Hracs B. J. Cultural intermediaries in the digital age: the case of independent musicians and managers in Toronto, Regional Studies. This paper explores the limitations of the contemporary do-it-yourself model of music production and the recent shift towards re-specialization in Toronto in Ontario, Canada. It argues that freelance managers are re-emerging as key intermediaries who catalyse and facilitate new organizational forms and strategic partnerships between creative workers. Attention is paid to how digital technologies and shifting market dynamics influence and alter the relationships and contracts between these individuals. The spatial concentration of managers and other ‘helpers’, including fashion designers, photographers and web designers, is also used to explain why music production remains clustered in space despite the decentralizing potential of digital technologies.

Geographers have studied the complex relationships between cultural production, consumption, and space for some time, but the marketplace for cultural products is being reconfigured by digital technologies and broader societal trends. For producers of fashion and music the contemporary marketplace is a double-edged sword featuring lower entry barriers and fierce competition from an unprecedented number of producers and ubiquitous substitutes. Global firms and local entrepreneurs struggle to stand out in the crowd and command monopoly rents for their unique goods and services. This paper examines how independent cultural producers use ‘exclusivity’ to generate attention and distinction. Drawing on qualitative research with independent musicians and fashion designers in Toronto, Stockholm, Berlin, and New York it presents three mechanisms through which exclusivity can be created. These include exploiting consumer demand for uniqueness, enrolling consumers into the production and promotion process, and manipulating physical and virtual space.

Economic, cultural, social, and political life is being increasingly shaped by digital platforms including social networking sites (Facebook), streaming services (Netflix) and sharing platforms (AirBnB). While social scientists have tracked the rapid emergence of platforms and developed useful conceptualisations about what they are and how they operate, surprisingly little attention has been paid to the nature of platform competition or the experiences of users. To address these gaps, this paper focuses on the illustrative case of recorded music, where platforms, including Spotify and Apple Music, face intense competition due to similarities in price and content. Drawing on 42 semi-structured interviews, 20 app ‘walk-alongs’ with Spotify users and an analysis of 120 documents (industry reports, trade magazines, press releases and news articles), it demonstrates how the basis of competition has shifted from content, price and curation to the engineering of compelling experiences that harness the unique and interconnected affordances of platformisation. The paper nuances our understanding of the dynamic and contingent nature of platforms, the processes of datafication and curation underpinning their interventions in markets and everyday life, the geographies of these virtual distribution and consumption channels, and the ways in which users imagine, value, and experience music streaming platforms.

Although economic geographers have paid significant attention to the competitive dynamics, organizational and employment structures of specific cultural industries, the existing research privileges large firms and established centres such as New York, London and Los Angeles. Moreover, despite the conceptual articulations of spillovers and “related variety” few attempts have been made to examine the collaborative linkages between two or more related industries and, more specifically, how changing macro-economic forces are affecting individual producers at the local scale. In this paper we address these gaps and argue that the growing prevalence of independent production is transforming the nature of the long-standing connection between music and fashion. Specifically, that strategic collaborations between indie producers are becoming crucial to competing in the contemporary landscape of cultural production and consumption. We also assert that the motivations and mechanisms of these contemporary collaborations differ from their historical counterparts in important ways. Indeed technological advancements and the demands of indie production are changing the networking practices that facilitate these partnerships and the ways in which indie producers value and exchange goods and services.

Although creative industries and creative talent have traditionally clustered in established global centres such as London and New York, new forms of independent production, digital technologies and mobilities are reshaping this landscape. Drawing on 87 interviews and participant observation, this paper considers whether independent fashion designers in Canada still need to locate in the established centres to realize their ambitions. It explores how these entrepreneurs choose a ‘home base’ for their operations and demonstrates how they mobilize three forms of mobility (temporary, mediated, virtual) to access opportunities and resources within Canada’s fashion system.