Hanging at EconSM: Music, News, and Contrarianism

Rafat has put a on a great and eclectic show here at EconSM conference in L.A.. Bringing together entertainment, media, and technology may feel so … 1999, but baby, it’s working.

Afternoon sessions are future of music vs future of news, with the former almost certainly crammed and the latter an under-attended monstrous room in which you could have a great game of ultimate without disrupting things. Contrarian that I am, I’m, of course, in the latter session. Under-invested and much-disliked categories are so much more interesting than being the umpteenth social music recommendation service.

More broadly, I have a theory that I’ll explain sometime about how to be effectively contrarian in the venture investing biz. Among other things, it says you should ignore sectoral investing fund flows. After all, fund flows into 1995 didn’t tell you the Net was about to boom, did it?

Related posts:

  1. Turnabout as Fair Play in Music Downloading Lawsuits
  2. The Wiggles and the Children’s Music Business
  3. Britney, the Chili Peppers, & the Economics of Music Downloading
  4. Locksmiths & Selling Music
  5. Contrarianism on the Google IPO