically on RackFame, like it, people meet on the app. They might join a crew together. They might join it being the same, like. Group chats and it transcends to real life. So we've had three babies born from people who have actually like met on the platform, is just, which is just a crazy sort of things that even fathom, you know, like people met on an online rap platform and then they had kids together. We've got people who've become sort of lifelong friends. We've seen loads of like crew linkups in real life with people like they might, you know, they'll be from all over like the U S or the world and they're all congregating meet and say New York or something like that.

Jakob Wredstrøm

You

John Lister

Record some music or hang out or anything like that.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Because when you have these sort of commonalities, that's usually with an artist. For example, my dad-in-law, he's traveled the world with Monta Hoopa, which is a band he's followed. And he's created lasting relationships from that particular artist. But rap fame seems to be more about the concept of rap. What is it that people actually gather around?

John Lister

What I'd say is it's a shared love for the music and the culture. We have this, the app is very like gamified. So, you know, for doing certain things in the app, you get rewarded. And one of those things, one of the sort of key pillars of the app is crews. Anyone at any time can start a crew and just sort of invite like-minded people to join. Even people who they might not necessarily sort of see the world in the same way, but they have the same goals. They both want to reach the top on the platform. We've got loads of like competitions where like, you know, if you win, if your crew wins a contest, then we will give everyone sort of Rat Fame X that crew hoodies and Even more than that, we've got awards every year, kind of like our version of the Grammys where people, we have like a crew of the year award, which is so cool. Like people literally come together, all like make a crew cipher or a song and just come together and just try and like, try and help each other hit the next level basically, from whatever level they start at.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Hmm. So, you know, that there is traction and people seem to be engaging and downloading, but what is it exactly that is a match with these people? Like, why do people believe this is something for them?

John Lister

I think the main reason is because of the... because of the features of the platform and the traction that we've had already. You know, as I mentioned, we've had like millions and millions of downloads and there's always someone active on the platform. If you, you know, download the app straight away, you're prompted to enter like a competition where you can win sort of $50 on your first day. Then if you go sort of like delve into the app a bit, we have a load of sort of public group chats where, which are designed for collaboration, are designed to like help people. Connect together, we have like mentorship systems where people who've been on the platform a bit longer can earn sort of like points for helping integrate new people, showing them the ropes like you know if you're great at recording on your phone and I have no experience and I share tips with you and immediately like you know we have a better standing, we have a better relationship together because we've like struggled together in a way.

Jakob Wredstrøm

But I imagine there's a big difference between being engaged in something and then being able to perform back to the, you know, very brief mention of my dad-in-law. Like, he would travel around the world to follow a band, but please don't give him a guitar in his hand. Like, he's not a musician by any sense. So like, when you talk about recording and sort of sharing how to record, is that for a specific subset of people that are also musicians or most of them sort of creative individuals that express themselves for music?

John Lister

Yeah.

John Lister

Yeah, well, so the majority of the people on the platform are artists themselves. That's like the big selling point of the platform that you can record and that kind of stuff. So I'd say we've got about 80 % of people who are artists. So for the other 20%, it's just the opportunity to listen to underground music that isn't released elsewhere, It's seeing the newest stuff that people are coming up with. Like we've got a kid called Kara. Snow who's he's just turned 13 and he's already won back-to-back sort of like thousand dollar competitions on the platform he's performed with Wu Sang Clan like it's really an opportunity to see like the next sort of like really cool stuff coming up which is why I think like so many like artists have shared stories about how they've they you know they deleted like other music apps that you know traditional ones that you'd like record listen to music on they just delete them because they

Jakob Wredstrøm

Mm.

John Lister

Just listen to rap fame now. And that's what they love to hear.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Mm. That's interesting. Like one of the things that is quite evident with action music, let's say if you would have someone playing traditional pop music, right? And they wouldn't necessarily go with the guitars and sing their songs for all their friends, like unless they've sort of reached a certain level. But maybe I'm wrong. But I believe my understanding of rap music is there's also.

John Lister

Mm-hmm.

Jakob Wredstrøm

A lower barrier of expression and still being supportive. You can be like, kinda suck and still rap and still have support from people around you. I'm not trying to make it a bad thing, but it's more encouraged to experiment and become better.

