Much has been made of the rise of the “creator economy” in the last year. With the Pandemic biting, millions flooded online, looking for a way to make money or promote themselves. The podcasting world has exploded, and with it platforms like Patreon, Clubhouse, and many others. But the thorny problem remains: Do you really own your audience as a creator, or does the platform own you? Companies like Mighty Networks, Circle and Tribe have tried to address this, giving creators greater control than social networks do over their audiences. Now another joins the fray.
Disciple Media bills itself as a SaaS platform to enable online creators to build community-led businesses. It’s now raised $6 million in funding in what it calls a ‘large Angel round’. It already claims to have garnered 2 million members and 500 communities since launching in 2018. Investors include Nick Mason (drummer in Pink Floyd), Sir Peter Michael (CEO of Cray Computers, founder of classic FM, Quantel and Cosworth Engineering), Rob Pierre (founder and CEO of Jellyfish), and Keith Morris (ex. chairman Sabre Insurance). It’s also announced a new Chairman, Eirik Svendsen, a expert in online marketplaces, SaaS and the publishing and media industry.
On its communities so far it has American country star and American Idol judge Luke Bryan, Gor Tex, and Body by Ciara. The platform is also available on iOS and Android and comes with community management tools, a CRM, and monetization options. The company claims its creators are now “earning millions in revenue each year.”
Benji Vaughan, Founder and CEO said: “The scale and rapid growth of the creator economy is extraordinary, and today that growth is being driven by entrepreneurial creators looking to build independent businesses outside of Youtube and the social networks.”
Vaughan, a Techno DJ and artist-turned-entrepreneur, says he came up with the idea after building similar communities for clients. He says the data created on Disciple communities is owned entirely by the host who built the network, “removing third-party risk and allowing insights to be actioned immediately”.
He told me: “We are moving from a position of effectively having ‘gig economy workers for social networks’ to owners of businesses who use social networks for their needs, not the other way around. Therefore, these people are starting to leave social networks to build their businesses and using social networks as marketing channels, as the rest of the world does. Once that migration happens where they move away from social networks as their prime platform, they need a hub where their data is going to get pulled together, they have an audience, which we see as a community that connects with itself as much as they do with the host.”
He thinks the equivalent of Salesforce or HubSpot in the creative economy is going to be a community platform: “That’s where they’re going to aggregate all the information about their valuable audience or community engagement. So, we are looking to, over time, to build out something very akin to what HubSpot sites they have for tech companies or SaaS businesses: a complete package, a complete platform to manage your engagement with your users, grow your user base and then convert that into revenue.”
Rob Pierre, founder and CEO Jellyfish said: “Creating and engaging with your community digitally has never been more important. Disciple allows you to do both of those things with a fully functional, feature-rich platform which requires very little upfront capital expenditure. It also provides numerous options to monetize your community.”
(Bloomberg) — The head of the International Monetary Fund warned the US that the global economy is closely watching interest rates and industrial policies given the potential spillovers from the world’s biggest economy and reserve currency.
“All eyes are on the US,” Kristalina Georgieva said in an interview on Bloomberg’s Surveillance on Thursday.
The two biggest issues, she said, are “what is going to happen with inflation and interest rates” and “how is the US going to navigate this world of more intrusive government policies.”
The sustained strength of the US dollar is “concerning” for other currencies, particularly the lack of clarity on how long that may last.
“That’s what I hear from countries,” said the leader of the fund, which has about 190 members. “How long will the Fed be stuck with higher interest rates?”
Georgieva was speaking on the sidelines of the IMF and World Bank’s spring meetings in Washington, where policymakers have been debating the impacts of Washington and Beijing’s policies and their geopolitical rivalry.
Read More: A Resilient Global Economy Masks Growing Debt and Inequality
Georgieva said the IMF is optimistic that the conditions will be right for the Federal Reserve to start cutting rates this year.
“The Fed is not yet prepared, and rightly so, to cut,” she said. “How fast? I don’t think we should gear up for a rapid decline in interest rates.”
The IMF chief also repeated her concerns about China devoting too much capital and labor toward export-oriented manufacturing, causing other countries, including the US, to retaliate with protectionist policies.
China Overcapacity
“If China builds overcapacity and pushes exports that create reciprocity of action, then we are in a world of more fragmentation not less, and that ultimately is not good for China,” Georgieva said.
“What I want to see China doing is get serious about reforms, get serious about demand and consumption,” she added.
A number of countries have recently criticized China for what they see as excessive state subsidies for manufacturers, particularly in clean energy sectors, that might flood global markets with cheap goods and threaten competing firms.
US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen hammered at the theme during a recent trip to China, repeatedly calling on Beijing to shift its economic policy toward stimulating domestic demand.
Chinese officials have acknowledged the risk of overcapacity in some areas, but have largely portrayed the criticism as overblown and hypocritical, coming from countries that are also ramping up clean energy subsidies.
(Updates with additional Georgieva comments from eighth paragraph.)
©2024 Bloomberg L.P.
The head of the International Monetary Fund warned the US that the global economy is closely watching interest rates and industrial policies given the potential spillovers from the world’s biggest economy and reserve currency.
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Published Apr 18, 2024 • 2 minute read
(Bloomberg) — The head of the International Monetary Fund warned the US that the global economy is closely watching interest rates and industrial policies given the potential spillovers from the world’s biggest economy and reserve currency.
“All eyes are on the US,” Kristalina Georgieva said in an interview on Bloomberg’s Surveillance on Thursday.
Article content
The two biggest issues, she said, are “what is going to happen with inflation and interest rates” and “how is the US going to navigate this world of more intrusive government policies.”
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Article content
The sustained strength of the US dollar is “concerning” for other currencies, particularly the lack of clarity on how long that may last.
“That’s what I hear from countries,” said the leader of the fund, which has about 190 members. “How long will the Fed be stuck with higher interest rates?”
Georgieva was speaking on the sidelines of the IMF and World Bank’s spring meetings in Washington, where policymakers have been debating the impacts of Washington and Beijing’s policies and their geopolitical rivalry.
Read More: A Resilient Global Economy Masks Growing Debt and Inequality
Georgieva said the IMF is optimistic that the conditions will be right for the Federal Reserve to start cutting rates this year.
“The Fed is not yet prepared, and rightly so, to cut,” she said. “How fast? I don’t think we should gear up for a rapid decline in interest rates.”
The IMF chief also repeated her concerns about China devoting too much capital and labor toward export-oriented manufacturing, causing other countries, including the US, to retaliate with protectionist policies.
China Overcapacity
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Article content
“If China builds overcapacity and pushes exports that create reciprocity of action, then we are in a world of more fragmentation not less, and that ultimately is not good for China,” Georgieva said.
“What I want to see China doing is get serious about reforms, get serious about demand and consumption,” she added.
A number of countries have recently criticized China for what they see as excessive state subsidies for manufacturers, particularly in clean energy sectors, that might flood global markets with cheap goods and threaten competing firms.
US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen hammered at the theme during a recent trip to China, repeatedly calling on Beijing to shift its economic policy toward stimulating domestic demand.
Chinese officials have acknowledged the risk of overcapacity in some areas, but have largely portrayed the criticism as overblown and hypocritical, coming from countries that are also ramping up clean energy subsidies.
(Updates with additional Georgieva comments from eighth paragraph.)
Article content
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