Thread by @paigefinnn

got beef? an exploration of feud marketing in hip-hop and tech twitter...[a thread 🧵]

1/ first, what is beef?

beefs, as defined by @EliSweet in his 2005 master's thesis Bullet on the Charts: Beef, the Media Industry and Rap Music in America, are conflicts expressed through texts, and the surrounding discourse about these conflicts between consumers and the media

2/ a history of beef
in this 2002 piece, Lola Ogunnaike and John Leland explored how feuds between top rappers and executives "whipped up fans". Clever insults and inflammatory remarks were all disseminated and promoted through the record companies. nytimes.com/2002/11/03/us/…

3/ why beef? feuds create publicity at little or no expense.

ex: Nas's beef with Jay-Z resulted in sales of Nas's album ''Stillmatic'' jumping to more than 1.6 million copies. the rivalry was the spark for one of rap music's most celebrated comebacks, said Elliott Wilson of XXL

4/ but sometimes beefs do come at a cost.

the murders of Tupac and Biggie showed that the beefing artists do not entirely control the beefs themselves; those who take sides also participate. participating means that the audience/media can affect others through the discourse.

5/ since the death of Tupac and Biggie, people have become more aware not only of the possible consequences of beef, but also of the power of the media to captivate public interest and factionalize groups of listeners.

6/ in @RuncieDan's How Hip-Hop Media Has Changed Beef, he explains how today’s artists are "pushed to plan out their attacks like a disciplined military regime -interviews, podcasts, and media appearances"
trapital.co/2018/10/26/how…

7/ in 2015, Meek Mill called out the biggest name in the industry, Drake, for not writing his own songs to get attention. Drake responded with Charged Up & grammy-winning Back to Back. Meeks album went Platinum and he reached #1 on the US charts for the first time in his career.

8/ In Soundcloud rap, artists used guerrilla marketing to propel artists like Lil Pump, 6ix9ine, and xxxtentacion to stunning commercial heights.

one of the techniques was carefully orchestrated feuds with other A-list SoundCloud rappers, creating cult factionalized followings.

9/ beef is an asset, not a problem or a moral dilemma.

although beef is often criticized, the media never fails to publicize it- they cannot ignore the incentive to broadcast sensational material. it benefits media outlets to give audiences the inside information they desire.

10/ building a software company is a lot like building a music company. beef is essential and necessary to be big or relevant. the beef has been SIZZLING on tech twitter recently >>>

11/ a quick note: there are two types of beef/feuds:

- beef against a competitor
- beef against industry norms or standards

12/ people are wildly opinionated by DHH's recent public airing of grievances against the Apple App Store. this is an example of beef against industry norms - Apple's 30% cut. If you're building an iOS app, you know the rules. this is a calculated, public, way to change them.

13/ when Microsoft launched Teams, Slack took out a full-page ad in the New York times patronizingly addressing their competition. this is an example of beef against a competitor.

14/ dave portnoy's gameified trading style is an example of beef against both a competitor(warren buffet) and industry norms of trading

https://twitter.com/TheStalwart/status/1274066978911764488

15/ tech twitter accounts like @VCBrags @vcstarterkit that provide an outlet devoted to instigating and disseminating tech beef, gained a collective 100k (37,968 + 63,804) in just a year.

they understand the power of feud marketing.

16/ challenger software companies and people who understand the power of feud marketing and how to execute it well will cement themselves in the center of the tech narrative.

now is the time to be opinionated.

happy beefing y'all 😇😉

shout out to @PottsJustin for whipping this image up in figma when I told him about my idea for this thread & @mhdempsey for the constant encouragement to learn in public. so grateful for you both!