This is a question that I've been pondering for the past few days. My main goal as a musician/producer at the moment is to meet other musicians and actually make friends online. I'm talking like real genuine connections bound by an interest in and love for making music. This forum was probably the best thing that's happened for me in terms of making "music friends." But I was wondering how many of you use social media like twitter, facebook and other platforms to create more connections with other producers/musicians/enthusiasts? What is your favorite platform for exchanging feedback, learning things about music/production or even finding new artists to listen to?

I think knowing this will benefit all of us since social media is so important if you're actually serious about your music and want people to hear and notice it. So let me know what your thoughts on this are.

 

https://medium.com/culture-clash/a5bed2bafa97

 

Basically all the remix i did was for guys i hooked up with on twitter or facebook. Since i use reddit a lot, the EDMproductions subreddit is kinda cool to exchange and find people to collab with. Don't underestimate soundcloud too, it's not that practical to socialize but i've met great guys there

 

Thank you. Very insightful interview and it reflects my current approach to building relationships online. Although I do offer services and I am a musician myself, shameless self promotion and commenting for the sake of commenting are big no no's for me. If I ever write or post about anything I always do it with the purpose of offering value like feedback, tips, praise, criticism etc... And if I want to get someone's attention I'll simply message them. I always try to be myself and act the same way as I would when i want to get to know someone in person offline. I go up and introduce myself, simple as that. But the thing about that article is that's Ryna Leslie, an alreayd established musician with tons of fans and followers, we as upcoming musicians don't have that. We're trying to build this base, and I think that's where social media is so important, we can reach alot of people and then start to interact with them on a deeper level after we catch their interest with our music, tweets, videos, etc...

 

Me only forums, much more info, knowledge etc. I use twitter from time to time but only to check what's happend in political world. Mostly news.

 

As legitimate as those goals are, unfortunately most of the people you meet in these endeavors either have their own, stronger agenda, or end up.. wanting something... or..just plain weird.

Maybe not most, but a lot.

 

That's true, sometimes.

It depends on how you approach people. It's just like in a real life situation. If you want to introduce yourself to someone but come off as being pretentious or needy then you will be received in the same way, but if you're genuine and offer real value then alot of people will be willing to do the same for you. Again, this is not in all cases, but it does happen.

 

All sorts of networking is good in my opinion. I just think that in order to be taken serious in the social network domain you need to be legit in your craft and have a legitimate following. Which can only happen if you conquer your city or town. If you go into internet marketing as just another producer or musician with a passion and what not, your in that matrix with over 3+ million other folks. So if your in there with 3+ million other folks with no solid service or following, the perception you will put off to the people you want to attract won't be of any use. This is why having a movement behind you is more important than any social marketing campaign. I'm not saying to not use these services, I'm just saying that they are pointless if not used correctly. I could be wrong, I'm just about the "suit and tie" shite as much as I am about the creative and expressive side. Either way, thats just my view on this matter.

 

I hate Facefuck and Twitter, they are the downfall of civilization in my honest opinion. I know they have some useful purposes but overall I think that they take more from us than they give. There was actually an article I came upon just recently saying that overall Facebook makes us less happy. If you're interested you can check it out here: Study: Facebook Use Predicts Decline In Happiness

I connect with people wherever I may be whether that's in the real world or on the net. If someone feels my vibe then we connect and share our vision, our desire to learn, our thoughts, etc. That's actually what happened here with SAiNT and many of our awesome members, the rest as they say is history. It's actually inspiring what happens on these forums...just today someone put up a song and said that it meant a lot to them and was asking if anyone wanted to collaborate and help finish it off. Bam 2 seconds later there's an offer and he's sending stems and working together with a new friend. I think if we're open to them great opportunities are always close by no matter where we may be.

 

By the way kooper had a cool template for collaborations so I figured I'd post the thread where it was discussed since it can relate to this topic. I'm sure if anyone is interested in what they read there he would be happy to share it with you guys. http://audiosex.pro/index.php?/topic/6719-listening-rooms/

 

I wish I had seen that before, it shows a different point of view on social media. I think it shows that today's youth perceives social media as an invisible wall between them and their favorite artists, icons, idols, etc. I believe it's partly because of how these celebrities act on their Facebook and Twitter accounts; They act following some sort of a magical formula rapidly gobbled together by label marketing departments, and everyone's been following the same formula.

The problem with that formula is, the marketing people want to reduce risks of liability by cutting the stuff that these artists might normally say but may not be politically correct, may not be in tune with 99% of all opinions or may simply not be of interest to most fans. That takes something out of the celebrity's humanity or personality, and unconsciously, fans and followers feel like they're not getting that person's true nature, but rather the carefully picked words of a middle man or a "translator".

I also liked seeing a bit more about how Ryan Leslie thinks; He already seemed like a much smarter and cultivated person than many money-oriented R&B and Hip Hop producers. Don't get me wrong, I am a hip hop producer too, it's what I grew up with, alongside soundtrack music and orchestral compositions. It's just that so many hip hop producers won't stray away from the typical formulas and how to's that the industry put on them, they won't take risks. Ryan Leslie, from what I've seen, tries to experiment when he's not constrained by labels or artists wanting a mainstream hit.

 

This thread took an interesting twist from getting in touch with fellow musicians to touching a fanbase. These are two differents issues and sure lead to different uses of social medias (if ever one wanna use them for these purposes.

Unfortunally it's kite the opposite with youth today (imo of course), they really buy that virtual proximity with the artist and don't really get the marketing scheme behind it. Just look at how they react to every update from their favorite artist, you would be amazed how every single follower ou facebook fan of an artist think these guys read themselves the tweets and comment. The vast majority of fans are not aware that they are actually considered as a database of consumers to interact with from time to time in order to get them consume an upcoming product.

On the other hand, what we don't see in this interview is how Ryan Leslie used social medias to grow a dedicated following of people who are willing to even give him their phone number (i found it very odd the 1st i've seen that request on his website but the guy know what he does). That wouldn't be possible without his knowledge of how these mediums work. Don't get fooled, i respect Ryan Leslie and admire him (this guy is really a genius) but just look at his videos. Everything is staged to show the dedicated guy, only interested in his music and genuinely authentic (he probably is) but at the end even this is a marketing scheme to sell us a certain "view" of Ryan Leslie.

At the end, Internet and social medias are just tools you can use to achieve a specific goal (good or bad) and you never lose in learning how to use those tools. The rest depends on your motives.

 

hahahahaha omg Catalyst I love you that was so abrupt and just plain hilarious!!!

the truth could not be expressed any better than that sentence

 

Thanks brother, I appreciate the kind words.
I feel like we're so involved with all these networks that we rarely ever take the time to step back and think whether they're really good for us or for society as a whole.

 

^ very true. Society is so ignorant...

 

Yeah I think it's all interconnected. Your friends can become fans and fans can become friends. There's no point denying that we all dream of making a living from our music and the way to achieve that in this day and age is to use the internet. I think the main problem is that when we use social media we just look at numbers, number of facebook friends, number of twitter followers etc...and we forget about making genuine connections with all these people who actually care enough to like and share our music.

Honestly I only use social media to keep in touch with old friends every once in a while and for business. I've found that forums like thi are the best place to make actual actual connections with other people.