To date my exploration of technology and creativity has been primarily around music, but technology impacts art and artists of all kinds. My own path into the world of tech startups was rooted in my use of technology as a dancer--for marketing, networking and training purposes.One of my favorite online sources of creative inspiration is browsing through portfolios on Carbonmade
Carbonmade is a site for artists of all kinds--from make-up and fine art to digital design and tattoo--to display portfolios online. One of the things I absolutely love is that the art is prominently displayed at the forefront. While there is space for an "about" section, it is almost unnecessary because the work speaks http://spencerfry.com/ for itself.
Coincidentally, I had been reading the blog of Spencer Fry, Carbonmade's CEO for some time as a source of wisdom and insight on the path to entrepreneurial success. The product of an artistic upbringing with a wealth of experience founding online companies, Spencer is the perfect example of someone leveraging technology to celebrate creativity. As such, I thought he would be perfect to interview for this blog.
Below is the first part of our interview, which focuses on Carbonmade as a tool for creative professionals and the benefits of being a part of a larger online community.Tomorrow, the second part of the interview will focus on Spencer's background and how he utilizes creativity as entrepreneur.
Anyone can stick their work up on a Web site, but clearly Carbonmade offers something that goes far beyond a simple Web presence.With that in mind, what difference does it make for artists having a presence among a community of other creatives, like Carbonmade?
Nowadays everyone agrees that as a creative person you need to display your work online. But even as recently as five years ago, when we started Carbonmade, this was not a universal feeling. People were still showing off lookbooks and dragging their portfolios around in those big leather cases.
Carbonmade was first created for my business partner and co-founder Dave's personal use. When we launched in December 2005, we wanted to create an application that would make it easy for Dave to maintain his portfolio. We wanted to keep it as simple as building with Legos, so Dave could spend more time producing work and less time worrying about how it was being displayed. It was only several months later, after lots of clamoring from friends, that we built a sign-up page and allowed others to use Carbonmade.
As you might expect from our philosophy of ease of use, Carbonmade stood apart from other portfolio services in being built and conceived for our own personal use. As users ourselves, we built a clean and beautiful product without the added bells and whistles that a speculative outsider might think others need when building a produc
As with Apple's design of the iPhone, we felt that less was more: "Do you really need copy and paste?" Steve Jobs asked himself when the iPhone was first released. The answer was "no," not until you can seamlessly integrate it without any detriment to the users. Users were eager to have copy and paste, but Jobs focused more on ease of use, simplicity and the overall experience, than any single feature.
People are proud to show their work off on Carbonmade because they know they're among tremendously talented people who share similar philosophies. This creates a culture of kinship with everyone feeling like they are a part of something. Something big.
Alexis Rodich, Pro Dancer Steps off the Stage into the World of Online StartUps
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