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| Author |
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| 25 new of 183 responses total. |
other
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response 101 of 183:
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May 20 16:34 UTC 2000 |
"Maybe they'll give tips." Heh.
To be fair, I kind of expect that the system would work much like the
shareware system works. MP3's could be be encoded with a shareware
reminder at the beginning or end, and for a small fee, access can be made
available to a notice-free replacement file, along with additional
tracks.
Lot of people will share the tracks that one person has paid for, and
lots of people will pay the small fee. But the artists will get the fees
directly.
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scott
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response 102 of 183:
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May 20 16:58 UTC 2000 |
Chuck D's article says that other forms of money making will be "discovered
or rediscovered". I'll agree that it's pretty hard to make money with the
current download model, but there's an incredible market for whoever can
figure it out first. And no, some form of copy protection is *not* an option
that makes any sense.
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aaron
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response 103 of 183:
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May 21 17:34 UTC 2000 |
I don't think that voluntary payment systems are likely to work.
Microsoft's proposal is in some ways the most viable -- create a
proprietary format, and sue anybody who utilizes that format without
paying royalties.
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raven
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response 104 of 183:
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May 21 18:29 UTC 2000 |
The real question is who's getting payed here? Remeber the artist is making
5% of the purchuse price of a cd in Royalties. If the artist produced their
own mp3 and sold them direct they would making damn near 100% of royaliaties
(100%- transaction charge and promotion fees) thus even if their sales were
lower and there was some piracy of the mp3s it seems likely that they could
still make a living due to the higher profit margin.
The record industry will argue that artisits need the hype machine to make
money but I don't think it's true, Ani Difranco, Phish, and the Grateful
Dead make money without hype, I think is true of some eltronica artists like
the Orb as well, REM was not heavily hyped in their early days when they were
on IRS records, neither were the Dead Kennedies, nor the Indigo Girls.
If an artist is good they can make good money by word of mouth. I think
direct sales on the internet only increses this potential.
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orinoco
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response 105 of 183:
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May 21 20:18 UTC 2000 |
Another interesting twist that occurred to me yesterday is that there are
people who could turn a profit selling mp3s -- the smaller-name artists, who
don't have a wide enough following for mp3 trading to build up momentum. I'm
not gonna pay for a Dave Mathews Band mp3 when I can turn dozens of them up
for free with a few minutes on the web, and not many other people are going
to either, so Dave Mathews stands to lose a lot of money on the mp3 thing.
But I heard recently that Rickie Lee Jones is going to be selling mp3s of an
obscure side project of hers called Austin Chain, and hell yeah, I'd buy
those, because I've checked, and _nobody_ has them on the web. Austin Chain,
by virtue of their obscurity, actually stands to make a little money through
mp3 sales.
More support for the idea that we're gonna see a return to lots of small local
bands?
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raven
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response 106 of 183:
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May 21 22:37 UTC 2000 |
re #105 Nods Kristen Hersh made some obscure tracks available as mp3s
on her web site that I may purchuse if I can save the money. More badwidth
wouls help too, it's a pain waiting almost an hour for each track to download
at 33.6.
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scott
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response 107 of 183:
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May 21 23:44 UTC 2000 |
Personally, I really hope that we'll see the smaller bands get a lot more
circulation.
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aaron
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response 108 of 183:
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May 22 04:54 UTC 2000 |
The hype machine sells records. They hype machine turns crap like Silver
Chair into a multi-million dollar return.
Remember MC Hammer? He negogiated himself a wonderful first record
contract, because he knew how much money he could make selling his own
CD's from the trunk of his car. But he knew he would make a *lot* more
money if he could take advantage of the hype machine. And boy, did he.
Some band you have never heard of can try to sell its MP3's on its own
website. Odds are, you'll never hear of the band or visit its website.
Maybe, one day, somebody will send you an MP3 file from the band, and
you'll be enticed to go and visit the 404 error that used to be its
website. Or maybe it will go into your collection of "MP3 files I got
for free" to be listened to at a later date, or to be forgotten. Ask
that band if they would like to team up with the "hype machine" for a
record or two.
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krj
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response 109 of 183:
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May 22 05:43 UTC 2000 |
Some would, some wouldn't. Ani DiFranco has basically told the major
labels to go play with themselves. She self-releases 2 or more albums
a year and is estimated to have earned about $4 million.
The Grateful Dead were the most successful touring rock band through
most of the 1980s, and for much of that period they didn't have a
record contract. They encouraged their fans to trade live recordings.
The Dead's major-label recordings never sold very much.
The hype machine can sell records in the short term. Maybe.
