I remember some 20-30 years ago you would sometimes hear about an artist (usually musician, or a group thereof) being sellouts, or having sold out. This of course in a pejorative way, as this was the most heinous of crimes an artist could ever commit against their fan base.

However, I can’t recall having heard this term for at least a couple of decades. Has the term been replaced with something else? Is it more accepted? Or is it simply so hard to make it nowadays that the concept of “selling out” is basically just synonymous with making a living?

Are there any modern examples of this and I simply missed the online chatter about it?

  • DarkFuture@lemmy.worldEnglish
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    2 months ago

    Because selling out is the standard in America now.

    It’s not noteworthy to sellout anymore. It’s expected.

  • wirelesswire@lemmy.zipEnglish
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    2 months ago

    Many social media influencers nowadays try to get big with the goal of “selling out”, or getting sponsored. From what I understand, ad revenue on its own hasn’t paid well for years, so they take on sponsors in order to fund their channels and pay their bills. You then have influencers like MrBeast and Logan Paul living large and shouting out their sponsors, making it look glamorous to their (often younger) audience.

    • NigahigaYT@lemmy.worldEnglish
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      2 months ago

      Came here to mention industry plants, too. There’s no “selling out” for the most part because most major artists are controlled from day one by the industry, versus back in the day when they needed to scrape their knuckles on their own to appeal to a major label. Social media and The Algorithm lets the labels build careers out of nothing.

  • squirrel@discuss.tchncs.de
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    2 months ago

    I only know this phenomenon from the punk scene and I think it still exists today. NOFX released a song about it 10 years ago.

    First verse lyrics:

    She asked me if I was a singer, then called me has-been
    She said she really liked my band in the early '90s, oh yeah
    I said stop saying those mean things, my ego is so fragile
    And then she called me a poseur punk
    Why don’t I drink up and get the hell out
    'Cause I’m a sellout

  • Lauchs@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    If your idols are youtubers and tiktokkers, their business model is selling merch.

    So opinions had to change.

    • neidu3@sh.itjust.worksOPMEnglish
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      2 months ago

      From what little I know about them, that tracks. They just happen to have a song that was pretty in line with what was (became) popular at the time and made it big. Everything else by them is A LOT more punkish.

          • Revv@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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            2 months ago

            I keep meaning to check those out. 10/10 recommend the Sapling Cage though. Her ‘How to Survive the Dino Wars’ series has been helping to keep me sane the last few months.

    • neidu3@sh.itjust.worksOPMEnglish
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      2 months ago

      I don’t think I’ve heard anything newer than 20 years by them. Ska isn’t my primary taste in music, but they had a few bangers way back when. And yes, this includes “sell out”.

  • intensely_human@lemm.ee
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    2 months ago

    Because artists now serve a younger generation who are far more authoritarian than Generation X. Selling out meant giving up the punk ideals that made one cool, and those ideals aren’t what’s cool any more.

  • 2piradians@lemmy.worldEnglish
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    2 months ago

    I think the plot was lost when the piracy/drm wars reached a peak and set new norms. The ‘talent’ that emerged steadily became performers rather than artists and put out disposable, largely formulaic pop made with protools.

    Nearly all the mainstream now are what many would have called sellouts prior to all this.

    Maybe there will be a move back to quality over quantity. Granted quality music is still being made, but by and large the current listener just wants to jump from the current sensation to the next after the staleness sets in.

    Long story long the internet changed a lot of things, attention spans are eroded, and we’re still learning how to deal with all of it.