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PrintableMoonbeam said: I think a new artist might be better served by having the highest quality downloads available with an expiration after 3 (or maybe 5) listens.
Once it's out there, someone'll figure out a way to keep it. | |
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Anxiety said: Ace said: Wasn't that a bust (in terms of getting people to pay)? I seem to recall reading that the number of people who kicked in a reasonable amount was very small. Me thinks that - if it were a resounding success - they would've trumpeted the figures (rather than refusing to divulge them). yet the album debuted on the charts at number one as soon as it hit retail, and it still has an unreal amount of buzz. i guess the question is, by whose standards are we defining "success"?  But, in the not-too-distant future, record retail will be a thing of the past. | |
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Ace said: Moonbeam said: I think a new artist might be better served by having the highest quality downloads available with an expiration after 3 (or maybe 5) listens.
Once it's out there, someone'll figure out a way to keep it. What if they're watermarked? It's just a silly idea- I was just trying to come up with something that would meet the needs of those who want to sample before they buy, yet still ensure that those who want to keep the album will need to pay for it. Feel free to join in the Prince Album Poll 2018! Let'a celebrate his legacy by counting down the most beloved Prince albums, as decided by you! | |
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Ace said: Anxiety said: yet the album debuted on the charts at number one as soon as it hit retail, and it still has an unreal amount of buzz. i guess the question is, by whose standards are we defining "success"? But, in the not-too-distant future, record retail will be a thing of the past. as we're already learning from the independent releases by high-profile artists. if what we've seen so far have been successful enough to be notable, just imagine what it could be like when people figure out what they're doing! | |
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Moonbeam said: Ace said: Once it's out there, someone'll figure out a way to keep it. What if they're watermarked? It's just a silly idea- I was just trying to come up with something that would meet the needs of those who want to sample before they buy, yet still ensure that those who want to keep the album will need to pay for it. Watermarks wouldn't help - as soon as someone had a non-watermarked version, you can bet your bottom dollar it would be copied and illegally distributed. I think the industry needs to face up to the fact that the genie's out of the bottle. | |
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Anxiety said: Ace said: But, in the not-too-distant future, record retail will be a thing of the past. as we're already learning from the independent releases by high-profile artists. if what we've seen so far have been successful enough to be notable, just imagine what it could be like when people figure out what they're doing! Ya lost me. | |
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Ace said: Anxiety said: as we're already learning from the independent releases by high-profile artists. if what we've seen so far have been successful enough to be notable, just imagine what it could be like when people figure out what they're doing! Ya lost me. yeah, well. imagine how i felt writing it.  | |
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Ace said: Moonbeam said: What if they're watermarked? It's just a silly idea- I was just trying to come up with something that would meet the needs of those who want to sample before they buy, yet still ensure that those who want to keep the album will need to pay for it. Watermarks wouldn't help - as soon as someone had a non-watermarked version, you can bet your bottom dollar it would be copied and illegally distributed. I think the industry needs to face up to the fact that the genie's out of the bottle. Probably, but what if the purchased versions are watermarked too? I know I'm clutching at straws here, but the NIN/Radiohead experiment has shown that getting the music out there will yield a good deal of sales. Feel free to join in the Prince Album Poll 2018! Let'a celebrate his legacy by counting down the most beloved Prince albums, as decided by you! | |
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Moonbeam said: the NIN/Radiohead experiment has shown that getting the music out there will yield a good deal of sales.
Nowhere near what they were in the pre-MP3 days. The NIN and Radiohead deals were clever marketing ploys (get a shitload of free advertising and score cool-points with your fans at the same time), but these sorts of things will have less impact as time marches on. Record retail (and, eventually, DVD sales/rentals) will die, and all of this stuff will move digitally. I'm sure - like everything else digital - there's a way around it, but hasn't Amazon's Unbox program made it fairly difficult to share that content? | |
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Ace said: Moonbeam said: the NIN/Radiohead experiment has shown that getting the music out there will yield a good deal of sales.