But there are too many stories of musicians who were ground up and
spit out when the label accountants decided that sales had been
inadequate; or when the label was acquired in a merger.
(The Universal Music Group merger was supposed to result in about
200 pop/rock performers being dumped, though I never saw a comprehensive
list.)
And the contracts are routinely written so that the musician has
a maximum amount of difficulty in restarting the career.
There are signs that musicians who aren't likely to become pop
megastars are catching on; the New York Times recently ran a story
about a guy signed by a major label who was keeping his UPS job.
This is a serious digression, alas.
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other
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response 110 of 183:
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May 22 06:22 UTC 2000 |
Example: Prince, who has just reclaimed that name -- because the contract he
had been under gave the record company the rights to his own damn name --
since said contract has now expired.
Pardon the gobblywangered sentence structure.
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aaron
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response 111 of 183:
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May 22 18:15 UTC 2000 |
re #109: Exceptions really don't prove the rule. Nobody is questioning
that it is possible to hit it big without the help of a major
(or perhaps even a minor) label. It is a rarity, but it happens.
I think the problem with short-lived bands is first that the
hype machine propels a lot of mediocrity into stardom -- that's
hard to sustain without talent -- and second that the type of
money a lot of these bands makes has a corrosive effect on their
unity. Yes, record labels will dump bands if their bean counters
tell them to, and it may be possible for those bands to eke out
an existence afterward, without the help of a record label. But
bands which have passed their prime, or were never any good in
the first place, will have a hard time making it on their own.
re #110: How big was that record deal, again?
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sspan
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response 112 of 183:
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May 24 03:18 UTC 2000 |
Here's how the MP3 thing will work as I see it, people will trade MP3s for
free, the record companies will make no money, the artist will make no money,
any other plan devised will not work because the ability to do this already
exists. Any proprietary format will just be converted to MP3 and traded for
free. Any sale of MP3s will fail because once a few people pay, they will just
distribute them for free. Eventually enough people will do this to make it
not worth recording new music.
As for artist making bigger profits selling MP3s, I can tell you I know one
band doing this, and they say at $.99 a song they pretty much break even.
People that don't want to pay $12.99 for a CD aren't likely to pay much more
than $.99 for an MP3 either.
I also know several reasonably popular bands that lose money touring, so
thinking that will make up for lost CD revenues doesn't work either.
Unknown artist getting known by distributing MP3s is another problem. Doesn't
help to get a bigger following if none of them spend any money.
I can see some big cchanges coming, and they don't look good to me..
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scott
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response 113 of 183:
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May 24 11:22 UTC 2000 |
It will eventually become difficult to make a lucrative career out of being
a "recording artist". actually, it already is incredibily difficult. On the
other hand, whenever I start paying attention to local bands I usually end
up finding some music I really like. And those local bands will benefit from
the technology of distribution.
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other
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response 114 of 183:
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May 24 17:37 UTC 2000 |
If you're losing money touring, then either you're not doing it right, or
you have an inflated idea of how popular you are, or you shouldn't be
doing it.
The point is you have to market the band and the music, and touring can
be a part of that effort, but you have to contain the expenses
appropriately. On the other hand, "losing money" could be just the wrong
way of looking at an effort that is actually an "investment" in the
marketing effort, but you still have to plan it properly.
It is a business, and if you don't run it like one, you lose money.
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krj
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response 115 of 183:
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May 24 18:34 UTC 2000 |
From USA Today: "A study suggests that Internet file-sharing programs
such as Napster can cut record sales. An analysis of sales within
5 miles of colleges (where Napster use is extensive) found a
drop of 4% to 7% from 1998 to 2000, while national sales
increased 20%." The study was done by VNU Entertainment and is
being flogged by Reciprocal, "a digital-rights management firm."
I haven't seen the detailed study, but one problem seems to be that
they are comparing per-store sales at the college locations to
overall industry sales. With the boom in megastores, it may be that
college students are just ditching the local shops and driving to
the nearest megastore. The sales shift to Internet retailers has
also been large in the study period.
Still this does square with the anecdotal evidence I've seen in my
two college towns. Smaller stores are shuttering; the Tower stores
-- especially Ann Arbor -- seem to be cutting the floor space for
CDs and moving in more assorted geegaws for sale.
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raven
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response 116 of 183:
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May 24 19:16 UTC 2000 |
Perhaps the key figure there in National sales are up 20%. I think people
will continue to bu CDs because it's easier to get the music and better
sound quality, + artwork, etc. Even with a high speed connection it would
take an hour to download an entire CD. College students may have that time,
but I think most people in the real world would not. For people ITRW I
think use Napster to download single songs to see what an artisit sounds like
and then purchuse a CD bases on this. I know from listening to a couple
Aphex Twin mp3s I would be more likely to purchuse their music now. The
overall trend is increased sales and I think Napster et al. could help this,
esp. if supplemented by direct sales by artisits.