John Lister

Yeah.

John Lister

No, I mean you're so right, like people in rap are just encouraged to express themselves and you know some artists, know obviously music is subjective but some people do that I'd say objectively better than others. But even in rap, you know, when I was younger, et cetera, like sending songs to friends, like, and you just get like a thumbs up reply, you know, or like, oh, the beat is awesome on this one. And you're like, well, yeah, but what about me? But like the cool thing about rap fame specifically is like, you can be sort of any level and people still do encourage you. Know, obviously we've had millions of downloads. So the range of people on the platform in terms of ability is massive, but people can always tell you how to improve, like say for argument's sake, I make a song and I send it, like, I listen to, or people listen to it on rap fame, they can instantly say, well, hit, you know, your flow is great, but the lyrics not great. Do you know what mean? Like we've got a really cool feedback system where others are encouraged to actively sort of like help other people and say nice things. Because then, I don't know, people, People just want to, like, for whatever reason the community we've built, people really want to help people improve because they see that as the main vessel for, why everyone is on the platform.

Jakob Wredstrøm

But how does that differ from music? What is the reason why people are more encouraging in this particular genre than presumably in other genres?

John Lister

I think because rap and hip-hop at its essence is just pure self-expression and if I... If I express myself and I kind of like lay my heart down, like, you know, the definition of rap, rhythm and poetry, right? It's like, it's something that's very true to yourself and supposed to be authentic and supposed to be real. And if I'm sharing my like real self, you can't really, you know, you can make fun of me, but that's, you know what I mean? Like it's, you're sharing like a real part of yourself and you're trying to be authentic. And it's, I think I feel like it's different from pop where

Jakob Wredstrøm

Yeah.

John Lister

In the main essence, you're trying to sell a narrative. Whereas in rap, you could write a song about just walking down to the shop and buying some crisps, and that might relate to someone in some sort of way.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Hmm. So there's maybe a different, more, more value put on authenticity than other chungers or maybe the, general consumers also buy into that more. Like again, with pop music, you know, one of the primary purposes might be general entertainment or general. So like the, hits are more important that it actually sort of are entertaining and it's catchy rather than where rap is more.

John Lister

And

Jakob Wredstrøm

Authentic expression. And what I find really interesting is, I've always been terrible with lyrics. I have fairly heavy ADHD and my assumption is I have almost no lyric memory, even with my own songs. I've written hundreds of songs. Can't remember a single one. But what I've noticed with rap and what I find the most fascinating is that people will listen to a lot of rap. Are usually also able to perform those raps to victory. Like even, you know, these texts are generally considerably more complex than a pop song, but like even then they're able to express themselves. And that might come back to the distorting on authenticity is a much bigger part of the consumption, I guess. You know, it might be a go out on limb here. I'm definitely not an academic when I speak about it, but just my assumptions.

John Lister

No, I think you make a really good point and we've actually done some sort of surveys inside our platform recently. Just like asking sort of like the user base, what they do, like the way they consume and create music. And one thing we found really interesting was that, so 75 % of respondents, so was about, I think it was about 600 people responded to this one question that they don't use AI in their workflow in terms of music. Water and music, they actually did a survey asking sort of people of all genres, know, do you use AI in your workflow in music? And 75 % of people who responded did use AI. Like, it's the complete, you know, in like a general setting versus sort of like an underground hip hop community, it's the complete inversion because people want that realness. Like people on the platform would rather listen to, you know, someone who just like is freestyling into their or even saying something written into their phone rather than something like really overly produced and heavily sort of like altered and corrected. I'd like a big thing, a big sort of debate on the platform at the moment as well as punching in. Like, do know what that is?

Jakob Wredstrøm

Uh, yeah, we're punching in, so going in performing on the track is just changing over or.

John Lister

So like when you're like recording sort of like recording it line by line, so just like

Jakob Wredstrøm

Yeah, sure. Yeah, yeah.

John Lister

So like, obviously completely standard in like most music recording, but in rap it's all about like, can you really spit that 16? Like, can you drop 16 bars in a row, no breaths, no messing it up? That's kind of like the competition element of rap where like people are less bothered with like you producing an amazing song, but.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Yes, sir.

