To clarify a couple points: our church was not 'large'. We averaged 250-300 over 2 services.

Regarding 'making it' it is actually just different, not better or worse than 30 years ago. You don't have to have a big following to successfully use kickstarter. Most don't. Most projects are very small. You match your projects to your size with some stretch. Your highlighted text has it all wrong. Getting over the first hump is different, and I would say it's way more accessible than in the past. What has changed is venue based versus home based. Venue based is harder, home based is way easier. Want to get 1000 CDs pressed but don't have the $2000 to get it done decent at Discmakers? Well, if you really NEED 1000 CDs, you should have a mailing list going already and should be able to get 150 or so folks to pledge you $15 and you end up giving them a CD after it's done at Discmakers. That's the kind of projects that are mostly done at Kickstarters. Sell the other 850 CDs for 10$ and you have $850 to go towards your next project. That's how most people are using these type of sites. (there are a few others, but Kickstarter is the one I have supported folks on.)

Tyler didn't 'start' in our church to make it in the music biz. He didn't use our church, as far as I can tell. His outside of church following in the local area was well along the way before our church as he played in a local band. In fact, our church really had not contributed at all to the firestorm success - it was never even discussed publicly. He only led worship a couple of times. Most of the time he was a supporting guitarist.

Anyways, I think we disagree. I just happen to know many folks that are successful using kickstarter and the like to do a reasonable amount of income without having to involve or worry about record companies or agents or the like. They are in control of their own destinies and sharing their art. I consider that 'making it'.

My Songs, photos, writing,etc.
My Sound Cloud