1. The most common and reliable way to make yourself a priority for your record label is to finish a product (Ye self-funded and called in favors to make a prototype of College Dropout and music video for “Through the Wire”), and to build buzz through self-promotion (the Def Poetry Jam audition tapes, the documentary, the interviews, etc).

2. Two setbacks: A few weeks after Ye’s near-fatal car accident, Rocafella shelved his album and didn’t give him access to studio time or production budget, so Ye called in favors from Pharrell and Jamie Foxx to get studio time to finish his album.

3. Ye already had so many starting points for Late Registration and started working on shortly after College Dropout dropped, he really just needed people to pay attention.

4.  6 years ago, I had suggested co-authoring a book with someone I respected immensely, he decided the book was a great idea and went on to get a publishing deal without me and to work with an A-list ghostwriter, so it broke my heart that Ye stopped working with Coodie and Chike after he gained momentum, and I’m glad to see they did a ton of great work without him, reconciled, and got to release this incredible visual experience. (This one doesn’t count: Four years later, I ended up writing and shipping a book on my own!)

5. Ye always believed he produced great work, but it was only until he showed the best stuff to enough people that they started believing it—which is the whole purpose of marketing.