John Lister

You being able to perform that in real life and being like a real sort of like for lack of a better word like a real G like being able to being able to back up what you say right being authentic.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Yeah, I think, you know, it sort of plays a bit more on the notion of skill than other genres might do. Like if you want to compare it to jazz, for example, I think there's the same element to it. Like the one thing is the expression of it is that you've actually mastered your craft and there's credibility in both. So the pursuit of skillful execution is, guess, one of the things that people really value in the community then.

John Lister

Yeah, totally. Skill is everything. Technique, skill, balance, ability to tell a story at the same time as making it sound nice as well. In rap, it's not totally devoid of songs sounding good. There's a lot of more poppy rap songs. There's a massive uptick in melodic rap in the last 10 years or so. There is a bunch of that as well. Technique is really key, which is probably different from other genres for sure. Like if you think about like pop music, like I'd say it's not devoid of skill and technique, but it's totally different. There's producers who, you know, help people, whereas like rappers, like it's more of a, you know, one person army type vibe, I'd say.

Jakob Wredstrøm

So what's the persona of a user? Again, my perception is just it's fairly young person that maybe is studying. How does it look, the audience on your platform?

John Lister

So... The general persona of people would be anyone who wants to record music, basically. We are obviously a rap-focused platform, like it's rap fame, but we see hundreds of different types of songs every single day. We've actually had a big uptick in electronic music on the platform recently. We've even run country music competitions on the platform as well, because it's what people like is what people were engaging with at the time and we always try and offer opportunities for people to express themselves in any way but I think as you said the majority of our user base is probably on the younger end but not totally. We had a comment recently where someone said like you know Rackfame I love what you do for the platform, you give opportunities to everyone from 15 to 65. And we probably have older and younger users than that as well. So there's a massive range of people from all different walks of life. You know, our say like Arabic community region would be totally different from our English speaking, totally different from our like Indian region. Like there's a massive range of people on the platform. But they all sort of come together to record and just share themselves.

Jakob Wredstrøm

What is the path to being a rapper nowadays? Is that somewhat similar to what any other genre would be?

John Lister

I would say vaguely similar but I think there's quite a lot of opportunities in rap music at the moment. You might have seen those hanging mic videos and stuff like that. People in rap just want to share themselves and I'd say obviously being on our platform is a great avenue to go down. However... in general, like just sharing your music, like creating content, like being part of that like whole machine is like how people are sharing themselves. And I think rap is still the biggest streaming genre in the world, although it's had like a dip in the last year or so. It's what people want to listen to and what people want to engage with generally. So I think there's opportunities for like young, like people who are hungry to make music, especially in the rap scene today.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Mm.

Jakob Wredstrøm

What I'm trying to go at is like, there, is it sort of the typical major label machine? Is that still sort of what counts as most pop music or is like, is there more like sub community, subcultures where things thrive or the sort of like parallel paths to success you see in rap music that you don't necessarily see in other genres.

John Lister

Mm.

John Lister

I see. Yeah, well, definitely. You know, to answer it in a short way. So, you've got platforms like Rap Fame who offer people opportunities, you know, you can win a thousand dollars every single week on the platform. But even so, like I think in rap music at the moment, it's a flex to be independent, you know, it's a flex to be making your own money. It's a flex to like be doing everything yourself. Like some of the biggest like artists at the moment are independent. Like here in the UK we've got some really cool independent rappers. The biggest group actually last year is a kind of rap group called D Block Europe. They're like a melodic rap group. And two years ago they were the biggest selling UK group, full stop. And they're independent as well. And I think people see less and less the value of being in a label and giving away the majority of your income and not receiving that much back because people are teaching themselves about digital marketing now that they're teaching themselves the full sort of scale of things and creating their own team rather than someone plucking you from the streets and creating you to be this persona.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Mm. So if you were to, you know, yourself, if you look outside of the platform, but you just look at yourself as a narcissist, which you are, but if you were to sort of redo it a few years ago, what would be the best suit you would have? Like how would you build a successful career in rap music?