Nowhere near what they were in the pre-MP3 days. The NIN and Radiohead deals were clever marketing ploys (get a shitload of free advertising and score cool-points with your fans at the same time), but these sorts of things will have less impact as time marches on. Record retail (and, eventually, DVD sales/rentals) will die, and all of this stuff will move digitally. I'm sure - like everything else digital - there's a way around it, but hasn't Amazon's Unbox program made it fairly difficult to share that content? you're right, but in the here and now, it seems to be doing exactly what it's meant to do. if this method stagnates, then it's going to be a joke as time marches on. i think we're at a place where the distribution of music has to evolve and people have to innovate, or else there will be a fair amount of extinction on the horizon. and i think people in the music biz are well aware of that. | |
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Anxiety said: here's one of the most brilliant pieces written in recent times about the music industry, by david byrne:
http://www.wired.com/ente...ntPage=all you should really scan this over for your research paper. you should read it simply because it kicks ass. great, great article. thanks for sharing. as for the issue of downloading illegally vs. buying downloads vs. buying cd's, my feelings and practices have changed a lot over the years. obviously when there was no such thing as downloading music, i bought everything i listened to. this was a fun and rewarding way of listening to music, but obviously i was missing out on a lot of stuff that i might have liked and the artists/labels were missing out on getting a lot of my money because a) i couldn't afford to give it to them, and b) i wasn't aware of their "product". when illegal downloading became an option, i used it sparingly. i used to to hear/own releases that i wanted that were out of print or otherwise completely available to me (no local retailer carried it or no credit card to order online, etc.). i still purchased music by artists that i was really into. or even the (relatively) rare whim of trying out something new that i'd heard on the radio or MTV or from a friend. this was a fair approach, i think, except it still didn't really expose me to the possibility of really buying any more than what i was already going to buy in the first place because it was by one of my top 10 favorite musical acts. then for several years, i just downloaded everything and really only bought albums by about 4 or 5 artists. i'd really completely shut myself down to music. and when i was listening to it, it was more of an academic exercise or a time-killer or obsessively-compulsively making compilation discs to fill a void.   this wasn't really rewarding for me, at least as far as enjoying or experiencing the music itself and i was totally ripping off the artists and the labels. i wasn't really being exposed to anything and i wasn't really interested in it anyway. plus, the people i lived with had *massive* music collections, so i mean, there was plenty to explore there when i felt the urge.
lately, though, i think i've struck a balance that's fair. i'm completely absorbed in finding new music and enjoying it and just letting it be a part of my life again. i've probably downloaded and listened to 100 albums so far this year. and i'm buying CD's of the stuff that i really like and think will stick with me for any length of time. and i've probably bought between 20 and 30 so far this year. i think this is probably the best balance. there is always going to be illegal downloading. it's just a fact. and i'm always going to be doing it but i actually want to own (and contribute to) something that i really really like. under my current set-up, i've now paid for more music in the last 5 months than i did in the previous 5 years combined. it's a win-win, i think. i get to try out and be exposed to things that i might not otherwise have even bothered with. this in turn gets a lot more artists and labels paid (by me at least) because i'm more willing to listen to their "product" and pay them for it if i like it. they're getting more money from me now than they would if there was no option to illegally download it and try it out. the more i try out, the more i end up buying.  "Try to remember how you used to feel about me
and think about how you're treating me now. Then try to reconcile them, if you can. But you don't even remember, do you?" | |
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I'd like to think that there will always be a market for physical releases, whether they be vinyl, CD, or whatever new format that could come along. For me, MP3's are cold and sterile. Having a tangible product that I can hold, having liner notes to read, tearing open the wrapping, and imbibing the "new CD" scent is all part of the experience. It gives me a sense of ownership, which may be silly, but I value it very much. It seems that there are lots of people around here who feel the same way, and I hope there are enough of us to justify the production of physical music products. Feel free to join in the Prince Album Poll 2018! Let'a celebrate his legacy by counting down the most beloved Prince albums, as decided by you! | |
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Moonbeam said: I'd like to think that there will always be a market for physical releases, whether they be vinyl, CD, or whatever new format that could come along. For me, MP3's are cold and sterile. Having a tangible product that I can hold, having liner notes to read, tearing open the wrapping, and imbibing the "new CD" scent is all part of the experience. It gives me a sense of ownership, which may be silly, but I value it very much. It seems that there are lots of people around here who feel the same way, and I hope there are enough of us to justify the production of physical music products.
i definitely think there's going to be a strong collector's market at the very least. i think it's going to take at least a generation or two before the overwhelming majority of people consider "the norm" to be non-tangible media. | |
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The shift in the music-buying public is indicative, I think, of a generational abandonment of paying money for goods. The news industry has run into the same issue. "News" no longer is viewed -- by younger consumers, at least -- as a commodity. It's just not worth money, to a lot of folks who are comfortable downloading something for free. The value of art has changed, in that sense. Some might still buy an album from a store, given the chance, but the technology has hindered the industry and the payment of artists, in that sense.
