The Donation Economy Kind Of Blows...

I actually learned this years ago, but I thought, since times had changed, I’d give it another shot, and I can already tell it hasn’t changed at all. I put that payload in the “Free Shit” category, with a donation button, in much the same way that I did in the first real iteration of Analog Industries, when it was basically a site entirely devoted to free drum loops. After a few months of putting up new loop sets most every week, I had received a grand total of about $30 in donations, which prompted me to put up this page.

What’s different seven years later? The ratio. That 909 set has been downloaded so many times now that the transfer of that one file alone has eclipsed everything else residing on this computer, many times over. And the number of donations? Zero. Goose egg. Nil.

Now, I could really give a fuck about the money aspect. If I cared about that, I would have sold the set, and most likely done quite well with it. I was just curious as to whether things had changed in the public conscience since last time I did this, and the answer is “no.”

Compare that to the Bandcamp Experiment. That has proved quite successful. The Bandcamp payments far outstripped any income from the 20-odd other services that EP is available in combined, and in about 20% of the payments, the buyer payed more than they would have if they had purchased from iTunes or Amazon.

It’s too early to make a sweeping generalization (like that ever stopped me) but in my considered opinion, asking people to pay something in order to acquire the content is a wiser choice than relying on their conscience or largess alone.

I know that many of you have explored the same paths here, and it’s time for a discussion of the relative merits of the tip jar versus even a simple required payment. What’s your experience with these two methods?