Joseph Gordon-Levitt, founder of hitRECord, the collaborative production company and TV show on pivot, is knowledgeable on “a freakishly wide range of subjects,” according to Brian Graden, president of Brian Graden Media.

Which is true, as the actor, filmmaker and founder of collaborative production company/TV show hitRECord, is about to debut a major movie this year as well as the second season of hitRECord on pivot this week.

Gordon-Levitt spoke Tuesday afternoon at PromaxBDA: The Conference 2015 in Los Angeles about creating a space for contributed content, encouraging creatives and building a community that engages on a constant basis.

Graden interviewed Gordon-Levitt, asking him about his “crazy idea” for a show created not by Hollywood, but by thousands of people around the world.

Gordon-Levitt says the basis of the idea was content, collaboration and community – three words marketers live by.

He started hitRECord because he couldn’t find a job. The actor had just finished working on 3rd Rock From the Sun, and found himself at a loss creatively.

“When you’re an actor, it’s difficult,” he said, “you have to wait for someone to give you permission. I had to take responsibility for my own ability to express myself and be creative.”

He named the new entity HitRECord because the very image of the record button became a iconic image to Gordon-Levitt, representing the active choice to create something of his own.

He posted videos, encouraged people to submit work and talk about everything online, and he found that people were more interested in making videos with one another in the online community.

It was very much so a small community – “we weren’t thinking about it as a company for years,” he said.

He was never worried about getting submissions from creatives because of the organic nature of the site.

“People feel good about contributing to our site because it doesn’t feel like a marketing campaign” he said. “If it did feel like that it would be harder to get people to contribute.”

HitRECord expanded, giving people prompts – called “challenges” – in order to give contributors a creative aim, often just an idea of what to write about for fun. Those themes took on lives of their own.

For example, a story submitted by someone for the prompt “first times,” entitled “First Stars I See Tonight” became a short film. The story describes the first time a 16-year-old girl saw the stars, having to use night vision goggles because of an eye condition she had.

The video saw more than 100 contributors – all of them paid, credited creatives.

Gordon-Levitt says that so many contribute to projects like these because he and hitRECord don’t see them as a crowd – there is no crowd-sourcing here.

“The whole term crowd source is a little damaging,” he said. “They’re not a crowd, they’re all individual people. The term ‘crowd-sourcing’ makes it sound like a numbers game, but it’s really about finding individual contributions.”

And these individuals are paid contributors as well, as it is a big priority for Gordon-Levitt and his team to make sure collaborators are rewarded.

Whenever a hitRECord project makes money, the team assesses each contribution to see how much each piece put into the value of the finished piece. For example, what is the percentage of the score from the video above? HitRECord then posts the pay proposal on the site, asking for feedback from the community to make sure it’s fair.

In a working world where so many designers and creatives are asked to work for free or for a maybe future profit, Gordon-Levitt says this payment system is top priority.

“Something I think is important in general,” he said, “is when you’re opening up this process allowing people to contribute that’s going to make money, you should pay those people – that is crucial.”

Not often are people going to hitRECord looking to get rich quick, but contributors often post photos of themselves with their hitRECord checks – proud and excited that they earned money for something they’re so passionate about.

That natural excitement is a large part of what Gordon-Levitt is all about. He added that when it comes to marketing and social media conversations, that authenticity and excitement is what makes people respond.

“People get excited when you’re not just selling them something and your purpose is something meaningful, other than making money,” he said. “It has to be an interchange – if you’re all you’re going to be is say why give us your content, we’re not giving you anything, it doesn’t feel a conversation.”

He predicts that that interchange is the direction of popular media as well.

“I really think that media is going to become more like a conversation,” said Gordon-Levitt. “That’s really the history of human communication. Not people sitting on a couch and listening for hours every night.”

Photo credit: Image Group LA

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