Let's Build a Social Network for the Arts. Together.

And take back control from Instagram and Big Tech

Let’s Build a Social Network for the Arts. Together.

Let me explain.

Editor’s Note - a housekeeping note - we sent this same article to our paid Sovereign Artist Club members on Saturday as we generally give first access to paid members. The response was so positive that we’re accelerating our timeline and opening up Musero (which you will learn about below) to all Sovereign Artist subscribers.

We know that a lot of artists are disappointed with some of the recent changes at Instagram. The algorithm has evolved, and many people, including artists, are having trouble seeing the engagement that they used to. In fact, Instagram has caused quite the uproar in the past few weeks with high profile complaints about the service morphing into a TikTok clone coming from most visual artists I know. Even influencers are upset about the changes including two of their biggest users, Kylie Jenner and Kim Kardashian. Twitter has been abuzz with hate for the new Instagram feed. And Instagram’s CEO announced they would (temporarily) walk back some of the changes. However, last week on Meta’s earnings call, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg made it clear that the future of Facebook looks like TikTok and that Instagram won’t be going back to straight up photo sharing with a chronological feed. The “walking back” of the changes feels like a hollow promise, and Meta is known for pushing ahead with their plans while throwing users a temporary bone.

A few weeks ago, Jack Conte, CEO of Patreon made it clear that he also is pissed off at Instagram on behalf of creators:

“I realize I’m a bit biased as CEO of Patreon here. I get that, but this is a big deal for creators,” Conte said about the shift to AI-heavy feeds, ironically, in an Instagram Reel. “We spent years investing in these platforms, building followers, building communities, and these changes remind us once again that these are not our followers, these are Facebook’s users.” 

Anger over Instagram’s never-ending imitation of TikTok has been simmering among creators for a while, especially after Instagram head Adam Mosseri declared that the platform is “no longer just a photo-sharing app.”

I suppose, from a profit standpoint, Instagram is making the right moves.  TikTok’s engagement and advertising model is the only path forward to growth for a company as big is Meta. But, nevertheless, artists need a place online, a social network, to show their work and connect with people. And that ain’t a TikTok clone.

And now I’m coming to my point:  Big tech is not going to help you with this.  They aren’t your friend.  They aren’t even your vendor.  You aren’t the customer in most cases, you are the product.  You are a drop of water in an endless ocean of eyeballs and metrics.   

Instagram was promoted as a place for you to promote your art, to showcase your photography and, importantly, a way for you to show your latest works to the following that you built on their platform.  But what did they do?  First they let you bring your friends and fans to their platform, then they changed the algorithm where less of your followers saw your posts, and now, they are changing the algorithm to the point where you’ll be lucky if any of your followers at all see your posts.  They are trying to turn themselves into TikTok at the expense of the photographers, artists and creators that made them what they are today.

It’s now clear that artists need a social network that is NOT run by “Big Tech” who will not hesitate to betray the very users that made them successful. 

It’s frustrating, we know.  We know because we are in the same boat.

At BoldBrush, all we do is think about artists.  We brainstorm how we can provide tools for artists.  We wonder how we can provide channels to help them reach new customers.  We think daily about how we can help them sell art.  We provide free information about how to market your art.  We pay substantial salaries to people to make videos, write articles, manage art communities, develop software, provide support and a host of other things.  Every single one of our people is thinking about one thing:  How do we make artists successful? 

In fact, our goal is to empower a million artists to live off their art.

We are on your side.  We are in your corner.  If you email us, we will answer.  If you join our Facebook groups, we are there, including me as the CEO, responding. You aren’t going to get to interact with the CEO of Instagram, or Facebook, or Squarespace, or Shopify. They aren’t on your side. We are.

You need a social network run by people who are dedicated to artists, who are dedicated to beauty, and who worship creation. That describes us, so we have built such a network.  It is called Musero.

So here’s my question to you, to help us continue to support artists:  Will you support us in return?

As Paid Sovereign Artist Club Members we are giving you the first opportunity to start using Musero (and to invite your friends, fans, followers and collectors), we will be announcing it more broadly next week.

To address the problem of Big Tech running these platforms, luring creatives to use them, and then later betraying those same artists, we are launching a social network that works like the original Instagram.  Artists need a place like that.  And it needs to be run by someone, not a big tech company, they can trust.  Someone who thinks about art all the time.  Someone like us.

Together, we can re-create the magic of early Instagram, but we can’t do it alone.  We need you to join our new network and commit to be active.  You must commit to post your art and to engage with others by liking their posts and commenting.  

We need our early artist users to invite their followers on Instagram and Facebook to join Musero and follow them there.  Explain to them that Musero is a chronological feed, that it works like Instagram did originally, and that it will provide a better experience for you to connect with them and stay connected with them.  In return, we will commit not to betray your trust the way that Instagram has done.  Your followers are your followers and if you post something, they should see it (assuming they scroll their feed).

If we can all do this together, we can attract great artists, collectors, photographers, creatives, suppliers and all the people we need to escape the TikTok, algorithmic insanity and just enjoy calm beauty once again.

We already have some great artists and collectors already using Musero. One collector, who owns over 300 original works of art and is already an active Musero user, wrote me directly to say:

I am so excited about Musero. I've been hoping you would step into the breach. I depend on Instagram for non-FASO art, but hate the non-stop videos. I wish they would just stop! Looking forward to Musero coming online!

So, let me ask, can you support what we are doing? 

Just help us build this network, for all of us, and we can escape big tech once and for all.  If we can pull this off, together, we will brainstorm how to add features to Musero that actually enable finding and selling art, that help promote artists and that build the arts up in general.  In other words, we want to go the opposite direction from Instagram who appears to be committed to becoming a platform where teenagers post videos of themselves dancing.

This is a serious question - if you can’t commit to Musero, please reply to this email and let me know why.  If there is something we can do better, we’ll consider it, because we want to be the home and the partner for visual artists.  

In a world awash with big public tech companies who use you for your data and your dollars - why don’t you at least consider that we should be in this together?  

If you agree, if Musero sounds like something you can commit to help build, please click the button below that corresponds to your platform of choice, and request an invite to join. We will try to approve requests on Saturday during the day, but please be aware we may not get to all requests until Monday.   Membership is free. 

We aren’t asking for your money, we’re asking for your help.  Let’s do this, together.

Looking forward to connecting with you on Musero!

Sincerely,

Clint
BoldBrush/FASO/Musero Founder
Art Fanatic

PS - We highly recommend the iOS or Android versions of Musero. They work the best, are feature complete and you will have a much better experience overall. If you also want to use Musero from your desktop computer, sign up for either one of the apps above and, once you’re approved and logged into Musero, from the main menu choose “Web App” and you will find instructions on how to use Musero from your desktop.