(ThyBlackMan.com) When it was announced that Apple was acquiring Beats for $3 Billion, the hip hop blogosphere exploded with talks of Dre being hip hop’s first billionaire. Being the nerd that I am and having followed the acquisitions of tech companies like Instagram and Whatsapp, I understood that there were finer financial intricacies at play than cutting a check for 25% (Dre’s stake in Beats) of $3.2 Billion (The initial Beats sale price to Apple).
After the dust settled and the acquisition was complete, Dre’s post-Apple net worth was estimated to be in the neighborhood of $780 Million; leapfrogging him over Hov and Diddy, but still putting him more than $200 Million shy of the billion dollar mark.
As inspiration often strikes me, it was a heated debate between two grown
@$$ men in the barbershop arguing about another man’s pockets that prompted me to tackle the idea of why Hip Hop has no billionaires.
Before I dive into this topic though, I would like to start by clarifying that the phrase “Hip Hop’s first billionaire” doesn’t imply someone that has made a billion dollars from hip hop but instead someone who found success in hip hop and graduated to greater business endeavours. With no further delay, let’s get to the list.
7. Hip Hop is a hustle – In hip hop we promote a culture of hustling instead of business building. We prefer to juug and focus on the quick lick than build lasting success. You can ultimately hustle up a million dollars, but hitting that billion dollar mark takes a little more than finessing. It requires solid business foundations.
6. Hip Hop devalues its most important asset – The true wealth of the music industry has always been in intellectual property; not record sales, tours, etc. It’s the legal monopoly over your masters and brand. Hip hop has devalued the worth of its masters with the constant release of mixtapes and free music. We have moved to a paradigm of “Let me get hot so I can get this show money.” Publishing and the administration of your IP (intellectual property) will bring you in money long after the shows stop. As technology evolves, so do licensing opportunities.
5. Rappers have poor brand value – Another part of intellectual property I mentioned in the last paragraph is Brand. There are few strong brands being built in hip hop. Today’s rappers derive their value from external sources, be it luxury cars, liquors or clothing lines. They freely promote other people’s businesses to build brand value by association. That’s part of the reason you can go into walmart and buy a Van Halen or AC/DC t-shirt and not find a single one for a hip hop group.
Finish story here;
http://www.makinitmag.com/blog/nw-7-reasons-hip-hop-has-no-billionaires (—–
When it was announced that Apple was acquiring Beats for $3 Billion, the hip hop blogosphere exploded with talks of Dre being hip hop’s first billionaire. Being the nerd that I am and having followed the acquisitions of tech companies like Instagram and Whatsapp, I understood that there were finer financial intricacies at play than cutting a check for 25% (Dre’s stake in Beats) of $3.2 Billion (The initial Beats sale price to Apple). After the dust settled and the acquisition was complete, Dre’s post-Apple net worth was estimated to be in the neighborhood of $780 Million; leapfrogging him over Hov and Diddy, but still putting him more than $200 Million shy of the billion dollar mark.
As inspiration often strikes me, it was a heated debate between two grown @$$ men in the barbershop arguing about another man’s pockets that prompted me to tackle the idea of why Hip Hop has no billionaires. Before I dive into this topic though, I would like to start by clarifying that the phrase “Hip Hop’s first billionaire” doesn’t imply someone that has made a billion dollars from hip hop but instead someone who found success in hip hop and graduated to greater business endeavours. With no further delay, let’s get to the list.
7. Hip Hop is a hustle – In hip hop we promote a culture of hustling instead of business building. We prefer to juug and focus on the quick lick than build lasting success. You can ultimately hustle up a million dollars, but hitting that billion dollar mark takes a little more than finessing. It requires solid business foundations.
6. Hip Hop devalues its most important asset – The true wealth of the music industry has always been in intellectual property; not record sales, tours, etc. It’s the legal monopoly over your masters and brand. Hip hop has devalued the worth of its masters with the constant release of mixtapes and free music. We have moved to a paradigm of “Let me get hot so I can get this show money.” Publishing and the administration of your IP (intellectual property) will bring you in money long after the shows stop. As technology evolves, so do licensing opportunities.
5. Rappers have poor brand value – Another part of intellectual property I mentioned in the last paragraph is Brand. There are few strong brands being built in hip hop. Today’s rappers derive their value from external sources, be it luxury cars, liquors or clothing lines. They freely promote other people’s businesses to build brand value by association. That’s part of the reason you can go into walmart and buy a Van Halen or AC/DC t-shirt and not find a single one for a hip hop group.
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