Do you mean “can the arts business model survive monopolies?” Half of the story here is of concentration of power in a quasi-monopsony (eg Spotify) and a de facto monopoly (LiveNation). That’s what’s actually killing the arts.
Joey Politano🏳️🌈
Can the arts business model survive AI? Perhaps the best guide is to look at how the arts survived past tech revolutions Take music—internet piracy and then streaming killed the lucrative CD market, but musicians mostly saved their jobs by focusing much more on live concerts
Sep 28, 2026 at 12:18 PM
The Myth of Capitalism Exposed
We need a revolution to cast off monopolies and restore entrepreneurial freedom. First of two excerpts from “The Myth of Capitalism.”
Artist Corporations: A groundbreaking structure for creative people
Creative people deserve the same economic advantages as everyone else. So we’re going to build it together.
Opinion | The Monopolization of America (Published 2018)
In one industry after another, big companies have become more dominant over the past 15 years, new data show.
The Game of Oligarchy | Brewster Kahle's Blog
I just invented and played a game today with my family, and it worked great– it was fun and we learned an important lesson. Similar to the game “Monopoly” which shows that one person ends up monopolizing even though you think the rules are “fair,” the game of Oligarchy shows that the “free market” leads inexorably to one person getting all the money and everyone else going broke. And fast.
Public Monopolies Are a Good Thing
Private monopolies are rightly criticized for being inefficient and unaccountable. But public monopolies are a different story — we should loudly and proudly say that democratically controlled public monopolies are a positive good.
We Found The Radical Solution That Could End Corporate Monopolies
How Artist Corporations became law
The Artist Corporation (A-Corp) is a new legal business form designed specifically for artists and creators. It simplifies shared ownership, protects creative missions and intellectual property, and creates infrastructure for collaboration and future benefits like group healthcare. This piece explains how the A-Corp came to be. For an
Laws of Tech: Commoditize Your Complement
A classic pattern in technology economics, identified by Joel Spolsky, is layers of the stack attempting to become monopolies while turning other layers into perfectly-competitive markets which are commoditized, in order to harvest most of the consumer surplus; discussion and examples.
A speech about Free-to-Play game design
About a month ago, I gave a speech at Creative Mornings in Portland about the way the Free-to-Play business model affects game design. I compared games to television, looking at the way television business models have drastically affected the composition of those shows.
Platform Monopolies - AVC
There’s an article in the NY Times Sunday Business Section today that lays out a very important question we have all been dancing around but will increasingly be dealing with. The article is nominally about Amazon’s fight with Hachette but it is really about internet platforms and monopolies. The author of the NY Times piece […]
Power: A Primer for Perplexed Economists
Let's Assume an Unfettered Marketplace of Ideas! Or Actually, Let's Not.
Subvert - The Collectively Owned Music Marketplace
“Subvert goes beyond hopetimism with a meticulously built, actionable framework. Very exciting!”
Subvert - The Collectively Owned Music Marketplace
“Subvert goes beyond hopetimism with a meticulously built, actionable framework. Very exciting!”
