Browse the music, Invest in the Band

By SJW

February 17, 2007   •   Fact checked by Dumb Little Man

This morning I was reading Gen X Finance and they made mention of a site named SellaBand. After reading up on it, Sellaband is actually kind of unique and offers an interesting way for you to make money, albeit with a fair amount of risk.

Essentially you browse their site and listen to music from undiscovered bands. If you like what you hear, you can purchase a “part” which is likened to a share of stock. A part is always $10 and there are a limited number available for each band so it would be easy to accumulate enough to me a major holder in a band if you wanted.

Gen X Finance sums up the steps nicely although I’ve put some emphasis on the last point because it’s implications could be great if you chose the right band.

  • Browse the listings and find artists that could be good investments.
  • Each artist on the site issues 5,000 parts (just like shares of stock). Each part costs only $10.
  • You purchase as many parts of the artist as you want.
  • When the artist has sold all parts (raised a total of $50,000) they go to the studio to record an album.
  • You receive a copy of this CD in the mail once it is completed.
  • The music is released for download on SellaBand.com and advertising revenues generated from this are split among the artist, SellaBand and the “shareholders”.
  • A regular version of the CD will then be sold through online partners and at gigs by the artist. The artist will receive 50% of the net profits of these sales. The rest will be equally divided between you and the other investors.

As with most forms of investing, you need to be smart and above all, remember this is Dumb Little Man, not the Wall Street Journal so do your own homework before you bet the ranch on some band.

Nevertheless, this could be fun and possibly something you could do with your kids.

Sellaband [via Generation X Finance]

SJW

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