Poor Kanye West.
No, seriously, poor Kanye West. As in Kanye West is poor.
$53 million poor.
The self-proclaimed music legend took to Twitter last week to bemoan his sad fate, saying he's "$53 million in personal debt."
Kanye's debt is roughly $15 million greater than the GDP of Tuvalu, the country with the smallest GDP in the world. Tuvalu would have to work for 1.4 years to pay off Kanye's debt.
So he asked a few tech billionaires if they would like to invest in him and his ideas "after realizing he is the greatest living artist and greatest artist of all time."
Your ideas can't be that great if you've made boneheaded financial decisions, like renting out AT&T Baseball Park in San Francisco and hiring the Chicago Symphony Orchestra so you can propose to your equally wealthy girlfriend.
"Mark Zuckerberg invest 1 billion dollars into Kanye West ideas," he tweeted. Other messages then followed, "Mark Zuckerberg I know it’s your bday but can you please call me by 2mrw … I am your favorite artist but you watch me barely breathe and still play my album in your house … I’m this generation’s Disney … I don’t have enough resources to create what I really can."
He then topped it off with "Mark, I am publicly asking you for help. . .one of the coolest things you could ever do is to help me in my time of need."
One of the uncoolest things you could do, Kanye, is ask Facebook's CEO for $1 billion on Twitter.
Then he turned his attention to Larry Page, CEO of Google, asking the same thing.
"All you dudes in San Fran play rap music in your homes but never help the real artists…you’d rather open up one school in Africa like you really helped the country…All you guys had meetings with me and no one lifted a finger to help…."
Yes, Kanye really thinks bailing out a rich rap artist is much more important than educating dozens of children every year for decades to come. All he needs is one of these billionaires to dump a billion dollars into him so he can generate ideas.
I'd come up with ideas all day long for $100,000. I'm not greedy.
That's just .01% of $1 billion, and I'd give you all sorts of ideas. Like a rocket that fires nuclear waste into the sun. Or a Magic 8 ball that asks questions instead of answering them. Or self-roasting marshmallows. Or a radio that makes all your favorite songs sound like Kanye wrote them.
See, four great ideas, and I just spun those out for free. Imagine what I could come up with for a hundred grand. And I wouldn't do anything stupid with it either, like renting out a Little League Park and hiring a kazoo band so I can re-propose to my wife.
But Kanye's giant ego wasn't done yet. A day later, he was back on his Twitter horse, comparing himself to Saint Paul.
The actual saint, not the city. Saint Paul the Apostle.
It's not a fair comparison though. While most saints lived lives of poverty, they didn't do it because they made galactically stupid financial decisions and then ask rich people to bail them out.
"Verily, I am the greatest living apostle, and greatest apostle of all time. I say unto you Emperor Nero, wilt thou investeth 10,000 talents in me and mine ideas?"
(I don't know how people actually spoke in the first century. I just imagine everyone who lived more than 300 years ago sounds like bad Shakespearean dialog.)
Except Kanye may not really be in debt after all. The day after the Apostle Debacle, he admitted that "yes I am personally rich and I can buy furs and houses for my family."
Another boneheaded decision: buying furs for your family when you live in California.
He also said "If I spent my money on my ideas I could not afford to take care of my family. I am in a place that so many artist end up."
Also, if you didn't spend your money on stupid stuff like extra houses filled with fur coats, you could afford to take care of your family and your ideas.
Kanye, you're $53 million in debt because your ideas either a) are not financially viable, or b) suck. If you're lucky enough to find someone to dump a billion dollars into that empty black hole you call your "ideas," I would imagine they'll require you have financial and business experts to advise you on the idiocy of most of your plans.
Just stick with music and rebuild your empire.
Or maybe just get a paper route.
Photo credit: David Shankman (Wikimedia Commons, Creative Commons)
You can find my books Branding Yourself
(affiliate link), No Bullshit Social Media, and The Owned Media Doctrine
on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Books-A-Million, or for the Kindle or Nook.
No, seriously, poor Kanye West. As in Kanye West is poor.
$53 million poor.
The self-proclaimed music legend took to Twitter last week to bemoan his sad fate, saying he's "$53 million in personal debt."
So he asked a few tech billionaires if they would like to invest in him and his ideas "after realizing he is the greatest living artist and greatest artist of all time."
Your ideas can't be that great if you've made boneheaded financial decisions, like renting out AT&T Baseball Park in San Francisco and hiring the Chicago Symphony Orchestra so you can propose to your equally wealthy girlfriend.
"Mark Zuckerberg invest 1 billion dollars into Kanye West ideas," he tweeted. Other messages then followed, "Mark Zuckerberg I know it’s your bday but can you please call me by 2mrw … I am your favorite artist but you watch me barely breathe and still play my album in your house … I’m this generation’s Disney … I don’t have enough resources to create what I really can."
He then topped it off with "Mark, I am publicly asking you for help. . .one of the coolest things you could ever do is to help me in my time of need."
One of the uncoolest things you could do, Kanye, is ask Facebook's CEO for $1 billion on Twitter.
Then he turned his attention to Larry Page, CEO of Google, asking the same thing.
"All you dudes in San Fran play rap music in your homes but never help the real artists…you’d rather open up one school in Africa like you really helped the country…All you guys had meetings with me and no one lifted a finger to help…."
Yes, Kanye really thinks bailing out a rich rap artist is much more important than educating dozens of children every year for decades to come. All he needs is one of these billionaires to dump a billion dollars into him so he can generate ideas.
I'd come up with ideas all day long for $100,000. I'm not greedy.
That's just .01% of $1 billion, and I'd give you all sorts of ideas. Like a rocket that fires nuclear waste into the sun. Or a Magic 8 ball that asks questions instead of answering them. Or self-roasting marshmallows. Or a radio that makes all your favorite songs sound like Kanye wrote them.
See, four great ideas, and I just spun those out for free. Imagine what I could come up with for a hundred grand. And I wouldn't do anything stupid with it either, like renting out a Little League Park and hiring a kazoo band so I can re-propose to my wife.
But Kanye's giant ego wasn't done yet. A day later, he was back on his Twitter horse, comparing himself to Saint Paul.
The actual saint, not the city. Saint Paul the Apostle.
It's not a fair comparison though. While most saints lived lives of poverty, they didn't do it because they made galactically stupid financial decisions and then ask rich people to bail them out.
"Verily, I am the greatest living apostle, and greatest apostle of all time. I say unto you Emperor Nero, wilt thou investeth 10,000 talents in me and mine ideas?"
(I don't know how people actually spoke in the first century. I just imagine everyone who lived more than 300 years ago sounds like bad Shakespearean dialog.)
Except Kanye may not really be in debt after all. The day after the Apostle Debacle, he admitted that "yes I am personally rich and I can buy furs and houses for my family."
Another boneheaded decision: buying furs for your family when you live in California.
He also said "If I spent my money on my ideas I could not afford to take care of my family. I am in a place that so many artist end up."
Also, if you didn't spend your money on stupid stuff like extra houses filled with fur coats, you could afford to take care of your family and your ideas.
Kanye, you're $53 million in debt because your ideas either a) are not financially viable, or b) suck. If you're lucky enough to find someone to dump a billion dollars into that empty black hole you call your "ideas," I would imagine they'll require you have financial and business experts to advise you on the idiocy of most of your plans.
Just stick with music and rebuild your empire.
Or maybe just get a paper route.
Photo credit: David Shankman (Wikimedia Commons, Creative Commons)
You can find my books Branding Yourself
(affiliate link), No Bullshit Social Media, and The Owned Media Doctrine on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Books-A-Million, or for the Kindle or Nook.