Native Instruments in preliminary insolvency ...

[BigRedX]

IME for the vast majority of musicians and composers, having a full time job is completely incompatible with making music for anything other than a bit of fun. You need to be able to be flexible with your time, often with no prior notice, in order to make the most of any opportunities that come you way, and also not be so exhausted at the end of the working day that you can then spend the rest of your waking hours working on writing, rehearsing, recording or playing gigs.

 

From personal experience I have had the most success in my musical activities when I was able to be flexible with how I spent my time, first in the 80s when I was a student and then unemployed, and more recently since I went self-employed 15 years ago where I can set my own work/music split. I tried to do the same in the 90s when I had a "proper" job and it completely and utterly wore me down to the point that when the band split I did no new music for the next 3 years.

 

I'm sure there are exceptions, but I guarantee you that they are rare or that they had some kind of financial safety net to fall back on or an organisation with musical contacts behind them. IME every new artist who appears out of nowhere has either already spent years being ignored or has an organisation behind them with strong music business roots.

[DF Shortscale]

1 hour ago, LukeFRC said:

I don’t actually think we are disagreeing- but if in your era hard work, drive and sacrifice would lead to success and being able to do something as a career in a creative field. 
In my post 2008 crash era and more so now hard work, drive and sacrifice would look like working the crap job to give you flexibility to pour time into your creative field, hustle to try and monitise what you do, and chasing the algorithm to market yourself. 

Yes, I agree and that is exactly why I'm saying it's a huge problem. The issue is not that people are not working hard enough now - if anything, people are working harder than ever before, for far less reward. But the AI / social media platforms you use to plough all that hard work into are the same platforms that are making their money from putting you out of work and making you broke.

 

In 2026, everything you post on insta, TikTok, Facebook etc is being used to feed generative AI. When you use those platforms, your license agreement tells you that. The generative AI fed by those platforms floods the internet with worthless junk which is a facsimile of everyone's content, and that devalues your actual work to zero. It's a trap, and there is no getting away from it without moving away from the algorithm chase model and the platforms that provide it. 

[rwillett]

1 hour ago, BigRedX said:

 IME every new artist who appears out of nowhere has either already spent years being ignored or has an organisation behind them with strong music business roots.

It takes some people ten years to become an overnight success...

 

Agree with all you have said in your larger post. My day job has nothing to do with music, music is a hobby to help me do something different from resolving complex IT and management issues. It's cheaper than Astrophotography so I reckon thats a bonus

Rob