John Lister

So I'd obviously start by recording hundreds and hundreds of songs because I'm really sort of have the belief that the more you put in, the more you'll get out. So first off, record hundreds of songs before you even start anything. And then... start producing content. Like make, find your song that resonates with people the most. Maybe try Rap Fame, because we've got a really great sort of feedback system. Find the song that people are resonating with and then create 50, 100, 200 videos of the same song, different settings, different outfits, different ideas, and just use all the tools that you have. Like there's a lot of free tools now that can analyze your content, see what's doing well, even you know on Instagram on TikTok they have all of the sort of standard stats that you can see like well the video of me you know rapping in front of the beach like that gets 10 times the amount of views of the one in my bedroom where I'm lying in my bed so I should make more of those types of videos so I think I think it's just about getting the content out make making sure you collab with people with a similar audience to get to elicit sort of like similar response. I think it's all about just doing that because it surprises me how many people and artists I've met who they're really talented, they're really cool but they just don't share themselves. I'm like, okay show me your Instagram, show me your TikTok or your rap fame profile, what are you actively doing to get yourself out there? And they're just like, oh I just post my song on Spotify and I've got like 10 players and you think... You have a great song. Please share yourself.

Jakob Wredstrøm

But I can imagine that it's also community where you can come fairly far without having that traditional releases. Like you can build up credibility on just, you know, putting content out that doesn't necessarily be to like, you know, Spotify songs, but it can be in the communities. It can be on Instagram. Can do songs on TikTok and sort of build a momentum without that being the official track release moment. Is that, is that correct?

John Lister

Yeah. No, I'd say that's really correct. And if you look at like rap fame specifically, you know, if you have a crew, so you can have up to sort of like 20 people in your crew, that's 20 people who like you, who are friends of you, who will listen to your music, who will give you feedback. And we have a really cool thing on the platform specifically called, we call it Judge for Judge. So it's kind of like where two artists match up and they listen to each other's song. And they rate each other's songs, they rate them based on delivery, based on their impression, etc. And that can really help you find new people and for new people to find you. And sort of building up your audience, getting people to listen and engage with your music, to comment on it, to help you improve, like these are the things that you can do to really take your work to the next level because it shows you how you can improve. It shows you how you can get that feedback and like really sort of like I think it can show you how to stand out because you hear, know, engaging in listening to a lot of other music, you know, for an extended period of time, you can see where other people are going wrong as well. And you receive feedback and that can show you where you're going wrong.

Jakob Wredstrøm

So it sounds to me that the journey sort of is also more accepted. Again, if I want to draw a parallel to one of the only parts of music that I really know, which is sort commercial pop music, is that there's really no such thing as like the journey. The journey is sort of for the industry, like the industry.

John Lister

You just find out. Right.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Yeah, but, you know, the ads is really only breaks through when, they break through, like, and the small sub genre or subset of fans that follow you in the beginning might help to create these super fans, but, you know, popularity comes oftentimes fairly sudden. And the journey sort of is not that big, big part of the picture, but it seems like, again, how you're describing it, that the journey of creating that career development is something that people appreciate a lot more.

John Lister

Totally. people... Again, it goes back to that word, like, in rap, like, people don't believe the stories. They don't want to see, like, a super polished person who was plucked out of nowhere, you know, industry plan is a big term that people throw around a lot. Whether it's, actually a real thing, I'm not sure, but... people really value sort of like being part of that journey, being part of the team. Like, you know, a massive thing, I think especially like amongst me and my friends when we were younger was saying like, we'd love to be that person to show a new artist to our group of friends, you know, to be like, you know, I knew about this person after his first song or a second song and now he's massive. And it's kind of like a, it's an ego thing to say like, you know, I'm so knowledgeable about music, like that I showed all my friends this, this upcoming rap. or something like that. People are not bothered really about the size of anyone anymore, I don't think. It's kind of clear with everything really. You can see massive platforms on social media that don't get views anymore. They can have millions of followers, but it's about what people are engaging with right now. You can look at someone's Instagram and they'll have a reel with 50 million views, but they'll have 2,000 followers. I think it's We're in a very much sort of like instantly engaged society, but not necessarily something where the views, et cetera, translate into having a million followers out of nowhere.

Jakob Wredstrøm

It makes sense. Yeah. So what is it? What is it about rap fame that really makes it successful? You talked about some of the features, but obviously having retention of people come back to the platform, but also having enough immediate interest to gather 30 million followers. Like what is it that you do right in that space with your messaging, with the way that you get users?

