what is Prince suppose tpo be doing again btw..seems to me he playing the game well

Oh yes please, another topic about sales, I was worried I didn't see a new one in an hour...

Marco81 said:

Oh yes please, another topic about sales, I was worried I didn't see a new one in an hour...

not about sales at all...its about the current environment.

Both artist mentioned above have been mentioned in numerous posts of artist Prince should mold his business model after.. Doesn't seem that their way is any more lucrative then his way.. His publishing arm is doing their thing with NFL Football, Good Wife, and Scandal...

[Edited 1/5/15 9:12am]

Madonna is damn near a billionaire.I think she must be doing something right

SoulAlive sa

Madonna is damn near a billionaire.I think she must be doing something right

oh for fucks sake..we talking current model of the business..not what thy are worth!~ Prince not bad off in wealth dept either

[Edited 1/5/15 11:05am]

SoulAlive said:

Madonna is damn near a billionaire.I think she must be doing something right

And everyone knows the song Happy, but barely anyone has heard any stuff from prince's two new albums. Guess Pharrell must be doing something right.

ludwig said:

SoulAlive said:

Madonna is damn near a billionaire.I think she must be doing something right

And everyone knows the song Happy, but barely anyone has heard any stuff from prince's two new albums. Guess Pharrell must be doing something right.

point was from a rev standpoint, pandora only paid out 2700 for 47 million plays

http://www.businessinsider.com/pharrell-made-only-2700-in-songwriter-royalties-from-43-million-plays-of-happy-on-pandora-2014-12

[Edited 1/5/15 11:32am]

lwr001 said:

ludwig said:

And everyone knows the song Happy, but barely anyone has heard any stuff from prince's two new albums. Guess Pharrell must be doing something right.

point was from a rev standpoint, pandora only paid out 2700 for 47 million plays

http://www.businessinsider.com/pharrell-made-only-2700-in-songwriter-royalties-from-43-million-plays-of-happy-on-pandora-2014-12

[Edited 1/5/15 11:32am]

Ultimately if Pharrell feels that he's not earning enough from Pandora he can pull his songs just as Swift did.

This situation isn't far removed from what Prince was moaning about in the 90. Pharrell signed up to let them stream his music, I find it unlikely he didn't know in advance how much he would earn from it. They sent him a cheque which he's looked at and decided he wanted more money. He hasn't removed his music from there yet (AFAIK) he just wants to sue. Ridiculous. Even more rediculous is that he's trying to sue the retailers rather than whoever gave him the advice to sign up in the first place.

As for Madonna I saw her with her tits out in the tabloids recently, so I'm guessing her new album must be out? She has a huge fanbase who are very loyal. I can't ever imagine her album sales dying off. Whatever she puts out will be a million seller easily. I'm not sure she's spoken on music streaming. I doubt she cares. Her fame has always been more important than her music.

Noodled24 said:

lwr001 said:

point was from a rev standpoint, pandora only paid out 2700 for 47 million plays

http://www.businessinsider.com/pharrell-made-only-2700-in-songwriter-royalties-from-43-million-plays-of-happy-on-pandora-2014-12

[Edited 1/5/15 11:32am]

Ultimately if Pharrell feels that he's not earning enough from Pandora he can pull his songs just as Swift did.

This situation isn't far removed from what Prince was moaning about in the 90. Pharrell signed up to let them stream his music, I find it unlikely he didn't know in advance how much he would earn from it. They sent him a cheque which he's looked at and decided he wanted more money. He hasn't removed his music from there yet (AFAIK) he just wants to sue. Ridiculous. Even more rediculous is that he's trying to sue the retailers rather than whoever gave him the advice to sign up in the first place.

As for Madonna I saw her with her tits out in the tabloids recently, so I'm guessing her new album must be out? She has a huge fanbase who are very loyal. I can't ever imagine her album sales dying off. Whatever she puts out will be a million seller easily. I'm not sure she's spoken on music streaming. I doubt she cares. Her fame has always been more important than her music.

