Comedian Nick Youssef Releases Free Download of His Album! Now You Can Stop Not Owning This For Free!
Now You Can Own Stop Not Owning This For Free
Comedian Nick Youssef releases a free download of his album on its one year anniversary
Nick Youssef is no stranger to the changing business model for content from music, to TV, to comedy. As an avid music lover, he admits, “When I look at how I consume music and TV, I want it all free because I know that’s possible. People want to pay $9.99 and be able to stream absolutely everything.” So on the one year anniversary of the release of his first album Stop Not Owning This, Nick is practicing what he preaches and making it available as a free bonus episode of his podcast Occasionally Awesome.
“I’m probably already 75% into my next hour,” Youssef explains, “and at this point, the people who are going to buy it, bought it. Once you’ve maximized the amount of money you can make, it’s ultimately still a creative endeavor and I want it in as many people’s hands and ears as possible. Hopefully they can laugh and then pass it on. You can still listen for free on Spotify, but I made it a download so people could listen if they’re somewhere where they can’t stream shit.”
Nick isn’t the first comedian to go this route. Both Ari Shaffir and Steve Simeone released their albums for free (with a kind of Director’s Cut style commentary) on Ari Shaffir’s podcast Skeptic Tank. “Who knows what the model will look like in five years?” Nick says, “Your instinct is ‘I don’t want to give this away for free because I worked so hard on it’ but then doing this maybe you get another couple thousand fans who want to buy the next thing you put out.”
