How Would YOU Monetize Young Buck’s Soon To Be Liquidated Music?
Young Buck failed in his attempts to come up with a plan to repay his debts that at one point was said to include damages of $10 million to G-Unit Records alone. 50 Cent's old school total destruction approach seems to have been successful and now all of Young Buck's intellectual property is going up for auction.
Though not quite the goldmine represented by the auction of Death Row assets, the relatively weak exploitation of those rights makes me wonder, how would you exploit Young Buck's IP?
After months spent considering possible reorganization plans for Young Buck, a U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge agreed to switch Young Buck's Chapter 11 to a Chapter 7 liquidation. Key to this decision was the refusal of 50 Cent, G-Unit and Universal Music Group to allow Young Buck to renegotiate his agreements with them.
This may be the most rational financial move on the part of G-Unit and UMG but it sounds like 50 Cent's early methods of moving opponents "off the strip." As he stated in February 2005 regarding Fat Joe and Jadakiss:
"I ain't gonna let up off of them until their homes are in foreclosure…Till it's really that bad…For me, if you begin to destroy, you should destroy completely."
If that was the plan, 50 Cent has succeeded and now Young Buck's IP is going up for auction May 15 in Nashville assuming the U.S. Bankruptcy Court signs off:
"According to court papers, that includes 'trademarks and copyrights, all masters, compositions, royalties, rights and licenses owned by debtor and all rights of publicity owned by debtor.'"
Some news outlets have reported that this property will also include the name Young Buck.
These assets certainly aren't the treasure trove represented by the assets of Death Row Records, including a bunch of stuff recovered from the studio. But the current exploitation of the "New" Death Row Records seems limited to reissues and new releases of material that Suge Knight kept on ice along with fairly basic merch.
Some of the initial releases included fairly cheap looking art, as was the case with Snoop Doggy Dogg's Lost Sessions and Dr. Dre's The Chronic : Re-Lit & From The Vault, giving the impression that Wideawake Ent Group was simply trying to profit without undue effort. Their lack of interest in working with former Death Row artists, who generally dismissed their activities as long as the appropriate royalties were dispersed, revealed that they were incapable of building on a powerful legacy.
Young Buck's intellectual property is nowhere near as potent as that of Suge Knight's history making label but that shouldn't stop the always insightful comment crew at Hypebot from suggesting a wide range of ways to profit from Young Buck's legacy.
How would YOU monetize the intellectual property of Young Buck?
Hypebot Features Writer Clyde Smith maintains his business writing hub at Flux Research and blogs about dance at All World Dance. To suggest topics for Hypebot, contact: clyde(at)fluxresearch(dot)com.
Wow…
How to make more then 10.000.000 from that? I sure as hell have no clue at all! anyone?
You don’t have to actually figure out a way to cover what he owed and might have owed in additional damages.
That will all be cleared in bankruptcy, the entity that gets the music and rights at auction will only have to pay whatever their winning bid turns out to be.
The next step is up to them and totally separate from the financial issues currently facing Young Buck.
This is a damn shame. Hopefully he doesn’t lose his name though. Damn..
I would personally revert to Suge Knight tactics and “take that bitch down”. I mean there’s a lot to learn from this life lesson for Young Buck. Don’t piss off the wrong people or spend money you don’t have in your bank account.
Exactly why you should build your own name and brand using social media.
There is much confusion over Young Buck’s bankruptcy situation and most published information is untrue. The decision to convert the proceeding from a Chapter 11 reorganization to a Chapter 7 liquidation was the bankruptcy Trustee’s, not Buck’s. Far from being obstructive, G-Unit has been an extremely supportive ally over the last months and integral to the effort to move Buck seamlessly to another record company. As well, Mr. Jackson, as co-publisher with Universal Music Publishing Group, has been a cooperative member of the team seeking to fund the reorganization plan and would continue on as one of Buck’s publishers. There have been numerous requests from strong labels to bring Buck aboard. Unfortunately, however, it’s not always easy for outsiders to understand that music industry relationships are highly political, that record contracts are a complex and sophisticated mix of art and commerce with many moving parts, that it’s often necessary to negotiate with several contenders in order to find the “right” deal, and that the process takes as long as it takes…especially if unrelated circumstances cause changes in position and parties. Aided by a G-Unit settlement and a willing publisher, Buck negotiated a workable deal with a label and was simply awaiting paper when the usual ups and downs of a volatile industry caused delay and the bankruptcy clock ran out of time.
So you’re saying they had a workable plan in place but the Trustee got impatient and killed it?
Does this mean that I can bid on the rights to assume the name, music and identity of Young Buck? Could I in effect become him?