Irving Azoff , musioc manager and former label head (Giant Records) is supposedly threatening to sue youtube for 1bn dollars...whats your take?

http://jewishbusinessnews.com/2014/11/21/irving-azoff-threatens-to-sue-youtube-over-song-copyrights/

Pharell's song was used in "Despicable Me 2" so he was already compensated, on top of it being used in commercials and any cover versions.

I think people are just done with Madonna, 30 years is a phenomenal run for any artist in pop. She should be more of a mentor though, direct music videos, write with other artists and not need to be the center of attention. The hardcore fanbase will always be there but this is where she should be negotiating with the Vegas hotels and do a residency. The touring overhead for her shows has to be insane.

I think Azoff and Iovine are trying to push for major label subscriptions, stick with Amazon & iTunes, maybe not sever ties but Spotify's going to have to charge for subscriptions so artists are being compensated for their songs at a higher rate. Sean Parker (the guy Justin Timberlake played in The Social Network) has his hands in Spotify and Facebook.

It would be nice if people would stop confusiong songwriter royalties with performance royalties. Pharrell made a heck of a lot more than $2700 from streaming his performance of Happy. Orders of magnitude difference.

[Edited 1/5/15 13:07pm]

Can't say I've read into it very much. Youtube struck deals with most if not all of the record labels with regard to their music being on Youtube. Also Youtube is owned by Google which has it's own mp3 retail and streaming business. I would expect Google have got their shit locked down as far as music rights go.

"Pharrell only got paid £2,700 from Pandora for Happy" is an attention grabbing headline. When you think about it in terms of a dollar a song it would make anyone think something is wrong.

But what if all 48 million streams came from one person? (That's obviously not the case). The point i'm making is that a "1 stream" doesn't equate "1 sale". If I buy the song on iTunes I pay £1 and I can listen to the song 48 million times if I want live that long. Pharrell gets a share of that £1. So you really can't assume that Pharell is $48 million dollars out of pocket. Which seems to be whats being suggested.

Also worth noting is that Pandora is a new revinue stream for Pharell, Radio stations are also still paying him, as is MTV, as is iTunes and Google Play. Pandora is on top of all that other money. So the headline is really "Pharrell not happy with extra $2,700 for "Happy" he wants a Billion".

here is an example of pandora payments for a 1.15 million play song. The songwriters slice keeps being portrayed as the full payment.

Strange. If these had been Prince's numbers the org would be full of people saying his career is over. You know that's true. But as this is not Prince people are saying the numbers are pretty good and Madonna and Pharrell are doing fine.

The only promo Madonna has done for her released-because-they-leaked batch of songs is whining on social media about "artistic rape" - she's luck she sold 36 copies never mind 36k.

NouveauDance said:

she's luck she sold 36 copies never mind 36k.

If only she took music theory, she'd be back on top.

Madonna low sales are a mixture of a couple of things IMO,

1 - Her older more loyal fans probably wont be feeling the route she has taken in recent years its more EDM sounding for the younger generation.

2 - The younger generation she seems to be trying to apeal to are not interested in a middle aged woman who's flashing her horrible hot dog nipples, trying to cling on to the charts by making music that is aimed their Market.

ludwig said:

SoulAlive said:

Madonna is damn near a billionaire.I think she must be doing something right

And everyone knows the song Happy, but barely anyone has heard any stuff from prince's two new albums. Guess Pharrell must be doing something right.

Never heard this song called Happy... Lucky Me!!

[Edited 1/7/15 4:38am]

djThunderfunk said:

ludwig said:

And everyone knows the song Happy, but barely anyone has heard any stuff from prince's two new albums. Guess Pharrell must be doing something right.

Never heard this song called Happy... Lucky Me!!

[Edited 1/7/15 4:38am]

It's my 3 year old son's favourite song. Says all you need to know

fnksoul said:

Madonna low sales are a mixture of a couple of things IMO,

1 - Her older more loyal fans probably wont be feeling the route she has taken in recent years its more EDM sounding for the younger generation.

