The Real World vs The Internet

I visited this seminar recently run by a music professional. He explained quite an elaborate picture of the music business but one thing didn’t sit quite right with me. He said “to make it in this business you have to get out in the real world. You can have some success on the internet but eventually you will find yourself having to embrace the real world to progress.”

Isn’t the internet part of the real world? At what point does the internet become fake? Does all this social media, these youtube videos and soundcloud recordings not exist? Are we all just swimming around in some social virtual reality?

Take Perrin Lamb. Relatively unknown outside the internet. He made over $40,000 when his song on Spotify made it onto a top playlist. This kind of online success can pay for a deposit on a house. 

My friend, who wishes to remain anonymous, gets over 100,000 views a week on Youtube and is able to pay for the rent on her flat.

Or Kurt Hugo Schnieder who became famous through performing medleys on Youtube has just signed a deal with Universal to perform more songs on Youtube. Kurt has over 6 million subscribers. Doesn’t sound to virtual to me.

Being online is just a way of sending information from one computer to another, i.e from one person to another. Technically it is no different that sending letter to a fan, making a phone call, appearing on tv, or standing on stage. At the end of the day you are connecting with people. All that is changing is the content and the experience. None of it is virtual.

So I want to end really to say there is no such thing as not being in the real world, it is all around us, no matter what you are doing, just because it involved pixels instead of atoms doesn’t matter. Keep doing what you love, spending time on what you are good at and living your life. 

Jon Hockley is the lead consultant of The Artist Potential which is an artist development and consultancy service. He has worked in the music business for 15 years and is obsessed with personal development.