gogoyoko - Fair Play In Music

gogoyoko was founded in Reykjavík, Iceland back in 2007 by musicians Haukur D. Magnússon and Pétur Einarsson, and developed alongside Reynir Harðarson, one of the founders of CCP Games and the original art director of the massively multiplayer online game Eve Online.

Part social networking music website, part  online music store where artists and music fans can interact and transact, the company’s motto is Fair Play In Music and proudly traverses the traditional bridges between artists and their fans by selling and distributing direct, and giving musicians a “ground-breaking revenue split" of profits.

The company also donate 10% of all advertisement revenues to charity and environmental organizations, and artists and record labels will also be given a choice to donate any percentage of their profits to charity also. As the service - now available throughout Scandinavia – prepares for a UK launch “by Christmas”, IMX grab a chat with founder Haukur D Magnusson…

When and where does the gogoyoko story begin? Who was involved and how did the idea come about - was it a pencil and napkin in a restaurant moment?
In Reykjavík, in September 2007, Pétur came to me and wanted some help with setting up a label since I had that experience. That eventually evolved into thinking about artists as a whole and people who enjoy music all over and who were using Myspace on a massive scale. I guess we really just thought that Myspace was kind of boring in the long run with limited possibilities. Without much knowledge in software development we met up with S. Reynir Harðarson, one of the founders of CCP, and introduced him to the idea. He joined us in the idea development on how we should bring this to life. Once the concept was clear to us we had two choices: to leave it there or take it all the way. We decided to jump.

The name sounds Japanese - what's the tale behind that?
It was a classic "what should we name the band?" moment. We had been in that process for a week in November 2007 and had come up with a lot of names and jiggles. We were only four at that time and we wanted something unusual and fresh that wasn't more than eight letters. When gogoyoko popped up we felt we had something. It's basically gibberish but people can also add meaning to it if they want to. There are a lot of possibilities but let's leave it at here for the time being.

The idea of cutting out the middle man is of course fairly controversial - have you had a lot of flak from labels and aggregators?
Well, of course we are offering artists to access the market directly through us and we consider the artist to be our No. 1. ally. We created gogoyoko from an artist’s point of view because we are artists ourselves and we wanted to build a dream platform for artists. However, we are not so naive to say that all labels and aggregators are artist’s enemies. We just want to offer artists who are interested an alternative to the more traditional way.

With founders / staff located everywhere from New Delhi and Oslo to Reykjavik and Munchen, this is a very global and 'digital era' company - any reservations about the efficacy of these kinds of internet-based or long-distance systems or does it all work smoothly?
This needs to be balanced of course and it took some time to find the rhythm, we have found the ups and downs in that process...and we try to develop the company based on what's working for its employees and its customers.

Where has your funding come from, and how will the project be sustained?
We had funding from some angel investors plus we signed an agreement with the New Venture Fund here in Iceland in January 2009. Our revenues in the long run will come from various posts such as ads, Freemium model, services and partnerships.

Your manifesto is "fair play in music" - what are your main gripes against prevailing models of music distribution?
Well it is "Fair Play in Music" and what we are mainly hoping to improve is the lack of transparency in the industry and the long distance between artists and fans when it comes to delivering music.

I have heard that gogoyoko is run by musicians - is this true? can you give us an idea of what proportion of staff are involved personally in music?
At least 1/3 part of the team are artists that have released songs in bands/projects and the whole team is heavily into music. We also have people on board who are experienced music professionals from various fields related to music.

In what ways does gogoyoko benefit musicians?
If you are a musician selling 500-25.000 songs/albums a year then every % of the retail price you get counts and with more money you will have more time to develop your career/passion/hobby.
It's also very useful for an artist to control when to release new stuff and these days you can very easily reach out to your fan base to let them know about a new release through a newsletter, social sites and other means. We strongly believe that gogoyoko is offering the best deal out there for artists who want to go their own way in channeling their music to their fan base.

In what ways does gogoyoko benefit music consumers?
Many music fans want to support their favorite bands by buying their music, merchandise, and go to gigs. We want to make people aware of the fact that when they use gogoyoko to buy and listen to music from the artists they dig, more of the price they pay will go to the artists then on other platforms. gogoyoko is a fast growing community with lots of interesting artists and people and the platform is in constant development.

Since the site's launch in Iceland earlier this year you've developed a bunch of new features - can you tell us what they are?
I guess we are most proud of our new frame player that travels with you where ever you go on the site. We've also connected the gogoyoko accounts to Twitter and introduced a special music manager area where people can manage their bands through lots of exciting features.

You have a big social network dimension too; this must be quite key to your ideas of closer relationships to musicians and artists, and community in general...
We have been doing a lot of researching around this and want to do this really well and include a blend of well known features in addition to our own innovative solutions. Also we have been crunching cross platforming possibilities to make it easy for people to enjoy what we are doing.

Do / will artists be encouraged to interact with customers via gogoyoko, or is it simply a case of those who want to can, and those who are too busy or can't be bothered, won't?
This is always the artist's choice but more and more artists realize that this is an important task on their ‘to do’ list, whether they are upcoming artists or more established. We have many fresh ideas on how to enable the direct relationship between fans and artists.

Charity is a big part of what you do also. Why did you set things up this way, and what can you tell us about that? Also is it mandatory for artists to contribute or do they have an opt-out clause?
With gogoyoko we wanted to create something that not only benefits artists and music fans but also millions of people in need worldwide. We believe in social responsibility and creating win-win situation through business which is exactly what gogoyoko Charity is aimed at doing. We are teaming up with 10 international humanitarian and environmental organizations, such as Doctors Without Borders, Witness and Unicef. gogoyoko then donates 10% of its advertisement revenue to these organizations and we encourage artists to do the same through their music sales. No one is forced to give to charity: people can participate if they want to and if they want to give more or even all of the proceeds from a song or an album they can do so as well. It's all about giving people the choice.

Who are your biggest competitors and what are your advantages (for users or for artists) over them?
It's hard to say. Strictly, from an old school economic point of view, it is easy to say that our competitors are "companies who operate on internet by selling music" but it is my belief that times are changing and the digital music is rapidly growing. So even though there's a lot of competition out there, we want to focus on "Fair Play in Music" and we strongly believe that people will prefer to buy music straight from artists if provided with the option to do so. We are, and have a good reason to be, very confident about our product, thanks to the strong team behind gogoyoko.

The crash must have been frightening for you as for many others, but you've weathered the storm and have now officially launched in Scandinavia - what can you tell us about that so far?
We launched in Scandinavia one week ago. We are doing things step by step and so far we are happy with the way things are turning out.

And what about further launches. I heard the UK was next on the horizon...is that true?
Yes, UK is up next and hopefully the people of the UK will be able to listen to their favorite music on gogoyoko during the Christmas Holidays. That's at least what we are aiming for.

What other plans do you have for 2009/2010?
Our ambition is to bring gogoyoko to the rest of the world before 2010 ends. We'll see how successful we will be with that.

Ultimately gogoyoko seems like an excellent model for 21st century businesses. Have you already had any examples of similar companies of ways in which you've inspired others?
Well, it's been really interesting so far. Many people have contacted us since we started, such as business people, filmmakers, designers etc. And I have at least noticed one or two copycats out there but hey, that must mean we're doing something right.

Pics from You are in Control by Hörður Sveinsson