Prince put himself out to the public eye and got everyone to go along with his elaborate digital interactive media extravaganza scheme. He deserves every bit of criticism he gets,everytime a spotlight is focused on his presence. Even if it's harsh,unfair and blunt in tone. When he comes back into the public limelight he better have something to offer. If he doesn't, the bills stack up and all he is left is Walls surrounding him and a crumbling pseudo palace in Minnesota. Not to mention deluded fans who can't honestly have any rational discourse with others when it comes to situations like this.

I'm laughing at some of the defensive responses. Some on this forum would go lockstep into a tank of Hammerhead sharks with fish belt tied around your waist. With Prince laughing and ridiculing you,kicking you into the tank. "OMGZ Prince touched me!! I have a heel imprint in the spine of my back!" And while you are being mauled & rammed to death, you would probably be screaming in maniacal agony, "UGGGGHHHH!! This Proves Prince is a genius. A tank of hammerhead sharks ughhhh! ::Shark rams new power zombie again:: How Brilliant!! This is art and Im so honored to be a part of this!"

Now if you are angry at that statement, it's obvious why.

BartVanHemelen said:

Bart I can document 10 years of pure Prince hate from you on this site.

That's not making shit up .

If you can tell me one thing that Prince has done in the last 10 years that you have posted here that you liked I will apologize to you.

I'm always shocked when Prince shoot his fans in the foot and we keep taking it. Wow!

Trickology I agree .

I am one of the people that have spent the $77 so I have a right to complain and I have. However what's the whole story? Somebody dropped the ball here big time. If it is Prince then he needs to correct the problems. I for one doubt seriously if I will give him another chance with his internet ventures period.

Trickology said:

It's funny 'cause it's true.

muleFunk said:

No, you can't. The simple fact that you use a phrase like "pure Prince hate" shows that you're making shit up. FACT.

BartVanHemelen said:

yeah, it's more of a hatred of life and people in general.

IstenSzek said:

Spot on.

It wouldn't surprise me if there were little more than 10k members.

errant said:

Fauxie said:

I'd say maybe even less than that. The numerous difficulties and glitches in accessing the site were pretty widely reported. I think that mostly die hards, devotees and a few curiosity seekers joined. I love 'ol Princey but the hype sounded way too good to be true so I didn't join, and when the horror stories from members started to pile up I knew I had guessed right.

From reading the articles before the launch it sounded to me like people telling each other what they wanted to hear at the time, Prince/Scott, etc. with a few "testimonials" from fans thrown in for good measure.

Form and hype over substance and functionality= enough blame to go around.

Militant said:

Man, I love Prince, but I am soooo glad I never fell for this LF crap. Great artist, (when he want's to be) but what a terrible business man. I'll always support new music -CD projects, however, I would never in a million years subscribe to any of his rip-off music download concepts.

Trickology said:

It's crazy to think that he can avoid all of this by essentially releasing some bootlegs.

babynoz said:

My guess would be way, way, way below that. Hell, no one bought that Opus thing.

murphdrag said:

Why not? He doesn't have to use the account for any personal posts. It just has to be an official Paisley Park account to let people know when music is coming out or to check out a video posted on his web 2.0 (hopefully) site. I'd also have an official Paisley Park YouTube channel with a few videos. I also believe Prince could make more money by having monthly subscriptions (say, $5 a month) that allows people to access special message boards where they could talk about bootlegs. There doesn't have to be some fancy looking "galaxy" or flash graphics. He should use the Xbox Live model where you can sign up for a free account, but if you're really hardcore you can pay $5 a month to access some special members only chat sections. Simple and plain, and no expectations of vault material being released. He wouldn't even have to release any music.

squirrelgrease said:

Naw bro, that Opus thing would have caused some divorces and domestic violence up in here, even the true devotees ain't that far gone...yet,

"You spent how much on what? WTF is a Prince opus???!!! Pack yo sh*t and get outta my house NOW, fool!"

My God, how many more threads are there gonna be about the LF site?

peterv said:

Until we get as many as we have had about...

his butt,
Prince vs MJ/Hendrix
his religion
people who want to marry him?

babynoz said:

Haaaaa! For real, though.

Trickology said:

Exactly, you can't have it both ways... if people are going to laud him with accolades for his pioneering use of the internet, then he needs to be called on his recently shitty endeavor. If you're going to get credit, then you're going to get the debit too.

None of this is surprising to any of us who have followed Prince's career for a significant period of time. And none of this is surprising for people who have done business with him.

Along with the lawsuits, failure to pay his taxes, and failure to pay his engineers, this is all feeding the meme of a self-indulgent artist with questionable business ethics. Someone, who when faced with fulfilling his legal and/or ethical obligations, responds with "chill" or "cut it out."

Lotusflow3r sucked big time. Content, design, accessibility, and so on and so on. And I say that as someone who purchased a membership.

The site was distant, dark, disconnected, ungrounded, unwelcoming. The man who once pioneered using the 'net to reach people (who remembers BedIScream??) has retreated. For him the 'net is just another dumping ground for whatever he's selling (and he's not even selling a whole lot).

BartVanHemelen said:

I agree, there's no way 25k people forked over 77 bucks for some promises of future content. If there were enough visible content available for download at time of sign-up, than sure 25k is probably possible. I'd like to think a good percentage of long-time fans know better by now.

errant said:

I'm curious, does anyone have any idea how much the site may have cost to build and promote?

LF Membership was 1,999,3121. but Ernie and Bart and S geez..were not members neither waz spooky or Graycap. But my funky flowerites P is a muther funking genius when it comes 2 environmental wrekas.

BartVanHemelen said:

Have to agree with Bart here - Bart is highly critical of Prince - but not hateful.

thedoorkeeper said:

HAhA...copy and paste 1,000,000 X. Dont make me fucking LArgh.

SPOOKYGAS said:

Antways Bart is Alexabder Nebervine..

I like Bart and I am really fucking with him but I cannot recall Bart liking anything musical or other that Prince has done and I have been on the Org since the around 1998.The one thing about Bart is that he is consistent.

I also agree with 50% of what he says about Prince and his business dealings.

At the end of the day Prince is the one who put his brand name on the project and he needs to make amends not to the Monday Morning sideline critics who have not bought the product but to the members of the Lotus project,NPGMC,and Crystal Ball fiascos i.e. the people who paid the money.