Here are some interesting things I found on the internet this week:
Six Books We Could And Should All Write by Anthony Madrid
Austin Kleon included this link in his newsletter a couple of weeks ago. My favorite book idea is his third option: “My idea is everyone should make one of these, a personal anthology of one’s gold standards. Poems one returns to over and over, like one returns to favorite songs. In selecting the contents, there has to be absolutely no concession to fairness. If three quarters of the book is one poet, so be it. If one of the poems is seventy pages long and none of the others are anything like that, so be it…There has to be one operating principle behind the books: the poems you go back to. Nothing more, nothing less.”
I am not enough of a poetry fan to dedicate an entire book to the art form, but I do love music. Perhaps creating this personal anthology of the musical experiences of my life would be interesting. There are so many different albums that speak to specific periods of my life and what was happening personally. I could write about concerts I attended, albums that I didn’t like at first but then fell in love with a decade later. The options are endless. Imagine my great grandchildren reading a book about how I got into punk rock in college!
How I Bought 20 Houses, Debt-Free, While Serving Overseas in the Military with Rich Carvey – Afford Anything Podcast
An interesting listen on how Rich Carvey seemingly did everything right financially to put himself in the place where he now owns twenty houses and grosses $15,000/month in rental income.
I am 40 years old and paying off a mortgage for just one house, the one I live in. Hearing these stories are simultaneously encouraging and discouraging. It’s encouraging to see how someone was frugal enough to buy twenty houses, debt free. It’s discouraging because I’ve never been frugal and instead of a portfolio of twenty houses, I have plenty of debt to pay off. But this is still worth a listen to see how someone used their finances in a creative way early on to allow them to retire by 45.
Why You (Probably) Shouldn’t Start A Record Label by Matt Brinkworth
As someone who started their own record label over almost twenty years ago, this article hits close to home. Matt makes a valid argument on why starting a label today isn’t the best idea thanks to advancements in technology allowing artists themselves to handle most of the things (outside of financing recording and promotion expenses) that labels did in the past. When I started my label, iTunes wasn’t around and everything was product based, spending thousands of dollars to get your CD release into stores. The digital world seems to make it easier for labels to release music and of course it has in some ways. But it’s also created a funnel for the top artists and labels to command the majority of listeners’ attention leaving very little room for brand new indie artists and labels.
Have a great weekend!
Aaron Hartley 