Beware the Shilldebeast, My Son

A bad day for Suicide Girls at the "Selling Sub-Culture Without Selling Out Panel" at SXSW Interactive. The alt.porn website was held up as the prime example of selling out. And no, it wasn't about the money.

The big mistake was forgetting who they were. The day the anti-Playboy did a deal with Playboy, it was all over for their cultural clout.

The real question now is whether there's such a thing as selling out. The consensus was that, even in the age of side-deals and sponsorships, the real fan base can be alienated. It's just that the millennial kids are waaaaay more forgiving than their Gen-X counterparts. According to Urb publisher Raymond Roker, "Corporations are like your rich friend." You'll hang out at their house, drink their liquor, then if they're really your friend then they'll still respect your work.

Corporations also better realize that the creatives may have more friends than them. So when Nike ripped off Minor Threat's album cover for an ad campaign, all they did was piss off anyone who recognizes Minor Threat, which is the very group they were trying to attract.

Richard Nash, who built up Soft Skull Press (publishers of the mighty Get Your War On) said that corporations have to get their heads around what the subculture pioneers really want. "We're not prepared to stand at the edge doing the circle jerk," he said. The creatives that they'll be working with want to get their art out there, so companies need to respect that.

Molly Crabapple warned counter-culture content creators not to become a Shilldibeast (noun, Defn: "Someone who is so greedy to get dollars from their sponsor that they don't create something culturally important or creative, they just accept writing whatever the beast says.") She was also blazing with righteous fury about companies who have turned spec art proposals into creative competitions, degrading the value of real hard work. "It's like going to WalMart, lifting boxes all day, then you go home and some lucky worker gets fifty bucks."

Gala Darling summed it up perfectly. "If you're doing great work, you deserve to be paid."

Oh, and Jeff Newelt of Smith magazine had a very important message for any conglomerate looking to acquire some cool: "$19,000 is my sell-out price"