John Lister

I think specifically what we do right is engage and listen to the community. So, so many parts of the platform we've... You know, obviously at the start, the platform was sort of a black box. Was nothing really on it, but we listened to what people wanted, the features that they wanted to see. We changed our content to make it more engaging for people. Like through user feedback, like through speaking to people, conversations like this, like, you know, I've done like it must be hundreds of meetings, like zoom meetings with users on the platform say like, you know, what do you like? Like, what do you not like? Like. Would you change this? Like, would you change that? It's really just engaging with our community and seeing what they want, as well as some like cool... know, innovative ideas from, you know, the great people that I work with at the platform as well. So it's that combination of like really wanting to create something that people engage with and enjoy more than anything, you know, but we're an online platform for people to have fun at the end of day. That's the like most basic sort of element.

Jakob Wredstrøm

One of the things that I don't fully comprehend, but I think it's an interesting question to ask is the prize aspect to it. Where does that come from that people can win prizes and what's the reasoning behind it?

John Lister

So we launched paid competitions about four years ago or just over four years ago and the idea was that we were already running competitions and we were giving out various prizes that were you know sort of maybe not money maybe it was headphones or just you know bragging rights over everyone on the platform but We added these sort paid competitions because there was a demand for it and people would really put extra effort and do more because of the price. For artists who haven't achieved international fame, $500 off any song is a difficult task. Terms of, you probably need like 200,000 plays or something like that on Spotify or maybe more to see anywhere near those kind of returns. So offering people an opportunity to just make money from one of their songs was really appealing thing and since then we've been doing competitions every week for four plus years now we've given around $300,000 in prize money and you know the community really appreciate it and we sort of really appreciate them as well.

Jakob Wredstrøm

So my immediate thought would be, isn't it, again, I might be wrong, but isn't it more so the, that there's an actual prize rather than the actual amount. Again, you know, if you want to draw a parallel, like I run a lot. Um, I used to be an elite runner and then I've taken up later in life and there are sort of competitions around here and. The fact that there's a price or there's a winner can be enough motivation to actually be motivated about something. Like if they believe they could potentially have a chance. So it's not necessarily the thousand dollars. Obviously that's attractive for certain personas and for most, but it's more so the opportunity of winning something and there's actually value associated to it. Like how would you assign that compared to actual cash?

John Lister

I think, yeah, that's a great point. And in essence, it's true. So we run. multiple competitions on the platform every week. the grand prize is $1,000 or more, and for some it's $50, just one $50 prize. And we get very good engagement in all of our competitions because people value that competition, the camaraderie as well. So you can release sort of like a collab track of up to 10 people on the platform and it'll go on everyone's page, et cetera. And you can all push that song, right? And if you, me, a bunch of our friends all pushing a song that we made to win this competition. Even that, even just that process, that journey of like the competition over a week or a few weeks, you know, we're chatting about it in a group chat saying like, hopefully we can win this week. yeah, like, you know, Jacob like really tightened up his verse, like John's vocals on the hook or whatever were great. Like, it's that camaraderie, it's that sort of element of we're a team and we're all trying to achieve this goal, whether it's like a yeah, thousand dollar competition or just a competition to win, you know, a new pair of headphones or like even just to win like premium or something on the platform. And, you know, having those sort of like bragging rights, like seeing your name like up in the lights if you win, like it can be a really great feeling for people. And, you know, we interview a lot of our competition winners in the past and just them speaking about like that feeling of just like opening up the app and just seeing their name that they won. Like it means so much to people. And you know, I think if we're not talking about like the biggest of the big artists, like to win a prize or to win an award or anything similar to that for your music is like, it's a first time thing for most people on the platform. Like before being a rap fame, like I'd never, you know, I didn't know anyone who won like a music competition. it wasn't even a thing like on my repertoire when I thought about music, but sort of like being here.

John Lister

Seeing all of that happening, like it's a massive thing and it creates so much enjoyment for people.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Mm.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Thanks, John. It's been great to hear about RapFame and one of the things that I'm always contemplating about when it comes to the future of the music industry is obviously these expenditures of people. So people want to spend money on music. And what I think is interesting about RapFame is that you have artists supporting artists, where so I think a lot of the industry is focusing on fans supporting artists.

