CNN Discovers Soulja Boy

January 17, 2008

Video: CNN American Morning: Soulja Boy: How’d He Become So Popular?

Back in October, I talked about the social media forces that were leveraged to bring Soulja Boy his success in Soulja Boy Is A Web 2.0 Wonder. But now that he’s nominated for a Grammy, MSM (that’s mainstream media for you newbies) just had to put a report together for “American Morning” to discuss the phenomenon, as you can see in the video above.

Lola Ogunnaike, entertainment correspondent for the show said:

“The song is such a huge hit because one, it has a really infectious beat, it has such a catchy melody, and it comes with its own dance.”

She also said:

“It’s become the hip-hop Macarena.”

Not sure about the Macarena reference, because hip-hop has always had its dances since its inception. In my day we even had a Pee Wee Herman song and dance. But what is it about “Crank That” that has made it surpass, say “Peanut Butter Jelly Time,” “Chicken Noodle Soup,” “Aunt Jackie,” and everybody down south snapping “they fingas,” while the Bay got hyphy and krump, and Memphis was buckin’, while other kids were doing the “Wu Tang” and “Percolator?”

Just what was the ingredient that this kid has, after building his MySpace and YouTube cred. To be quite honest, the one ingredient that Soulja Boy has had, that most of these other dances haven’t (although Chris Brown krumps and Usher snapped his fingas) — all of the ingredients that Ogunnaike states, plus the instructional video and the music industry machine behind it. If Chris Brown had created a krump song with a how to krump video, do you think we’d be here talking about Soulja Boy today? Well maybe we would be, ‘cuz krumping ain’t easy.

The Soulja Boy stats:

3 million ringtones sold of “Crank That”
28 million hits on YouTube
“Crank That”: Highest Selling Digital Song of All Time
600,000 units of Soulja Boy Tell ‘Em sold
127,000 digital downloads sold of “Crank That” (just last week alone)

Category: Celeb 2.0, News, web 2.0

Ken Gibbs Jr

The crazy thing is that he had 700k views before he ever got the deal. Imagine if there was a way for him to monetize all of that himself? Would the label be of much use beyond paying for the insurance on his world tour, if he could? Another reason why Jay (or Beyonce) needs to push us all to the tipping point with an internet only album. There are 5 stats listed up top, with 50 middle men in between the Soulja Boy and the end result. It doesn't need to be like that any more.

Lynne d Johnson

Ken - Yes someone like Jay or Yonce needs to put out a digital release. The lessons of RadioHead and Saul Williams have taught us this. What these artists have been able to accomplish w/out labels and the many pockets they have to feed is awesome. Sure, people could say the numbers are/were low, but they had no middlemen to pay. They got more money to keep for themselves. Here's an interview on Cnet.com with williams: Unlike Trent Reznor, Saul Williams isn't disheartened from Jan. 11. Williams says:

"I think it's early in the game. I'm not disappointed at all. I think Trent's disappointment probably stems from being in the music business for over 20 years and remembering a time that was very different, when sales reflected something different, when there was no such thing as downloads. Trent is from another school. Even acts that prospered in the '90s, you look at people like the Fugees or Lauren Hill selling 18 million copies. That sort of thing is unheard of today. But Trent comes from that world. So I think his disappointed stems from being heavily invested in the past. For modern times, for modern numbers we're looking great, especially for being just two months into a project."

And in this dotmatrixproject post Niggy Tardust Digital Download Figures Released:

[…] Saul’s previous record was released in 2004 and has sold 33,897 copies.

As of 1/2/08,
154,449 people chose to download Saul’s new record.
28,322 of those people chose to pay $5 for it, meaning:
18.3% chose to pay.

Of those paying, 3220 chose 192kbps MP3
19,764 chose 320kbps MP3
5338 chose FLAC

NIN Trent Reznor was disheartened, but I have to agree with Saul on this one. This is a new business model. So yeah, imagine if Soulja Boy know how to monetize all that love he was getting before the industry cut in.

Just check out Thom Yorke and David Byrne in Wired:

"It turns out the gambit was a savvy business move. In the first month, about a million fans downloaded In Rainbows. Roughly 40 percent of them paid for it, according to comScore, at an average of $6 each, netting the band nearly $3 million. Plus, since it owns the master recording (a first for the band), Radiohead was also able to license the album for a record label to distribute the old-fashioned way — on CD. In the US, it goes on sale January 1 through TBD Records/ATO Records Group.

While pay-what-you-will worked for Radiohead, though, it's hard to imagine the model paying off for Miley Cyrus — aka chart-topping teenybopper Hannah Montana. Cyrus' label, Walt Disney Records, will stick to selling CDs in Wal-Mart, thank you very much. But the truth is that Radiohead didn't intend In Rainbows to start a revolution. The experiment simply proves there is plenty of room for innovation in the music business — this is just one of many new paths. Wired asked David Byrne — a legendary innovator himself and the man who wrote the Talking Heads song "Radio Head" from which the group takes its name — to talk with Yorke about the In Rainbows distribution strategy and what others can learn from the experience. "

Anthony Farrior

I still don't like the fact that the real version is about profane sex. Hopefully this will encourage rappers to keep it radio ready for the MSM.....