Make Your Own Rules

Stories and Hard-Earned Advice from a Creator in the Digital Age

By: Andrew Huang

Narrated by: Andrew Huang

USA TODAY Bestseller

YouTube sensation Andrew Huang offers practical tips and hard-won advice for creatives seeking financial stability while staying authentic.

How does a musician with acute hearing loss, a refusal to perform live, and no industry connections carve a path to millions of followers and lucrative royalty checks? In Make Your Own Rules, Andrew Huang shares stories from his two decades as a music industry misfit and offers advice on both the artistic and business sides of working as a creator in our digital era.

Beginning with auctioning his songwriting skills on eBay as a teenager, Andrew continuously found new ways to thrive in a music career over the last twenty-plus years. His storied career and hard-won wisdom can help aspiring digital creatives find success as well. Organized by sections on building your creative foundations, growing an audience in the digital age, making money, and staying true to yourself, Make Your Own Rules pairs personal anecdotes with concrete advice applicable to any freelance digital creator. You’ll learn how Andrew became an early adopter of sharing music online—for free!—and how he leveraged social media to grow an organic following and amass millions of song streams and video views. Additional chapters provide insight into his designing an online course and music production tools that have been used by tens of thousands of people, and how he created revenue streams for himself that didn’t exist previously.

With open-minded perseverance, Andrew made up his own rules for life. His unlikely journey will inspire creators to find opportunity, financial stability, and fun in their pursuits.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2024 Andrew Huang (P)2024 Simon & Schuster Audio

Great general proccess advice

There was a lot more to this book than I was expecting at first. I had assumed it would be only about the music industry or how Andrew does YouTube (like so many series/books/etc. are) l, but he goes through his background and gives great insight on what he does and why. The background and step by step life processes make the advice much more meaningful and generalized. I can easily see how to apply not the specific rules Andrew has for himself, but how to make and follow my own rules and how those rules can bring personal success no matter how I view success to be.

The authenticity of our journey isn't set in stone

As a musician myself I really respect and resonate with Andrew. I've watched so many of his videos. and to hear his story through and have him give us nuggets of wisdom along the way was very inspiring; not only to try things that work for you but to explore more avenues.

You need to hear this, I need to hear this.

Eye opening insights from a massively creative individual with no quit. Personally there have been so many golden nuggets and it's so inspiring to hear Andrew's journey. I plan on revisiting this book many times. I love that he reads the audiobook.

The struggles we all go through, that you think you only go through are all here and more. Hearing how he worked through these and how you can is just so refreshing.

Thank you Andrew!

Insightful, relevant and actionable

Andrew’s journey combined with the lessons learned along the way were inspiring, insightful, and in some ways surprising. It was refreshingly open, authentic and vulnerable. He was open about how luck has sometimes seemed to play a role in his success, but also how much hard work, practice, planning and thought are essential as well. I’m older than Andrew but I also appreciate his discussion about how important mindset can be. Very enjoyable listen!

Andrew Huang the GOAT

Love Mr. Huang. The book is a beautiful extension of himself. Give this a read, important for any artist.

Divine timing

I found this book at what feels like the perfect juncture in my life. I've been dedicating more and more of my time to music production over the last few years. Just s few months ago I shattered my femur and am in the process of moving into an exciting but completely alien living situation.

Finding my personal standard of success as an artist in the music industry has been a life goal for the last 11 +years and I've recently been feeling aimless, which is a bummer.

Andrew's book eloquently spoke to many questions that have been swirling in my head for years. My interest was peaked the entire time and it's almost sad to have reached the end, but I'll be going back for a second listen. Mad respect and gratitude to Andrew for this masterpiece of a book!!

Left me inspired

Well written and full of insight! Andrew really wrote this to help share what he’s learned from his success making a life doing what he loves

Sound concepts. Pun intended. =]

What a great book and having the author (Andrew) read it, made the concepts and info that much more genuine and intriguing. =]

Art & Fear for the Internet Generation

I’m married to an artist and internet creator, and my “scene” has long been people who create things for the internet, and I’ve long been an Andrew Huang fan, with a particular admiration (as an entrepreneurship nerd) for how he innovates on internet and creator business models, so I picked up his book knowing it would probably be good. Like so much of what Andrew does, it wasn’t what I expected, but in a good way.

I went in expecting a focus on business, which is what it says on the tin. However, the book is in significant part an auto-biography, which is used as a framing device and context for the advice given. This was refreshing, as many business-oriented books tend to proffer advice as facts that often don’t work outside the context they were developed in—Andrew talks about the experiences that led to his conclusions and helps you understand the situations they were designed for. Plus it’s just more entertaining.

While the book has fairly actionable business advice, I would more categorize it as a structured questioning and critique about preconceptions that many artists have about themselves, and how he was able to balance (or even justify) art with commercial success. This is something I see friends struggle with often, and Andrew reaches many of the same conclusions we have, so it’s great for there to be a resource that can be a head start in learning for upcoming artists in a very metrics-driven and hypercapitalist context. When my wife and I started dating she suggested “Art & Fear” as a way of understanding her better, and this very much feels like a spiritual successor for the Internet era. I would call it essential reading for the modern artist, and have picked up an extra copy for friends.

As an aside, I appreciate that Andrew goes into the messiness of his journey, including explorations of ideas that didn’t serve him well, or only worked for him in a certain context or time of his life. I think that’s part of the advantage of this semi-biography format.

I first consumed this as an audiobook, and it’s narrated by Andrew, which I think elevates it as it’s well performed and Andrew telling his own story lets him emphasize ideas or key moments well with his inflections and subtle emotion. Definitely improved the experience.

The freedom

This book gave me freedom!! Thanks Andrew!!!! They say I need at least 15 words but I think I said enough.