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Grex > Music2 > #112: Changes in the Music Business | |
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| 25 new of 189 responses total. |
orinoco
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response 150 of 189:
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Mar 31 17:21 UTC 2000 |
Not if the "items" are encoded and delivered online.
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diznave
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response 151 of 189:
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Apr 3 14:47 UTC 2000 |
Okay, true.....still, the number of every day non-computer related things you
can purchase online is large and getting larger and they have to get to you
somehow...
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krj
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response 152 of 189:
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Jun 14 22:39 UTC 2000 |
News item: Seagram, owner of the largest (or maybe second largest)
record company, the Universal Music Group, is in negotiations to be
acquired by a French media conglomerate.
News item: the world music label Wicklow, headed by Paddy Moloney
of the Chieftains, is now in limbo. I expected this, as
Wicklow was run as part of BMG's classical music division, and
that classical music division is being dismantled.
Wicklow has put out some very nice albums by Sin E', Mary Jane Lamond
and Varttina; get them before they all go out of print, I guess.
I don't even know if the new Varttina is available in the USA yet.
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mcnally
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response 153 of 189:
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Jun 20 00:58 UTC 2000 |
Today's NYT ( http://www.nytimes.com ) has a front page story on
French water and utility conglomerate Vivendi's proposed buyout of
Seagram. According to the NYT, the French buyer wants to transform
itself into an "entertainment and telecommunications giant". The
article doesn't give many details, but definitely gives the impression
that the buyer is much more interested in the MCA/Universal Group
holdings than the original Seagram's core distillery business (it's
suggested that the liquor part of the business would be quickly sold
off..)
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krj
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response 154 of 189:
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Jul 21 16:05 UTC 2000 |
You may recall that CD Now was probably the biggest of the dot-com
retailers on the death-watch list. Cnet reports today that Bertelsmann,
one of the four remaining major labels, is buying CD Now for $117 million.
CDNow says it will continue to operate its retail shop under that
brandname. Bertelsmann gets the experience that CD Now has accumulated
running one of the largest music-related sites. The deal is seen as
win for both companies. CD Now stock peaked at $25/share, and the buyout
is at $3/share.
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krj
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response 155 of 189:
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Jul 21 19:38 UTC 2000 |
Opinion item:
http://www.vh1.com/thewire/news/article.jhtml?ID=699
Matt Johnson of The The writes about his experiences as an artist
in the newly-conglomeratized Universal Music Group. He was one of the
artists to survive the brutal roster massacre at the label, but
Universal shows no interest in promoting his new release, so he's doing it
himself by making MP3 downloads available. He admits that he has
previously been critical of Napster and the Mp3 trading scene.
Quote: "Most artists with more than a couple of years' experience
now sadly accept that the industry is run by principles of
institutionalized corruption."
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mcnally
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response 156 of 189:
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Jul 22 08:11 UTC 2000 |
I've been listening to a lot of The The albums lately (and, incidentally,
have unfortunately been discovering that the one I like best is the one I
bought first.. I hate it when you start buying a band's catalog hoping to
discover more of what attracted you in the first place and just don't find
what you were looking for..)
I'll probably actually take advantage of the chance to download a track a
week from his latest in order to decide whether I want to buy it.
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brighn
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response 157 of 189:
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Jul 24 04:51 UTC 2000 |
I've always thought that Matt Johnson was an overrated hack who was made by
hype and the label. Ironic that he's biting the hand now that he can't get
any more vittles.
Matt Johnson does have musical talent... "Infected" displays this. He also
has a LOT of arrogance, and more arrogance than talent.
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mcnally
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response 158 of 189:
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Jul 24 05:03 UTC 2000 |
I kind of agree with your criticisms of Johnson -- I think he's
produced enough good work to show what he's capable of, and piles
and piles of pretentious dreck (e.g. the "Mind Bomb" album)
I've been very frustrated listening to the The The albums I've
bought lately, even considering that they were heavily discounted.
It's undoubtedly significant that I think the best thing he's done
was an album where he didn't write a single one of the songs --
"Hanky Panky", his album of Hank Williams (Sr.) covers. His blazing
cover of "I Saw the Light" is far better than anything he's done
performing his own material, much of which suffers from embarrassingly
sophomoric lyrics.
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krj
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response 159 of 189:
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Aug 2 23:01 UTC 2000 |
News item: New York Times, August 1: "Digital Music, Chapter 2."
EMI rolls out its plans for downloadable music.
EMI plans to charge "full retail price" for downloads: $3.99
to download a single, $17-$18 for an album. EMI claims distribution
costs are actually higher online than for the
distribution of a manufactured CD.
This plan is DOA, I predict, unless pricing is slashed.
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brighn
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response 160 of 189:
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Aug 3 00:15 UTC 2000 |
Hmmm... $17 to sit at my computer for half an hour to download a CD onto a
generic CD, with no booklet, ... or $15 for a commercially produced CD with
booklet, no waiting?
Touch choice. I'll have to think on it.
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scott
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response 161 of 189:
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Aug 3 00:51 UTC 2000 |
Online distribution may be more expensive now, but that pricing will kill
them. And long term online distribution has got to be cheaper... no trucks,
no excess inventory, infinite catalog space.
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other
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response 162 of 189:
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Aug 3 01:57 UTC 2000 |
Ken, is that article on line? I think I'd have to read it myself to believe
something that incrfedibly stupid is actually suggested as a marketing plan
by a functioning business....