This isn't helping your paper, is it? | |
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ThreadBare said: The shift in the music-buying public is indicative, I think, of a generational abandonment of paying money for goods. The news industry has run into the same issue. "News" no longer is viewed -- by younger consumers, at least -- as a commodity. It's just not worth money, to a lot of folks who are comfortable downloading something for free. The value of art has changed, in that sense. Some might still buy an album from a store, given the chance, but the technology has hindered the industry and the payment of artists, in that sense.
This isn't helping your paper, is it? if you're in the younger generations, look at how we're getting screwed by paying money for goods. look at our gas crisis. look at how worthless the dollar is becoming in virtually every other nation on the globe. what good is our money if you're a kid growing up in this world? i'd feel all kinds of entitled to nick a free record online. | |
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Anxiety said: ThreadBare said: The shift in the music-buying public is indicative, I think, of a generational abandonment of paying money for goods. The news industry has run into the same issue. "News" no longer is viewed -- by younger consumers, at least -- as a commodity. It's just not worth money, to a lot of folks who are comfortable downloading something for free. The value of art has changed, in that sense. Some might still buy an album from a store, given the chance, but the technology has hindered the industry and the payment of artists, in that sense.
This isn't helping your paper, is it? if you're in the younger generations, look at how we're getting screwed by paying money for goods. look at our gas crisis. look at how worthless the dollar is becoming in virtually every other nation on the globe. what good is our money if you're a kid growing up in this world? i'd feel all kinds of entitled to nick a free record online. Only, as with the news industry, people's livelihoods are attached to younger consumers buying the product as their predecessors did. The pay-for-perusal online model hasn't worked, though. Just ask the New York Times, which abandoned its subscription-only opinion pieces about a year ago. Second, the assumption (which might be wrong) is that the younger consumers aren't being hit quite as hard by the economic downturn as are their older counterparts. | |
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ThreadBare said: Anxiety said: if you're in the younger generations, look at how we're getting screwed by paying money for goods. look at our gas crisis. look at how worthless the dollar is becoming in virtually every other nation on the globe. what good is our money if you're a kid growing up in this world? i'd feel all kinds of entitled to nick a free record online. Only, as with the news industry, people's livelihoods are attached to younger consumers buying the product as their predecessors did. The pay-for-perusal online model hasn't worked, though. Just ask the New York Times, which abandoned its subscription-only opinion pieces about a year ago. Second, the assumption (which might be wrong) is that the younger consumers aren't being hit quite as hard by the economic downturn as are their older counterparts. i think younger consumers aren't feeling the brunt of it as hard as their older counterparts because they have less life experience and are probably more able to mentally/emotionally/etc. adapt to our current reality than those of us who see the huge negative changes coming as a result of the economic turndown. no? as for not paying for news, well...that is its own thread, and i'm sure it would be a very interesting thread at that! but i see what you're saying. | |
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I think that part of the problem the industry is facing is not only the availability of illegal downloads, but their abandoning of the single as a promotional tool in the late 90's.
Yes, with the rise of illegal (and legal) downloading, sales have decreased overall. But until fairly recently, there was really no ability to sample an album by buying a single. They started doing away with singles in the late 90's. Singles have always been loss leaders for labels and retail outlets. They're cheap ways of getting people to try out an artist's album (especially when they're paired an album track as the b-side), to get them in the store to maybe pick up the album itself instead or even something else in addition to the single. You used to be able to go to the store and buy a single and let it win you over to the idea of buying someone's album. Unfortunately, the decline in the availability of singles coincided with the rise in illegal downloading. It hasn't been until recently that you could actually BUY a single, thanks to online download retailers. And people are taking advantage of that and buying single tracks again, or bundled tracks as a "single". But I think at this point, it's too little too late and the ship has sailed on it being a good replacement for the physical single release when you can just go ahead and download the whole album for free. PS: if anyone already said this and said it better, then nevermind. I'm skipping around on this thread  [Edited 5/22/08 22:13pm] "Try to remember how you used to feel about me
and think about how you're treating me now. Then try to reconcile them, if you can. But you don't even remember, do you?" | |
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Anxiety said: ThreadBare said: Only, as with the news industry, people's livelihoods are attached to younger consumers buying the product as their predecessors did. The pay-for-perusal online model hasn't worked, though. Just ask the New York Times, which abandoned its subscription-only opinion pieces about a year ago. Second, the assumption (which might be wrong) is that the younger consumers aren't being hit quite as hard by the economic downturn as are their older counterparts. i think younger consumers aren't feeling the brunt of it as hard as their older counterparts because they have less life experience and are probably more able to mentally/emotionally/etc. adapt to our current reality than those of us who see the huge negative changes coming as a result of the economic turndown. no? as for not paying for news, well...that is its own thread, and i'm sure it would be a very interesting thread at that! but i see what you're saying. Don't get me wrong. I think young folks are doing what anyone would do: latching on to emerging technologies and making decisions according to convenience. Both music and news have in common the delayed ability to make money off of the new platforms. Music has been far more successful, but it has occurred slowly and about a decade after the cruel downsizing of the artist side of the industry through label consolidations and closures. In news, it's been almost reverse. You're right. Another time.  | |
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The purchase of music in itself will end soon imo. I think the licensing of music for TV, film commercials... as well as live performances... will be the only ways to make money from it. | |
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R3V said: I think that part of the problem the industry is facing is not only the availability of illegal downloads, but their abandoning of the single as a promotional tool in the late 90's.
