Chapman Youtube Drama Continues...

Haych

Modellista said:

Haych said:

Chapman’s been on the phone to KDH: “Brilliant, man, worked exactly as I planned. The internet has gone nuts. I’ll wire the money to your offshore account as agreed. Want some goodies from NAMM?”

Don't agree.  I think this is Chapman's Ratner moment.

I wasn’t in any way being anything but facetious. I do agree that chapman has potentially shot himself in the foot, though. But still we’re all here talking about him, five pages in. 

I’ve kept up with the thread for the sake of morbid curiosity. Sooner or later it will all blow over, most likely, and be forgotten. In the meantime the hot topic in the guitar community is Rob Chapman.

It might damage his reputation somewhat but you can guarantee that there are some, who have never previously heard of Chappers, who are now very aware. 

tony99

Poor Chappers, heavy lies the crown my friend,

#staystrong

darthed1981

tony99 said:

Poor Chappers, heavy lies the crown my friend,

#staystrong

To be or not to be, that is the question,

Whether tis nobler in the youtube to suffer the slings and arrows of negative comments,

or to take arms clumsily against a sea of haters,

and by opposing, fill them with renewed vigour and destroy my own career....

tony99

For God’s sake, let us sit upon the ground

And tell sad stories of the death of kings;

How some have been deposed; some slain in war,

Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed;

Some poison’d by their wives: some sleeping kill’d;
 and yet some stilleth make utter gobshites of them selfs on t'internet

hollywoodrox

I’ve had a flu jab

darthed1981

Alas, poor Chappers, I knew him Horatio...

a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath
borne me on his back a thousand times,

though he hath made a right tit of himself this time...

Philtre

...and his name shall forever be removed from headstocks to be replaced with "Total Cock"...

Jez6345789

I always reminded of one of my favourite friends who I knew and learnt a lot about business from he was a marketing man in London in I suppose the UK's Mad Man era late 50's-60's and early 70's he worked with so many of the big companies of the day and did many of the big campaigns of the day. But the boardroom tales he used to recant from that era were priceless about the pitches and how to handle the era's equivalents of today's YouTube heroes.

Telling one fat cat chairman after a particular failure had ratcheted up in the press who then dug into some of his practices. 

He walked into the boardroom with two pieces of paper. He politely said the solution to deal with this is easy Sir you have two options that I have written down for you. They need little explanation and both are simple and not expensive to implement. 
Chairman asks what are they so Bob holds up the first one with Mea Culpa written on it. The Chairman a public school type blustered that will never happen, never show weakness to the jackals, I will sue if I have too. Then Bob said you will need the 2nd one Sir, simply handed him the 2nd one in an envelope with Go quietly into the night written on the front with a resignation draft and press release and left. 

The times change and the scenarios are different but ultimately there are only a few ways to properly deal with these types of issues. This was realistically the modern equivalent of a need for silence or Mea Culpa. Sadly as I said the combination of Ego and a modicum of success is a heady addictive cocktail before you add in the internet fanboys cheering you to your own demise. 

Anyway, there is now far more interesting NAMM news so I am off. 

tony99

Jez6345789 said:

I always reminded of one of my favourite friends who I knew and learnt a lot about business from he was a marketing man in London in I suppose the UK's Mad Man era late 50's-60's and early 70's he worked with so many of the big companies of the day and did many of the big campaigns of the day. But the boardroom tales he used to recant from that era were priceless about the pitches and how to handle the era's equivalents of today's YouTube heroes.

Telling one fat cat chairman after a particular failure had ratcheted up in the press who then dug into some of his practices. 

He walked into the boardroom with two pieces of paper. He politely said the solution to deal with this is easy Sir you have two options that I have written down for you. They need little explanation and both are simple and not expensive to implement. 
Chairman asks what are they so Bob holds up the first one with Mea Culpa written on it. The Chairman a public school type blustered that will never happen, never show weakness to the jackals, I will sue if I have too. Then Bob said you will need the 2nd one Sir, simply handed him the 2nd one in an envelope with Go quietly into the night written on the front with a resignation draft and press release and left. 

