Members are eligible to receive quarterly ownership shares depending on how active they are.

Subvert, a new marketplace for music and merchandise that aims to be fully community-owned, wants to offer a new alternative to platforms like Bandcamp.
 
The venture, announced earlier this month, will enable artists to sell directly to their audience. It’s currently amassing members before launching a product next year. Artist, labels and fans can join the Subvert co-operative, which owns the actual platform, for free as a cofounding member. While anyone joining can be provisionally accepted, there will be some measures to finalise everyone’s participation, cofounder Austin Robey told Resident Advisor.
 
“We are intentionally delaying the formal incorporation of Subvert because we want to include thousands of folks to be named in our formation documents,” he said. “It would be great to set a world record for the number of co-founders in a business.”
 
Members are rewarded with perks depending on how they contribute to Subvert. Individuals actively buying and selling releases, participating in governance and onboarding new faces, among other actions, can receive ownership shares every quarter. Those shares come with a monetary value based on recent valuations, Robey noted.
 
Once the platform is up and running, it will align individual rewards with collective benefits, Robey explained: “When a fan buys a record from an artist on Subvert, they’re presented with an opportunity during check-out to join the Subvert co-op. From this purchase, both the fan and the artist will earn a growing stake in the underlying value of the platform. Uniquely, this ownership experience is integrated with the platform experience.”
 
Inspired by the work of US political scientist Elinor Ostrom, an advocate of community-run economies, Subvert describes itself as a “collectively-owned Bandcamp successor.” Robey hopes the co-op business model will prevent corporatisation in music and uplift independent creators. “Collective ownership can win,” he concluded.
 
Check Subvert’s website below for more information.

Official website: Subvert