Music to your ears: GIVE puts your money directly in artists’ hands

What do Hamilton’s Young Rival, Toronto’s Mounties and Brooklyn’s Buke and Gase have in common?

They’re all bands that have been supported by their fans through the website GIVE.

Co-founded in 2013 by McMaster alumnus Johnny Rodgers, GIVE is a service that allows anyone to give any amount to any artist — and, most importantly, to give directly.

“We looked at every way an artist can be supported,” said Rodgers of how he and business partner, Connor Lowe, developed the site.

You can buy a T-shirt or download an MP3 or go to the concert. But the artist only gets a small portion of the money from those sales. GIVE, on the other hand, charges a modest fee (between five and ten per cent, clearly shown at the time of donation) and the artist gets the rest.

GIVE brings the age-old concept of patronage into the 21st century, essentially democratizing the process. The minimum amount you can donate is $1 and the maximum is $1,000. In reality, donations have ranged from $2 to $250, says Rodgers, with an average contribution of $6-7.

The site has a database of 3.2 million artists. Can’t find the artist you want to support? You can add that information yourself. So far, GIVE has connected 300 fans with 50 artists, and $10,000 has flown directly to those artists as a result.

“Instead of paying for a physical commodity,” said Rodgers, “GIVE focuses on supporting the artists and building relationships.” And while the site has featured mostly musicians to date, the intention is to support all artists in all media.

Now a user interface developer at a Vancouver start-up, Rodgers graduated from McMaster in 2006 with a degree in Communication Studies and Multimedia. He credits McMaster with giving him a well-rounded education within a small cohort of colleagues. It was a third-year programming class, in particular, that helped focus his career direction.

“I had a great time at Mac,” said Rodgers. “It was a great place to get started.”