Thousands of bloggers around the world will write about poverty today. Here’s my contribution:
Why You Should Be Wealthy
We live in a world that cannot make up it’s mind about money. And no group of people is more confused than the church. I personally believe this is a tragedy and I’d like to point out why. So here are my 25 reasons why I think you should be wealthy:
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Because you can.
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Because others can’t.
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Because others need you to be so…
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They can see your success and believe they can succeed too.
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Because righteous, rich and loyal Christians terrify the enemy.
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Because a 10% tithe of a lot is a lot.
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Because 25% or 50% of a lot is even more.
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Because there’s no way to legally become wealthy without helping a whole lot of people (and if you win the lottery, see reason #7). Wealth is gained by providing something people want and creating a company (jobs) to provide that something. Both of these activities help people. Period.
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Because the Lord gives you the power to gain wealth. Deuteronomy 8:18 – But remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your forefathers, as it is today.
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Because He hates poverty. Among others, here’s Prov. 10:15 – The wealth of the rich is their fortified city, but poverty is the ruin of the poor.
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Because the bible says the following in Prov. 13:22 – A good man leaves an inheritance for his children’s children.
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Because you’ll be free to spend your time how, where and when you’re truly needed instead of spending 50% of your waking life working for someone else.
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Because you’ll eat healthier and probably live longer.
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Because you’ll have extra food and…
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Extra cars and…
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Extra homes.
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Because someone you know is hungry, has a broken down car, or simply needs a place to go on vacation.
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Because you would be a Godly and kindhearted employer.
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Because you would be a Godly and kindhearted landlord.
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You’d have more peace in your life. I didn’t say happiness, I said peace (see reason #10).
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Because you could become more active in your community, town, state or country.
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Because money is a tool and…
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As a tool, it is either controlled by you, used against you, or sitting idly wasting away. Wealth is NOT about amounts, it is about control. It is about stewardship – which is really what this post is about (see reasons 1, 6-9, 11, 12, 13, 14-19 and 25)
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Because properly gained wealth is one of the tangible measures of how you’ve helped other people. This sounds controversial, but it’s not. What I mean is IF and WHEN you help people (see reason #8) you will gain wealth. For some reason, this repels people from moving forward in life. They keep their goals small so “people won’t think I’m greedy and selfish.” Sorry, but if you have the next Microsoft, Cancer treatment, Automobile Engine or local restaurant idea inside of you and you don’t let it out, THAT is being selfish and greedy. And DON’T apologize if letting them out gives you reasons 6, 11, 12, 13-16 and 18-21 in the process.
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What have you been given? This is much deeper than reason #1. That is not simply about effort but about living out the big dreams God has placed in your heart. The ones that make you excited and terrified at the same time. The ones that cause you to think “what if” and “no way” in the same breath.
My hope is that you’ll put “because you can” with “what have you been given” and become a #5. And isn’t that what you really want to be?
PLEASE read this and heed the call to action at the end – especially the part about firing their butts and sending them home.
And speaking of, is NOW a good time to make a serious push for congressional Term Limits?
Marketing & Strategy Innovation Blog has a post about “The impact of the internet on customer behaviour.” It presents further discussion about recent studies showing the internet to be twice as influential as TV and eight times as much as print media.
I don’t find this surprising at all and here’s why.
In what is now called “traditional media” interaction revolved around stuff. We watched stuff paraded across our televisions, heard it paraded across radio and flipped through it as we looked at magazines and newspapers. And while that mentality is present on the internet – banner ads, contextual ads, etc., the internet is about us.
When we are online, we are much more likely to be active than passive. We are searching, responding, creating content and any number of other things best described as interacting. Because we are in this mode, we naturally interact with “stuff” too. If your like me, when I come across something new online I immediately seek out what others I know are saying about it. Which is why studies are showing the internet to be influential.
But it’s not the internet. It’s people. It’s us, just like it’s always been. All the internet has done is make interaction easier and we ain’t seen nothing yet.
Marketing online is not difficult if you keep this in mind. Don’t get overwhelmed by all the hype, it’s always about people.
In the past two days, I’ve come across four articles about giving away digital content for free. Most are, somewhat understandably, bemoaning the idea. This post quotes Esther Dyson as saying “that the ease with which digital content can be copied and disseminated would eventually force businesses to sell the results of creative activity cheaply, or even give it away. Whatever the product — software, books, music, movies — the cost of creation would have to be recouped indirectly: businesses would have to “distribute intellectual property free in order to sell services and relationships.” It then goes on to describe all the problems – for artists and consumers – that this will cause.
On the other side, is this post from Joe Wikert about his excitement and ideas after reading Adam Engst’s point of view. I love Joe and Adam’s enthusiasm and want to encourage the same in you. They are looking for opportunities to succeed in the midst of changes by introducing new concepts that bring benefits to their customers. Ideas like this will always win. Starbucks is not about coffee, it’s about a “second home.” Disney is about dreams coming true.
