Media Research Exec Says Music Industry Is On Its Last Legs 401
Ponca City, We Love You writes "For years, the major record labels have fought a pitched battle against the MP3 format. Although major labels like EMI and the Universal Music Group have embraced MP3s in recent months, a story from the Mercury News says early returns from those moves indicate they've had little impact on the industry's fortunes — for better or for worse. 'These are ailing businesses on their last legs,' said Eric Garland, chief executive of BigChampagne, a market research company focused on digital media. The question of copy protection on song downloads 'matters a whole lot less to them than it once did.' The industry has a bigger problem. Consumers used to buy CDs for $10 or $15 a pop. Increasingly, they're buying songs at about $1 apiece instead. So, even if transactions continue to increase, the industry is seeing far less money each time consumers buy and it's having a difficult time making up the difference."
death of the industry or of the album? (Score:5, Insightful)
Death of the album (Score:2, Insightful)
Apropos quote in the article (Score:4, Insightful)
To protect your account, please sign in.
Not a member yet? Sign Up. It's Free!
What a clever way to show how propietary content and artificial constraints on access can spell doom! I bet more than half the comments in this thread will be about the idiocy of putting a registration-required article in the summary.
As for the actual topic at hand, if the music industry goes away, who will provide music? Once the vacuum is created, it will be filled by someone else. Music isn't like buggy whips. Maybe it's like bottled water, though. You used to get it in those plastic gallon bottles, but nowadays you mostly get it either from large 5 gallon jugs or 500ml bottles. Content stays the same, packaging and marketing changes.
What's the bottom line? The evolution of the music industry will lead to dumber and more expensive product of something that is essentially free otherwise.
Oh noes! (Score:5, Insightful)
Not dead just BOGOF (Score:3, Insightful)
Chirping away about "Used to be $10 for a CD now its $1 for a track" is just plain silly as saying its the end of the industry. What it means is that the distribution cost has now been practically eliminated so all that is pretty much left for the companies is the profitable bit, remember the creation and shipping of a CD (although cheap) is a business cost.
The industry has big big issues, but that has nothing to do with albums v mixed basket and everything to do with actively preventing people buying music in a mixed basket approach.
Re:death of the industry or of the album? (Score:5, Insightful)
Hitting reality like a brick wall (Score:5, Insightful)
You built a wall around yourself and ignored the real problem. Your own costs are too high, you rely more on the popularity of an artist/band rather than the true talent he/she/they possess, and you chose to ignore new technology in how it could bring you new opportunities. Think fast or die slow.
Re:Death of the album (Score:5, Insightful)
Some albums were a cohesive experience. "The Wall" by Pink Floyd isn't one song and 9 batches of bad rehearsal. Led Zeppelin's albums always fit pretty well together, too. Lots of rock bands did this at one time or another, and the easy listening people nearly always do.
As for the album as just a compilation of unrelated songs, sure, some bands and soloists have always done B-sides. Some of them did good B-sides, though. 5 great songs and 5 or more good songs is, to me, worth $10. One hit and 9 or more songs the proverbial million Shakespearian monkeys could each write and perform individually is definitely not. This is one reason the movie industry hasn't been hit by copyright infringement quite as hard -- it's called production values.
Another reason is that the movie industry has largely moved to market-based pricing instead of setting a minimum any disc should get (hey -- isn't that illegal anyway?). If a movie just came out and it's really hot on the market, it might be $30 on DVD and $45 on Blu-Ray. If it's a B monster flick from the 1960s, there's a good chance it's in the dollar bin. How many albums from the big four record companies are in a dollar bin, or even a $5.00 bin? Lots fewer than deserve that deep of a discount, I'll say.
I woudn't say the industry is in trouble (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:So long Music Industry... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:So long Music Industry... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Bah (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:So long Music Industry... (Score:5, Insightful)
There would be some implosions in the current model that would on the surface appear to negatively impact the artist and consumer. While the artist would spend more promoting on their own, distributing on their own, recording on their own, they would likely be letting go of a static percentage similar or likely less than they do now to industry giants.
The state of DRM would change, as there would be no more litigation funded by record companies (leaving the MPAA to twist in the wind without a partner in crime) and less funding toward P2P obfuscating and software rootkit technologies. The online download would become the primary medium of the industry, and while I agree there is a need for some copy protection, to prevent widespread distribution, without a monolithic industry behind it, less invasive alternatives may finally see the light of day.
Personally, I wouldn't say I've been actively boycotting Big Music, but I guess you could say I have been, subconsciously. I haven't bought a CD in probably 10 years. I do support larger artists through iTunes and Amazon's DRM-free initiative. I also spend WAY more time and money on local/touring artists on a face-to-face level. Local artists, I buy tickets to shows, help promote (street team style), buy merchandise when it moves me, and basically just stay active in the scene, cross genre whenever possible. Touring artists, I will buy a ticket to a show, avoiding Ticketmaster at all costs, buying their CDs and merch in person, where they generally get a larger cut of the sales.
