Creative Scenes in today's economy

I first saw this band play live a year or so after this local TV show performance. Most of the hundreds of millions of people who've heard their music since would be hard pressed to identify them from from this video if their name wasn't there.

People of all ages and all walks of life have an urge to create something.  They start creating.  Our school system, designed 130 years ago to turn kids into compliant factory workers, stamps the creative urge out of most people.  But not all.  Some continue to create, despite the pain and oppression thrown at them from the larger world.  These people usually move out of their oppressive towns and cities and into creative scenes formed earlier by similar people, usually in large cities. 

These little groups of people try new things, bounce ideas off each other, and progress in their crafts.  Ideas are their commodities, and these people create our new pictures, paintings, music, sculptures, buildings, technology, software, games, businesses, sports, pastimes, and a lot of new products.  In today's constantly changing world, these people create the new industries and the new jobs.

Everyone has seen this happen time after time, especially in the high tech world.  Yet, most civic leaders still spend much of their time oppressing their creative people, and propping up the last vestiges of the Industrial Age that haven't collapsed yet.  In doing so, the people running towns, cities, states, and much of the federal government are sewing the seeds of their own financial ruin. 

A handful of large cities comprise most of the economy of the United States, and are literally carrying the rest of the country financially.  Most of our country is struggling.  Even worse, they don't want to admit they're struggling. 

The economic future of EVERY small village, town, city, region or state is in the IDEAS in the heads of the people in that region.  Civic leaders can't FORCE creative scenes into existence.  But they CAN enable, support, and nurture the CREATIVE SCENES they have, and help those people rebuild the cultural and economic future of their region.  If they don't, the MOST CREATIVE PEOPLE in their areas will move to the biggest cities where they can live and work with like-minded people. 

No creative scenes, no economic future for your town, city region, or state.  It's as simple as that these days.  Do you want your region to have future or not?

My work in this world these days is to help people, find, create, build, and nurture their Creative Scenes.  Why are you here?

The band above has sold over 39 million albums since that video was shot.  I know for a fact that has helped the city where they lived most of that time.  I used to live there, too.