The times change and the scenarios are different but ultimately there are only a few ways to properly deal with these types of issues. This was realistically the modern equivalent of a need for silence or Mea Culpa. Sadly as I said the combination of Ego and a modicum of success is a heady addictive cocktail before you add in the internet fanboys cheering you to your own demise. 

Anyway, there is now far more interesting NAMM news so I am off. 

Jez your posts are ace, makes a change from the usual chuff in here. No honestly it's really refreshing.

We should go for a pint.

Vibetronic

Modellista said:

Jez6345789 said:

I have followed this for whatever reason morbid curiosity or it actually is a modern business story played out in social media.

Agree 100% with all of this, wish I could have put it so well.

Chapman obviously hit a great business opportunity with the initial collaborative design idea.  His clientele were young internet-savvy guitarists who bought into his persona and enjoyed the interaction with their idol.

Slightly older cynics like me couldn't understand what the fuss was about.  I've gone on record saying Chapman isn't a musical artist in the sense I was brought up with - someone who's primarily known for their music.  He's primarily a businessman that plays the guitar.  This may be an old-fashioned viewpoint but I suspect it's widely held. Despite Dorje's modest success it's not what he's primarily famous for by a considerable margin.  I believe Dorje comprises mainly of Anderton's employees - it's a symptom of the Anderton's Youtube content success, not the other way around, regardless of his ludicrous claims of being able to make a living off his music and being in the charts three times this year, statements which stretch the truth so far it becomes invisible. 

Then we come to Jez's salient points above. Perhaps it takes a lot of ego to get where Chapman’s got, undoubtedly a lot of hard work and a sprinkling of luck. But when the ego starts to take over you’ve got a problem. Personally it’s always been apparent that he loves himself but now it’s really gone too far. I think he has to apologise, eat some humble pie, and hope he’s not done irreparable damage to the brand whose popularity is by definition inextricably linked with his. 


 

Sort of sums up what I've been thinking too, knowing virtually nothing about this man apart from what I've read here and googled since. Fair play for having a good business idea, but he's not making himself look good at the moment. The chart stuff is nonsense; I had a no.1 in about 2001 on mp3.com and have yet to see a penny, and more people probably listened to it back then to get it there. 

m_c

I think RC's biggest flaw is he takes things far too personally, and gets drawn into discussions he probably shouldn't.

I personally don't like his playing much, but I do think he's a good example of what you can achieve if you're determined enough. I do like his tutorial vids though, as he seems to explain things in ways I understand.

tony99

Does he still do Kung Fu and does anyone know what discipline he practices and also how far he progressed?

soma1975

I think this whole thing shows the inherent danger in making the person the brand. 

gregm

soma1975 said:

I think this whole thing shows the inherent danger in making the person the brand.

It depends on the person, I disagree I believe his success is based on the image he built. 
As the saying goes, power or money shows the true person. 

pintspiller

tony99 said:

Does he still do Kung Fu and does anyone know what discipline he practices and also how far he progressed?

Is there something you'd like to say about him but scared to incase he kills you?

DaevidJ

Punching down is never a good look...

Funkfingers

DaevidJ said:

Paunching down is never a good look...

FTFY

m_c said:

RC … seems to explain things in ways I understand.

This has been the secret of Chappers’ success. It has also contributed to some YT viewers deluding themselves that they could do the job just as well and, hence, attract similar levels of recognition, lucre and nubile groupies. 

soma1975

gregm said:

soma1975 said:

I think this whole thing shows the inherent danger in making the person the brand.

It depends on the person, I disagree I believe his success is based on the image he built. 
As the saying goes, power or money shows the true person. 

Well yes exactly it is. So the RC the person and RC the brand and business are so inextricably entwined that you can't separate one from the other and neither can your customers or audience. 

And so a dig at a business becomes a dog at a person and vice versa and it's impossible for things not to be personal. As in 'the nut on my Chapman guitar wasn't well cut so Rob is a bellend'. 

Modellista

^ or “Rob’s a bellend so I don’t want one of his guitars,” which is the risk to the business at this point in time. 

Philtre

Modellista said:

^ or “Rob’s a bellend so I don’t want one of his guitars,” which is the risk to the business at this point in time. 

That was always the case for me. They might be well-made guitars, but his name on the headstock? I'll pass on that.