Just for the record: I know Jonathan a bit and he markets himself as himself. The story of programmer to musician is 100% true and both are things he's pretty much always done.

As for the money side of it...the difference between a programmer salary and where he's at now is that his current level of income is probably a spike -- the arc for most musicians is usually steep -- and he's working his butt off for that spike.

So maybe it's a marketing thing, but only if you count being yourself in public as marketing.