Creatives taking control of their careers with subscription platforms

Those in the creative industries have been using subscription platforms to help them generate more of a regular income.

For many creatives, such as musicians and artists, they’re building a fanbase via social media and then offering exclusive content through subscription platforms with all proceeds going to the artist.

This is according to research from the University of Sussex, University of Warwick and the Institute for Employment Studies.

Commenting on the findings, University of Sussex Business School Professor Dimitra Petrakaki, said, “Amid the challenges of music streaming, copyright theft and AI-generated art you’d be forgiven for thinking an artistic career was only realistic for the privileged few, but this is far from true.

“Today’s savvy creatives are using social media like YouTube and Instagram to build a fanbase, then monetising this through subscription platforms like Patreon. In exchange for a monthly fee, fans get exclusive benefits from early music releases to behind-the-scenes footage and one to one interaction with artists.”

“Artists can get a sense of freedom with monthly subscriptions, compared to the hamster wheel of working to commissions, and a real sense of loyalty from their community.

“In some ways it’s taking the dynamic back to an earlier, pre-twentieth-century understanding of the relationship between patrons and artists, with patrons supporting individual artists instead of the wider art economy. At its best, this closer relationship can provide mentorship and personal support as well as funds.”

And while this new model does offer positives, such as the opportunity to take home a regular income, it can come with some downsides as explained by Dimitra: “Some artists feel a sense of creative pressure, fearing that close contact with fans led them to become crowd-pleasers. The model is also open to abuse, with subscribers able to join a channel, download all the content and then unsubscribe.

“Lastly there were worries of becoming overly dependent on Patreon itself, and vulnerable to changes to terms and conditions or charging structures, although that was generally considered a reasonable price to pay.”

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