All of the negative reminds me of this speech from Other People’s Money where Danny Devito’s character speaks about the mistakes of the buggy whip makers at the dawn of the automobile. Instead of involvement in the biggest opportunity of their lifetimes, they put more effort into creating better buggy whips. Make sure you don’t do the same.
Beyond considerations about terrorists, the mentally unstable and other rational fears, I’m simply not worried about the technological and environmental challenges of today.
Developments like CamTrax are the reason why.
Though it doesn’t solve any major world issues, check out this piece of code that recreates the Wii without anything more than a webcam. It will have ramifications far beyond gaming and I figure that with leaps like this taking place – capabilities vs. cost – it’s reasonable to expect most problems can be solved.
Even some of the major world ones.
Beyond considerations about terrorists, the mentally unstable and other rational fears, I’m simply not worried about the technological and environmental challenges of today.
Companies like CamTrax are the reason why.
Though it doesn’t solve any major world issues, check out this piece of code that recreates the Wii without anything more than a webcam. It will have ramifications far beyond gaming and I figure that with leaps like this taking place – capabilities vs. cost – it’s reasonable to expect most problems can be solved.
Even some of the major world ones.
“In today’s globalised, digitised music industry, record companies may be on the run, but the enterprising individual artist has never had it so good.” That’s the quote beginning Robert Plummer’s story on BBC News about Ahmed Fakron’s blossoming music career.
Fakron is a Libyan born artist seeminly doomed to “international isolation” until about a year ago when a “New York-based DJ known as Prince Language unearthed an old Ahmed Fakroun track called Soleil Soleil, re-edited it and put it out on a 12-inch single, renamed Yo Son.” But that’s not the cool part, or the part of interest to you.
“Since April this year, Ahmed Fakroun has had 20 of his songs available for download from 7digital’s indiestore – an offshoot of the firm’s main site that allows singers and bands to create their own digital music shop.
“It happened through a fingertip. I happened to find [the store] while I was surfing and I tell you, I am happy to find them. It wasn’t too complicated, my fans started to know about it and others discovered it,” he says.”
Still not convinced?
DubMC has an in depth interview with Kenyan band Yunasi. You think you have it tough in the music business? Read this. The live in a country with no music industry. None. The radio stations mostly play western music and they earn all the money they make through live performances. Again and again, they mention how they long for the structure and mechanisms of the music businesses we take for granted in the west. Mechanisms that are still valuable btw.
But then, near the end of the article, the band mates say this:
“The internet has been a God-send to Yunasi. It allows us a window to the whole world and different demographics that despite geographical positioning can be exposed to our music conveniently. We have a website making our info available 24-hours a day, social networks like Myspace accounts allowing interaction with potential fans, YouTube allowing our videos to be available, music available for purchase directly for download from our website, on Itunes, Amazon and so forth. We are able to get useful contacts of world music professionals, media, festivals and organizations just at the click of a button that allows networking opportunities. We even can send our music to anyone in the world and use the available learning opportunities to make us better musicians. We were even invited to two festivals in Thailand festival thanks solely to our website and the availability of our video on the internet. People are also able to contact us easily after listening to our music from whatever sources. The internet offers us numerous opportunities to better ourselves as a band and further our careers.”
Take a look at what’s going on in the GLOBAL and internet linked music business and you’ll find endless opportunities.
Check out Dominic Basulto’s slide deck on four business trends:
(1) Social Data
(2) Micro-Payments for Online Social Experiences
(3) Content Mashups
(4) “Live” experiences (that really aren’t “live”)
What’s interesting to me is that they are all related to Social Networking, which I believe to be the big mega-trend today. They also fit squarely into any business model a musician or artist should have today.
Don’t let the doom-n-gloom of the industry news fool you, people want to be entertained. It may appear that the “hows” of entertainment are a mess right now, but I would argue that they’re not. As I’ve said before, I argue that the selling of products that contained music was the anomaly – what we’re seeing now is a return to normal. For thousands of years, people went somewhere to hear music and probably paid to do it. For the past 100 years, people bought music and took it home. That’s not going last – at least not the same way.
Which is why I like this list as a guide for musicians and artists. Are you doing something in or with or creating or manipulating or sending social data? Are you offering stuff cheaply – micropayments – that give people experiences? How ’bout mashups? Could you create or offer pieces of stuff and let your fans go nuts with it? Where could that lead? Lastly, what are doing about “live”?
Back to my point, isn’t music ultimately about live? Even “fake” live?
The owner of NYC indie record shop Rockit Scientist Records is quoted as saying:
“Anybody who legally downloads music is an idiot! You can get it for
free, why pay for it? Download it illegally, who’s going to catch you?
Legal or illegal, they sound the same.”
Hmmm, interesting. But as this article says, perhaps “he seems to recognize that there’s still plenty of value in the physical product: the CD or vinyl for those who want it.”
And the CD is just the beginning of related stuff people will – still – pay money for.
Logic + Emotion brings us a simple little graphic to get what it takes to build our brand through our heads.
Check out Stairway to Brand Heaven & Hell.
It’ll take two seconds unless you print it out and stick it on your wall. Which is what I’m doing.