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aaron
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response 117 of 183:
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May 24 21:18 UTC 2000 |
re #115: I think kids in college communities are also more likely to
use Internet discounters.
I think that Napster will have the biggest effect on recordings aimed
at the market with the least money -- that is to say, high school and
college kids. Adults are much less likely to obsess over spending $14
for a CD, as opposed to spending hours downloading music and building
their own. The net effect may well be that the record industry starts
aiming toward a slightly older market.
Cassette tapes were supposed to kill the recording industry, and then
DAT was supposed to be the end. While MP3's have caught on in a way
that DAT did not, and are becoming a viable mainstream recording
format, I don't think it's the end of the road for commercially
produced tapes and CD's.
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orinoco
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response 118 of 183:
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May 24 21:33 UTC 2000 |
High school and college kids may be the market with the least money, but they
prop up a good-sized chunk of the music industry as it now stands.
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krj
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response 119 of 183:
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May 25 02:34 UTC 2000 |
Cnet has coverage of the study, which was done by SoundScan division
VNU Marketing, at a URL which is too ugly to consider typing in.
Cnet's story pretty much shreds the claims about Napster:
"The drop in college music store sales was more pronounded in 1998
than in 1999 -- a year before Napster was written..."
They interview a number of record store managers who say that
the bigger competition is Internet stores and the big chain megastores.
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aaron
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response 120 of 183:
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May 25 17:19 UTC 2000 |
re #118: Right. But you have to pitch your products at the market that
will *pay* for them.
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aaron
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response 121 of 183:
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May 25 19:38 UTC 2000 |
Those of you who have cable can tune into MTV at 10:00 this evening, for
a half-hour special presentation, "Napster: Grand Theft Audio?"
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krj
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response 122 of 183:
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Jun 1 01:44 UTC 2000 |
I meant to put this in a while ago. The Village Voice carried a story
on a report by an investment research group:
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0021/howe.shtml
I suspect this represents real research for investors, as compared with
the Soundscan study of college CD shop sales, which was pushing the
music business point of view. This study can't be pushing a music
industry point of view, because its conclusion is that all parts of the
industry are screwed. Paraphrasing from the report:
The study's worst case scenario estimates that 16% of US music sales
will be lost to Internet piracy by 2002. Even if the record industry
wins its current battles against Napster and MP3.com, more applications
will come along to replace them.
Some sort of encryption system might help, but the SDMI process to
develop secure downloadable music has broken down. They were supposed
to have a standard a year ago, so products could be on the shelves
for Christmas 1999; now it looks like product deliveries in 2003.
Too much squabbling between the involved parties in the SDMI group.
The big record labels will have to push into selling Internet downloads
directly to consumers; when they do that, they will piss off the
brick-n-mortar CD stores, who currently generate 80% of sales.
The study says the stores will "retaliate" against the labels, but I
don't see how -- they're CD stores!! What else are they going to sell?
So look for two or three years of bitter fighting between the labels
and the record stores, with the record stores being "on the ropes" by
2003.
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krj
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response 123 of 183:
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Jun 9 16:36 UTC 2000 |
John Hockenberry, one of my fave guys, writes an essay for MSNBC.com today.
"Give Me Napster, or Give Me Death" is the title.
The URL is unmanageable, you can find it from mp3.com. Nothing earthshaking
really, except Hockenberry's comparison of mp3-swapping technologies with
the new communication technologies which were involved with the fall of
the Soviet empire and the Palestinian uprising. Hockenberry's conclusion
is that saving the music business would require "a Stalinist-style licensing
system for the transfer of information."
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mcnally
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response 124 of 183:
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Jun 9 19:58 UTC 2000 |
I haven't read the article yet, but I basically agree with his premise
as phrased above. The technological cat's out of the bag at this point
and I can conceive of no way for the copyright interests to put it back.
At this point the main option remaining to them is the one they seem to
be committed to -- push for greater criminalization and prosecution of
intellectual property offenses as a deterrant. Unfortunately, there's
plenty of evidence to suggest that that approach will never work..
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mcnally
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response 125 of 183:
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Jun 9 19:59 UTC 2000 |
(I suppose they do have one other option available to them: produce music
so uninteresting that nobody will be motivated to copy it. Sometimes it
seems like they're pursuing that plan as well..)
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