2 - The younger generation she seems to be trying to apeal to are not interested in a middle aged woman who's flashing her horrible hot dog nipples, trying to cling on to the charts by making music that is aimed their Market.

I.... CAN'T..... BREATHE!!!

i think the most important factor is that the internet, complete with thievery in the form of bootlegging and leaks, really has turned into an artist's nightmare, it's even happening in the publishing industry; self-publishing indie writers are being sold out by amazon/kindle, their product sold in bulk, with amazon dictating prices for their work which is dropping dropping dropping. said self-published works are showing up overseas, for free download as well.

We need to rethink the whole business model for music, movies, series, books and comics.

There are more professional, semi-professional and aspiring artists in every discipline than ever before.

More ways for them to reach their audience but a jungle of data for said audience to choose from.

Free illegal downloads and streaming are killing sales and that ain't about to change anytime soon.

Global licence is a key that can't be ignored much longer IMHO.

For huge artists and companies self-produced "all you can eat" services such as Marvel's digital offer may be a way to generate profit from their past catalogues.

Small artists will continue starving but it's not like they weren't starving before anyway, so I don't think they're so affected, at least they can find a limited audience for what they do, which was more difficult before. We may end-up -at least in the music industry- with less artists making millions and more artists making a little more money than before (that wouldn't be so bad), or with no one making decent money anymore, IDK.

Funny thing is 3D printers and nanomechanics are soon going to expand those problems over much of the industrial world save food and beverages. In a few decades if not a few years you'll be able to build anything from a spoon to a complex device such as a smartphone with your own 3D printer given that you have a design and basic materials. Designs will be shared illegally online the minute they're bought by the first few customers so they won't be so profitable either.

And robots will put millions of people on an unemployemed market that'll be more and more competitive.

I have no idea where this is going, no one does, but humanity will adapt one way or another.

TheEnglishGent said:

djThunderfunk said:

Never heard this song called Happy... Lucky Me!!

[Edited 1/7/15 4:38am]

It's my 3 year old son's favourite song. Says all you need to know

Isn't that the target audience that prince tried to reach with his new Welton-produced garbage music?

reached out to Madonna during his "slave" years. She ignored him. Now owns his own masters and publishing company. KARMA!!!

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

reached out to Madonna during his "slave" years. She ignored him. Now owns his own masters and publishing company. KARMA!!!

She didn't ignore him, she only heard about it three years later. Because instead of calling her, he put a strange message on some dodgy website. Everybody thought he was crazy and now he is alone and friendless.... And Madonna is a million times richer, and is still directing and acting in movies. PSYCHE!

(I have no excuse for all her S&M photos and tit baring.)

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

reached out to Madonna during his "slave" years. She ignored him. Now owns his own masters and publishing company. KARMA!!!

He reached out to her?

You mean that passive-aggressive dream diary thing he posted on one of his failed websites that only about a dozen fans ever read.

Pentacle said:

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

reached out to Madonna during his "slave" years. She ignored him. Now owns his own masters and publishing company. KARMA!!!

She didn't ignore him, she only heard about it three years later. Because instead of calling her, he put a strange message on some dodgy website. Everybody thought he was crazy and now he is alone and friendless.... And Madonna is a million times richer, and is still directing and acting in movies. PSYCHE!

(I have no excuse for all her S&M photos and tit baring.)

But does Madonna own her publishing & masters? Also Madonna sold her soul to get where she's at! She slept her way to the top. has around him who he wants around him.

Pentacle said:

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

reached out to Madonna during his "slave" years. She ignored him. Now owns his own masters and publishing company. KARMA!!!

She didn't ignore him, she only heard about it three years later. Because instead of calling her, he put a strange message on some dodgy website. Everybody thought he was crazy and now he is alone and friendless.... And Madonna is a million times richer, and is still directing and acting in movies. PSYCHE!

(I have no excuse for all her S&M photos and tit baring.)

But does Madonna own her publishing & masters? Also Madonna sold her soul to get where she's at! She slept her way to the top. has around him who he wants around him.