John Lister

Mm.

Jakob Wredstrøm

But inherently, guess also these artists are becoming fans of each other. So it's like a very, very active group of fans that are basically also expressing themselves through the same medium. Does that change things, how they spend? Like what are the opportunities of spending money on your platform? Can a fan spend money?

John Lister

That is a really good question. And yeah, so I'd say. One of the main vessels in which people can spend money on our platform is by promoting their tracks. So if you're a really big fan of a particular artist, you can promote their tracks as well. let's say I love your music, I can go onto your page, any of your songs I can promote and that will get you more feedback, more exposure, more comments, likes, et cetera. And that's a great way that people engage with each other. And the way we've set it up on the platform So for a lot of actions, so say if you support someone, you get a little badge on your profile to say, I've supported this person. Like, here are the songs from other people that I've supported. Here are the songs that people have supported for me. And we even have sort of, we have our own charts. So we have, you know, artist charts, song charts, et cetera. We also have sort of like supporter charts and commenter charts as well. And... One sort of new thing that we've added pretty recently is voice comments. So you can leave sort of like a voice note on someone else's track to say, to express how you feel about it. And that's sort of like been a whole sort of explosion of people offering supportive comments, which is honestly, it's so nice to see. And we even have a little initiative. We have like a voice comment of the week. And so the best voice comment they get, I think $10 or $20 just for being supportive, which is really cool. But yeah, most people support each other through that. We also have opportunity for you to purchase beats of beat makers who release on the platform. So there is a pretty cool ecosystem of like you being able to support me, me being able to support you, et cetera. Like if there's three of us entered in a competition, we win a prize, like we'll split it. Like you see like so much of that going on, which is really cool.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Amazing. Well, to be honest, like it's very novel for me to hear of a platform that has an audience that basically are mainly artists and then also supporting itself. And I think that's quite fascinating. I struggled to see where that can be replicated in other genres at scale, but I think that may be the beauty of rap music, I guess. What's your comment to that?

John Lister

I take your point, but I massively disagree because I think, you know, right now there is a rap fame that exists in other genres, but it's just it's much more spread out and it's across different platforms. It's across message boards. It's across... you know, sort of like in-person and online events is on different Instagram pages. It's just not been focused in a way that people can engage with it together. However, the core principles of offering feedback, a feedback engine, of charts that, you know, uplift you when you're up, that motivate you when you're down to keep going, keep improving. I think that's a universal thing across every genre. Like at the end of day, people want to be heard.

Jakob Wredstrøm

And

John Lister

And people want to be supported and also support other people. Know, one of the best things I think you can do if you're feeling down or whatever is go and help someone else. And I think that's a massive part of like our community and why I think it could extend into sort of any genre, to be honest. And we already see, you know, hundreds of artists who are not rappers on the platform get love and get sort of like support from other people. Obviously, you

Jakob Wredstrøm

Mm.

John Lister

Like anything in a massive platform, you'll have some detractors, but I really think with the right sort of marketing and the right sort of processes put in place, maybe a different colour scheme for rap, for country, to rap, to whatever, to metal, I think there's a real opportunity there, to be honest.

Jakob Wredstrøm

I think it's sort of as we end the conversation today, and thank you so much for contributing, one of the reflections that I have here, which sort of is a tiny bit of a change of mindset for me, is that I, when I've talked with people about fandom and platforms surrounding about fans supporting Asist, I have the majority of the time thought about like a persona, which is like a... passive bystander to some degree, like someone who appreciates the music and sort of can identify the music. But I haven't as much thought about people who are themselves expressing themselves through music. And they were basically the fans as well, like people who are... colleagues to some degree, not really in a practical sense, but like they express themselves for their same medium, then they're fans of others. And that you create community monetization and career opportunities around that, which I think is incredibly fascinating. And obviously that's not necessarily something new, just I haven't thought about it that way. What's your sort of experience with that different persona versus like a passive fan?

John Lister

Mm.

