Tsuperstars

The Tsu social network was designed for those who create original content to be able to profit from their work. It's tough to be a musician these days with falling sales of music and miserable royalties from streaming services. They can make something from Youtube if they have a big enough following. Everyone on Tsu makes something if they are getting views and that can be on their videos, so they can earn twice on those.

Here's some of the big hitters on Tsu. Some of these will not be generally known, but they have built big followings. This may partly be down to some help from the Tsu team, but also by encouraging fans on other sites to join up. Each of those recruits will be earning the star a little more through the Tsu algorithm that passes a share of earnings up the 'family tree'. I expect some of these people are making thousands of dollars per year from Tsu.

I'm no star, but I'm making over a dollar per day. I have nearly 4700 followers and a network of recruits. Not many of my network are active, but they still make me something. Tsu is approaching 5 million users, so there is still massive growth potential. I've had one payment of $100 so far and am half way to another.

Even the fans can make something if they recruit their friends and do their own posts. Even if it's just a few cents they can make charity donations and I expect a market to grow that trades in Tsu funds.

You can find me at http://www.tsu.co/steevc. If you join up there then you become part of my network and can start building your own. There's currently a competition for musicians with prizes of $1000 and up. It's well worth an entry if you have an original song to submit.

Update (2021): Tsu is dead and so are some other platforms I used. I am now using Hive which has an active community and pays me. Let me know if you want to join up.

Be a video star

I've been on the Tsu social network since it started in late 2014. Their main feature was that you get paid based on the views you get for your content. Their concept was that those creating original content (artists, photographers. writers, musicians) should get rewarded for their work. That content could be shared from other sites (e.g. Youtube) so that you would earn on Tsu as well as any income you got elsewhere.

People have asked if Tsu could host video themselves. I expect there are some issues with that in cost of hosting, as well as ensuring it does not breach copyright, but some new video functionality is coming in May. To promote this they have launched a contest for original music. Musicians can submit a track (linking to it on Youtube, Soundcloud etc) and if selected to progress should create a short video (up to three and half minutes). Songs will be judged in 6 categories with winners getting $1000 and then play off for a grand prize of an additional $8000.

I assume that videos will use the new features. They are obviously hoping to recruit more musicians to use Tsu to promote their music. I know that some on the site have done very well from it by bringing in their fans. There's an incentive to recruit musicians as those who invited the winners of the categories will also receive $1000.

It's tough to be a musicians, so any extra income should be welcome. Help to bring musicians to Tsu and they could benefit and you will too through their network scheme that passes a share of income to the 'parent'. Once you have joined you can use the Invite button.

I've only written a few original songs, but I'm tempted to submit one.

Tsu are you?

This is not a post about my music, but I wanted to write about this topic and it's my blog :)

I've played around with various social sites over the years. Some, such as identi.ca and Multiply, don't exist any more. Eventually I got onto Facebook and Twitter, although I'm not a big user of either. My favoured site for some time has been Google+. This is due to a combination of the features and the people on there. There are lots of cool tech and music folk there. It also integrates with other Google services I use.

Social is obviously big money. Facebook are making billions and spending them on any new companies that might compete. Google don't seem to be directly making money from Google+ as it doesn't have any ads (yet), but they have other income.

There have been various sites that promise to share what they earn with their users. One of the latest is tsū. They say they will take 10% of the profit and share the rest amongst users. Somehow they work out who deserves what (perhaps based on views, likes etc). There's a pyramid aspect as the person who recruited a user gets a portion of that user's income too, over multiple generations in diminishing amounts. Basically each level gets a third of the previous level. This guide explains it all far better than I can.

So, there is an incentive to build a big network of new users. Some people have thousands, but mine is more modest. I've managed to recruit 155 people who have another 92 children of their own.

That seems fairly good, but it's not enough to earn me much money. I get a few cents per day from some combination of what I post and what my network makes for me. Other people are earning several dollars per day. You need to build up $100 before you can get paid, and that will take me years. The best I can really hope is that I make enough to donate to one of the charities on the site. You can send some of your money to any user who enables that feature.

I'm really just playing around with the site to see how it works. There are not many famous people on there. There are a few bands, sports-persons and celebrities, but not many really big names and few of them are of interest to me. I have still found a number of interesting people to follow, including some cool musicians. You can see them in my following list there. Unfortunately it's one of those sites you can't really explore until you sign up. That's always annoying, but seems to be common.

I think that the site is missing a few things. If you follow hundreds of people then it's difficult to handle the feed as there's no way to group people. The only privacy levels are friends only or public. And of course it's overrun by people who are desperately just trying to make money by spamming every post in sight. I get loads of friend requests that I just decline as I have no interest in those people or in just boosting my numbers. I'm mostly posting links that I would also post on Google+ with some of my photos that I'm happy to be public. There is not really enough compelling content to keep me coming back unless something changes soon and I have nothing better to do.

How did I build my network? Of course I posted my link on those sites I generally use and got a few people that way, but I don't like to spam my friends. I found tsumatic which is a place to post your link, but I don't think that has done much for me. I also found tsuforum as a place to discuss the site. There's a sort of competition running there where the people with the most posts each day get new sign-ups. I have no idea how they do it, but most of mine seem to come from places like Morocco.

In conclusion, it's an interesting site with some potential. Don't go there expecting to make loads of money unless you have the potential to recruit loads of people and can use it all day. It's fun, but not essential.

If you want to play then please use my link as that will give me a small boost in earnings that may keep me visiting. I don't expect to retire on that.