Yes, with the rise of illegal (and legal) downloading, sales have decreased overall. But until fairly recently, there was really no ability to sample an album by buying a single. They started doing away with singles in the late 90's. Singles have always been loss leaders for labels and retail outlets. They're cheap ways of getting people to try out an artist's album (especially when they're paired an album track as the b-side), to get them in the store to maybe pick up the album itself instead or even something else in addition to the single. You used to be able to go to the store and buy a single and let it win you over to the idea of buying someone's album. Unfortunately, the decline in the availability of singles coincided with the rise in illegal downloading. It hasn't been until recently that you could actually BUY a single, thanks to online download retailers. And people are taking advantage of that and buying single tracks again, or bundled tracks as a "single". But I think at this point, it's too little too late and the ship has sailed on it being a good replacement for the physical single release when you can just go ahead and download the whole album for free. Good point! I really missed the availability of singles in the US. Australia is better, but it seems physical singles are becoming obsolete here too. Sanity (one of the leading record stores here) has done away with singles altogether, and most albums too. Instead, they have "listening stations" where you can preview tracks and pay to download them. Browing through the Prince section, they had virtually all of his albums available to download, but practically nothing to physically buy. I was disgusted.Feel free to join in the Prince Album Poll 2018! Let'a celebrate his legacy by counting down the most beloved Prince albums, as decided by you! | |
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i'm trying to remember the last physical SINGLE, cd or vinyl or otherwise, that i purchased.
prince's "fury" cd single, maybe? or no, wait, just a couple of months ago i got the "zombie killer" 7" single by leslie hall + elvira. it's on red vinyl. | |
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Anxiety said: i'm trying to remember the last physical SINGLE, cd or vinyl or otherwise, that i purchased.
prince's "fury" cd single, maybe? or no, wait, just a couple of months ago i got the "zombie killer" 7" single by leslie hall + elvira. it's on red vinyl. I still buy lots of singles- I've probably picked up at least 10 this year. The last one was "The Only One" by The Cure. Feel free to join in the Prince Album Poll 2018! Let'a celebrate his legacy by counting down the most beloved Prince albums, as decided by you! | |
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Moonbeam said: Anxiety said: i'm trying to remember the last physical SINGLE, cd or vinyl or otherwise, that i purchased.
prince's "fury" cd single, maybe? or no, wait, just a couple of months ago i got the "zombie killer" 7" single by leslie hall + elvira. it's on red vinyl. I still buy lots of singles- I've probably picked up at least 10 this year. The last one was "The Only One" by The Cure. got that via iTunes saw it at a wrecka stow recently, but they wanted 9.99 for a 2-song 7" import. i figured the 1.98 iTunes downloads would suffice. | |
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Anxiety said: Moonbeam said: I still buy lots of singles- I've probably picked up at least 10 this year. The last one was "The Only One" by The Cure. got that via iTunes saw it at a wrecka stow recently, but they wanted 9.99 for a 2-song 7" import. i figured the 1.98 iTunes downloads would suffice. 9.99? 
