We wrote about startup HitRecord for the first time last October, when it launched a project with artist Logic. He was the highest-profile musician so far to take advantage of HitRecord’s platform for creative collaborations: posting the bones of a new track and inviting fans to flesh it out with their own contributions – with the promise of paying those chosen for inclusion, including royalties.
HitRecord was founded by actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who has since been courting VC firms to back the platform. This week, the company secured a $6.4m Series A funding round, with investors including VC firms Javelin Venture Partners, Crosslink Capital and Advancit Capital, but also YouTube co-founder Steve Chen and Twitch co-founder Kevin Lin. Gordon-Levitt told TechCrunch that HitRecord has paid out around $3m to its community since 2010.
“The idea is anybody could come to start their own thing and there will be better tools to self-organise and find your collaborators,” he said, of HitRecord’s plans now. “We’ve been cash flow positive five years. We know how to run a business. It’s just we’ve been running a production company business, now we want to run something that’s more like a technology business.”
Tools: platforms to help you reach new audiences
Tools: Kaiber
In the year or so since its launch, AI startup Kaiber has been making waves,…