Has the internet created more professional musicians?
![andrew-donoghue.jpg](https://www.zdnet.com/a/img/resize/d0dbee773db95617aa29d204eb7337d6738e397b/2014/07/22/06d3e888-1175-11e4-9732-00505685119a/andrew-donoghue.jpg?auto=webp&fit=crop&frame=1&height=192&width=192)
Yesterday's meeting with Sellaband - which also included Sharon Osbourne's brother David Arden (who also represented James Brown) - threw up some interesting issues about how the Internet has turned the music industry back into a cottage industry - via the long tail issue. Being able to sell music, gigs and merchandise directly to fans - artists no longer face the sign to a label or sing in pubs and do a day job dilemma they may have faced in the past.
You might not "make it" but artists can feasible make a living selling their music and related merchandise full time - however while this is the theory I am not sure how this stands up in practice - and if is accurate we should have seen an accompanying rise in the absolute numbers of self-sustaining artists out there in the last five years or so.
Has the internet changed what it means to be an recording artist - the make it big or sink into obscurity proposition may have been replaced by a middle-way.