I got the CD single for $3.99. Feel free to join in the Prince Album Poll 2018! Let'a celebrate his legacy by counting down the most beloved Prince albums, as decided by you! | |
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Still buying plenty of singles and CDs here in Moscow... [including 'Fury' ]
Moonbeam said: Anxiety said: i'm trying to remember the last physical SINGLE, cd or vinyl or otherwise, that i purchased.
prince's "fury" cd single, maybe? or no, wait, just a couple of months ago i got the "zombie killer" 7" single by leslie hall + elvira. it's on red vinyl. I still buy lots of singles- I've probably picked up at least 10 this year. The last one was "The Only One" by The Cure. | |
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Yes, innovate - I wonder what P will come up with next. He is the one who has been taking the field to the next level. I have high hopes.
Anxiety said: Ace said: Nowhere near what they were in the pre-MP3 days. The NIN and Radiohead deals were clever marketing ploys (get a shitload of free advertising and score cool-points with your fans at the same time), but these sorts of things will have less impact as time marches on. Record retail (and, eventually, DVD sales/rentals) will die, and all of this stuff will move digitally. I'm sure - like everything else digital - there's a way around it, but hasn't Amazon's Unbox program made it fairly difficult to share that content? you're right, but in the here and now, it seems to be doing exactly what it's meant to do. if this method stagnates, then it's going to be a joke as time marches on. i think we're at a place where the distribution of music has to evolve and people have to innovate, or else there will be a fair amount of extinction on the horizon. and i think people in the music biz are well aware of that. | |
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Totally agree about the quality thing. I think talent is much less of a prerequisite for making it these days. Contacts and physical appearance seem to have taken over. Moonbeam said: KatSkrizzle said: The quality of music element...I'd have to agree to disagree. I think today's Hip Hop is an ignorant mess, but I also feel like it is the classic older to younger crowd of trends as well. You and I may think its not quality, but perhaps kids are into bullshit. I know my older peers thought my music was mindless bullshit as a teen...so you never know. Little Brother got signed to a deal strictly from online exposure. They signed to Atlantic for their second album from the noise and publicity of the first album, and Atlantic fucked them. But....Little Brother had NO ONE fighting for them in the board rooms of Atlantic, so I would blame some of that on their sloppy team and lack of persons on the team to fight for them. Atlantic also released their album the same time Lil Kim's came out and she was about to do time. Little Brother's people should have been up there fighting. Instead their manager was hanging out with them on tour (DUMB ASS). I digress. Yes, record labels don't take risks anymore. They are in the age of superstars. But I feel the reason for that is that they have lost SO MUCH $$$ from sleeping at the wheel. Record labels merge because they are not making dollars because of the loss of record sales. They STILL rely on record sales. I know there has been crap music in every decade, but it seemed like there used to be a lot of good stuff that would get mainstream exposure too. I can't tell you the last time I enjoyed at least 20% of what was on the charts. I am by no means a barometer of good taste, but I just find that music has become increasingly processed and is being released by artists with less and less personality and less of a focus on the musical craft itself. I'm 28, but I feel about 58 when I turn on MTV or am forced to listen to the radio. | |
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This tangible/non-tangible media thing got me thinking... I wonder if some time in the future music could be distributed via other, non-traditional platforms by being embedded in our personal belongings and everyday life objects, like clothes for example. We already have the musical birthday card that starts playing music when it's opened, and I bought once a 'sound pillow' as a gift for a friend. The possibilities are endless, and it would really merge the digital formats with our real-world everyday life. It would make music ubiquitous, and it would satisfy both the new trends and demands for digital formats and those who like to have something tangible in their hands. Am I fantasizing? Or do you think that at least my grandkids may see this?... Anxiety said: Moonbeam said: I'd like to think that there will always be a market for physical releases, whether they be vinyl, CD, or whatever new format that could come along. For me, MP3's are cold and sterile. Having a tangible product that I can hold, having liner notes to read, tearing open the wrapping, and imbibing the "new CD" scent is all part of the experience. It gives me a sense of ownership, which may be silly, but I value it very much. It seems that there are lots of people around here who feel the same way, and I hope there are enough of us to justify the production of physical music products.
i definitely think there's going to be a strong collector's market at the very least. i think it's going to take at least a generation or two before the overwhelming majority of people consider "the norm" to be non-tangible media. | |
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Anxiety said: i'm trying to remember the last physical SINGLE, cd or vinyl or otherwise, that i purchased.
 It is not known why FuNkeNsteiN capitalizes his name as he does, though some speculate sunlight deficiency caused by the most pimpified white guy afro in Nordic history.
- Lammastide | |
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