YouTubers release "I've Got Nothing" a crowdsourced song for charity

November 11, 9:42 AMSF Social Media Marketing ExaminerSarah Browne

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You've given up your dream of becoming the next American Idol. That music "insider" you met at the MySpace Secret Show turned out to be not-so-insider. And the songwriting workshop with genius Peter Case  was amazing but you still haven't found anything to rhyme with 'unrequited.'  In the old analog days, most wannabes would simply give up, hope Oprah does her karaoke competition again or find a friendly open-mike night in a neighborhood.

But today if you want to make a hit song, why not use the Internet to "crowdsource?"With 136,470 views on YouTube and counting, "I've Got Nothing" is a song written entirely by the YouTube community.  A 19-year old youngster called Charlie McDonnell, together with three other perky teenagers, have created the project as part of BBC’s ChartJackers, an attempt to break into the UK music charts without the usual toolkit -- that is, money, producer, studio, even musicians.

Here’s the official description of how the song was created:

“The lyrics of the song are made up of YouTube comments, compiled into a song by another YouTuber. The lyrics were released and then YouTubers wrote a melody for the lyrics, and we picked our favourite. We held YouTube auditions via video response to pick the band, found the producer of the song through YouTube, and the music video is made up of literal interpretations of the lyrics, clapping and singing along, by YouTubers!”

The upshot follows the classic formula for hitmaking, with a catchy melody and uber-bouncy sing-along style video.  Charlie himself pronounces the no-budget  results: "extreme cheesiness.""I've Got Nothing" was just released on iTunes yesterday, with all profits going to BBC's Children in Need program.The Chartjackers urge Twitter users to tweet about their song so that UK Radio 1 DJ Scott Mills will be persuaded to play it on air. 

Will this social media experiment work? 

Via Mashable

Crowdsourced for charity