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krj
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response 163 of 189:
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Aug 3 05:39 UTC 2000 |
It was in the New York Times online for August 2. Unfortunately they move
most of their items to the for-pay section after a day, though some of the
tech articles get to remain readable for free, so this article might
still be there. I'll have to check later.
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mcnally
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response 164 of 189:
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Aug 3 16:59 UTC 2000 |
The only way I can possibly conceive of those prices being justified
is by using special "record industry math" (you know, the same kind they
use to calculate artist royalties..)
I realize that the record industry executives Just Don't Get It when it
comes to digital music distribution, but even they can't be so clueless
as to expect that to be a viable retail model.
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brighn
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response 165 of 189:
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Aug 3 19:35 UTC 2000 |
Actually, I could conceive of those prices for out-of-print items, those
"Rarities" which some Napster users insist they're using Napster to get...
but not for items in current production.
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krj
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response 166 of 189:
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Aug 3 21:18 UTC 2000 |
The New York Times URL for the story about EMI's plans to sell
downloads of music, including their pricing schemes:
http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/00/08/biztech/articles/02popl.html
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krj
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response 167 of 189:
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Aug 4 17:19 UTC 2000 |
Anyone remember Copycode?
Copycode was Columbia Records' plan to put code markings into the audible
spectrum of recordings by leaving out certain frequencies.
The idea of Copycode was that this system would indelibly mark
copyrighted music, and then Congress would mandate that all recording
machines would include circuitry which would shut off if someone
tried to copy a Copycoded recording.
Congress punted to the National Bureau of Standards, and the NBS study
found:
1) Copycode was fairly audible.
2) Copycode did not always prevent the copying of encoded material
3) Unprotected material would occasionally trip the Copycode
circuitry in a recorder, causing it to shut off.
The NBS study buried Copycode, and it was never heard from again.
This was back around 1988, before Columbia Records was sold to Sony.
The concept, however, is back, under the name "watermark."
I have this from Usenet: I have not verified that it genuinely comes
from New Scientist:
Starting over
Record producers were appalled last week when they found they could
hear a supposedly inaudible "watermark" designed to make DVD-Audio
players reject copied discs. The industry's Secure Digital Music
Initiative (SDMI) had chosen a commercial watermarking system, called
Verance, which adds digital changes to music waveforms. The mark must
be robust enough to survive MP3 transmission over the Internet, but
remain inaudible when played on the yet to be launched DVD-Audio
players. After the disastrous London demo, an SDMI spokesperson
admitted: "We are starting all over again."
From New Scientist magazine, 22 July 2000.
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krj
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response 168 of 189:
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Aug 4 18:28 UTC 2000 |
http://www.inside.com continues to offer interesting coverage.
http://www.inside.com/story/Premium_Story_Cached/0,2771,7085_9,00.html
discusses how some folks think the record biz needs to co-opt Napster,
not fight it, through a concept named "Superdistribution."
Essentially, you would want people to pass your content along and
become marketers for you.
There are also reviews of the early versions of the major label
legitimate download systems:
http://www.inside.com/story/Premium_Story_Cached/0,2771,7005_9,00.html
The title is really all you need:
"My Life In Hell, or How I Tried to
Download Pink Floyd, Legally." This discusses EMI's system.
http://www.inside.com/story/Premium_Story_Cached/0,2771,7677_9,00.html
This reviews the Universal Music download system. Quote:
"Apart from having a rather expensive, legitimately downloaded
song file rendered unrecognizable by the legitimately downloaded
software player, additionally off-putting were the 30-odd
screens of terms and conditions that must be agreed to before
using the Intertrust/Magex software."
There was a similar review in Billboard. This stuff is not ready for
prime time.
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krj
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response 169 of 189:
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Aug 24 20:36 UTC 2000 |
A third major label has disclosed its plan for online
music sales.
http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/000822/n22679178.html
BMG's prices are set at $1.98 - $3.49 for downloads of individual
songs, and $9.98 - $16.98 for each full length album download.
I wasn't sure this was a new story, it so resembled the
previous stories on the EMI and Universal plans.
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mcnally
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response 170 of 189:
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Aug 24 22:42 UTC 2000 |
I'm baffled by who would purchase an album under such a plan, unless
you absolutely had to have it *NOW* (or rather, four hours' download
from "now")
So far all of the major label on-line music retailing plans I've heard
can only be explained by one of two possible explanations:
1) they want on-line music retailing to fail, or
2) they simply do not understand the concept of providing enhanced
value to consumers.
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anderyn
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response 171 of 189:
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Aug 25 01:27 UTC 2000 |
at work, i could download an album fairly quickly. (i've usually been able
to get five or six songs concurrently, in much less than twenty minutes.)
of course, if i'm paying over ten dollars for an album, I want a physical
item.
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other
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response 172 of 189:
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Aug 27 02:24 UTC 2000 |
i'd lay odds that these marketing shams are direct responses to an RIAA lawyer
suggestion that the record companies establish an online business model which
could be demonstrated in court to be suffering from the unfair competition
of the mp3-sharing systems, in order to either maximise damages claims or
comply with a technical requirement of the laws they seek to use to extinguish
napster/gnutella.
If i had to guess, that is...
(No, i don't have any inside information, just a theory about the law and its
uses.)
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mcnally
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response 173 of 189:
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Aug 27 03:31 UTC 2000 |
I have, in my more paranoid moments, harbored similar suspicions..
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other
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response 174 of 189:
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Aug 27 04:24 UTC 2000 |
considering whom we're discussing, calling it paranoia might be a stretch...
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