John Lister

Well, I mean, it's obviously something that I see sort of every single day and it's really interesting because, you know... I guess being part of this platform, my perception is that everyone's a creator, everyone makes their own music but also engages with bigger creators. But something that we've seen quite a lot is people taking their fan base they've got from some traction on the platform and taking it into a different realm. So one artist, he's called Dexodus, but he changes Monica to Weatherman. And he's created a whole streaming environment, where people go on his show, like play their songs, et cetera, sort of a similar concept to Rat Fame, but as a sort of like music review show. And he's, you know, been really successful from taking the early steps that he did on Rap Fame and expanding from there. And like, we see that.

Jakob Wredstrøm

It's really interesting. John, thank you so much for sharing about rap fame and thank you for walking us through it. And I think there's a lot to learn here. And, I say that because I obviously, again, I'm a bystander in most senses when I'm talking about music tech. Like I speak with a lot of companies and I've helped build some, but... The majority, I would say almost everyone that I meet think about fandom, maybe it's a little bit different than what you're experiencing. And I think there's a lot of value to be had to think about it the way that you guys think about it and how you've built sort of the community and support system and how to sort of monetize that into like premium expenditures. You know, obviously the biggest interest from a lot of assets and that can be really interesting to see how that could also be second phase of a lot of these careers that maybe are created on your platform.

John Lister

Mm.

Jakob Wredstrøm

But John, thank you so much for joining.

John Lister

Thank you for having me. I really appreciate it. And, okay, cool.

Jakob Wredstrøm

See. Okay, no, I'll cut that out. Just continue.

John Lister

No, and yeah, I just wanted to say that, you know, I think... that most people don't understand about like artists and fandom and all of that kind of stuff is like people are willing to invest in themselves, you know, like we see that every day from people buying themselves a guitar who are just hobbyists to people, you know, buying a microphone, etc. And what really counts is you're willing to invest in yourself 10 times the amount if you feel someone investing back in you, which I think is a big part of our platform. So when someone wins a competition, it could be $50, they get that $50 in their bank and they think, they're not like, I'm gonna go and, you know, go for a few drinks with my friends. They're like, okay, well, here's a mic that's $100. I couldn't have afforded it before, but I can spend 50 and then now I've got my mic, now I'm leveling up my setup, now I'm trying to get to the next level. And I think that's like a really important sort of, I guess, service that we give to people that they really value and that is not really seen, except in sort of like online community similar tasks basically.

Jakob Wredstrøm

That's a really interesting point. So being invested in is also what motivates you to invest in yourself. I haven't quite thought about it that way before. That's actually really interesting. I think that sort of applies for a lot of things in my life as well. I think that's a really great statement to have me reflect on this episode.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Thanks, John. So that got my mind thinking and a lot of things going on in my life. That's why I got quiet.

John Lister

No, no problem. But you know, it's so true. It's like when you're a kid and you're, you know. Like you said, you're an elite runner when you're a kid. If no one told you, Jacob, like you're sick at this, you're doing well. If no one ever said that to you, you wouldn't invest in yourself to keep going, to keep that drive, to keep on it because you didn't get that support and that encouragement. You know, when you, if you're like mom or dad got you a new pair of trainers, you know, you felt, yeah, like I'm ready for the race today. Like I'm good to go. And I think that can make a huge difference in the way people perceive themselves and the way they, even create.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Mm.

Jakob Wredstrøm

That hit home run. I will, John, you know, obviously that's a whole different conversation why that hit the home run for me right now, but I think that's an incredible takeaway that the importance of people investing, supporting how that also helps you motivate to actually take the next step. And I guess maybe that's also the outcome of the community on your platform that there is creating these, call it like protective silos of like development. Like as you develop, there needs to be some sort of safety that needs to be some sort of room to grow without too much external criticism or your own thoughts like killing yourself. But there's actually these sort of extra-unvendidation or not necessarily a validation, like encouragement to continue investing. Yeah.

John Lister

And you know to someone who doesn't get that from their friends or their family like it means everything, you know, to see people commenting on your track and dropping fire emojis and all of that kind of stuff when you never thought you would get that, like even to just talking from my own perspective, like it means so much. You know, to get support from people that you've never met. And it can really hurt you.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Mm. That's brilliant. Thanks, John. Thanks for taking your time today and love to talk to you, man. That was great.

John Lister

Cheers, thanks Jacob, thanks for having me. Been a great conversation and really happy to be here.

Jakob Wredstrøm

Cool man, stop being recording.