I'm all for the collapse of the industry. It appears to be the only means of innovation, and it will right a lot of wrongs currently out there. Unfortunately, the best way to do this still seems to be choking their sales as much as possible, usually by illegal downloads and bootlegs. I hate to see the artists suffer, but it is definitely causing a positive effect, as more and more artists are breaking away from Big Music to go it alone. Sometimes the best way to change a law is to break it. We shall see.
Let'em Burn (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:So long Music Industry... (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't be so sure. When a band can distribute its albums by posting a zip file on a web site, there's a lot less incentive to turn to labels. The industry exists right now because it exists - not because it's necessary. As people start to see how the economics of giant media labels work against them, the tide can turn.
Entire industries (as we think of them) don't disappear overnight, but they do sometimes disappear, or change into something so different you couldn't really call it the same industry with a straight face. That's where we are. They're a dying breed, whether they know it or not.
The Elephant in the Room (Score:0, Insightful)
No one wants to admit it but filesharing is the primary reason the industry is experiencing declining fortunes. When I say primary I do not mean to ignore other factors contributing to the decline of the industry.
Yes they failed to embrace the technological revolution until too late
Yes they put out a signifigant quantity of inferior product or coddle losers like Britney
Yes they are a fat and bloated bureacratic bunch of bungling psychophants
Yes the ala carte offering on download sites is a factor
But hands down, the sheer amount of lost revenue to illegal downloading and offshore piracy is surely bankrupting the industry as a whole. The Digital revolution made this possible wheras before, analog inferiority and generational audio loss was the major hindrence.
The current generation of "fans" if you can call them that feel a sense of entitlement to download anothers property freely. They reason its just a song so whats the harm and if we multiply that times hundreds of millions of downloaders over the course of their lifetimes and what economic model does this serve?
Ultimately it serves to kill whats good about the music industry as evidenced in its history of discovering, nurturing and supporting/marketing artists worthy of our attention. I am fortunate to have been born in the 60's and to not have been subjected to the drivel that passes for music today. I came of age in the 70's, a decade when the long playing LP was more than just a collection of singles.
The future (if things remain as they are) will be filled with more of the current crop of talentless music pimps and ho's shouting and wriggling with a microphone and rendering lackluster musical pornography and I dont have problem with that as long as there is more to choose from but I predict there wont be and I prefer true pornogrpahy to the lukewarm tittilation that you find in todays music. I say to britney or beyonce etc. go to porn already!
The future for music is a Randian nightmare where creativity goes unrewarded and eventually dies on the vine.
Its happpening now, expect more of the same
Re:The party's over (Score:3, Insightful)
Album Experience (Score:2, Insightful)
I am hoping that the death of the album is a good thing. The last thing we need is another Nickelback album. The death of the current market structure and format can only give the artist more freedom to be creative and that's what I really miss about mainstream music.
Until then, I'll keep looking for those indie bands that get it and keep listening to my King Crimson albums on my headphones.
Music isn't on MTV anymore (Score:2, Insightful)
Here we go again (Score:4, Insightful)
Not all bands write their singles and then pad the rest of the album out, some actually write about 20 songs, select the ones they like the most, and release an album. THEN they choose what songs to release from the album.
It's only the American Idol and other reality show winners that choose the singles prior to releasing the album (most likely because they're covers) and then pad the rest with crap.
I'm sure I'm not the only one who thinks that there are better songs on the album...
Re:Bah (Score:3, Insightful)
$.50 - Label
$.20 - Apple
$.30 - Artist
less
less
less
less
which should be
Re:Oh noes! (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm sure they're sitting in board rooms right now, wondering if they can get away with pricing the one hit at $12, and the remaining tracks at $0.99 each...
Re:Recruit Better Talent (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Recruit Better Talent (Score:4, Insightful)
I guess they'll have to tour.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:So long Music Industry... (Score:3, Insightful)
I hate the record industry with a passion, but even I have to admit that if they go tits up, it will affect a huge swath of the entertainment industry. Who's going to sell out stadiums ? Who's going to book festivals ? Who's going to front the cash for up-and-comers to pay for studio time ? The RIAA bastards are to musicians what banks are to homeowners. They're both dirty cheating skimming enterprises, but they offer regretfully needed services, all because money is the world's #1 problem.
We techies may well be open to online delivery, but the other 98% of the world is not. That's why Wal-Mart still makes gobs of money and will continue to do so for many years to come. People just aren't psychologically and emotionally ready to grow out of the brick-and-mortar system yet.
Re:So long Music Industry... (Score:4, Insightful)
Whenever people talk about the "collapse" of the record industry, I always want to ask, "Do you honestly think people will stop making music?"
I wouldn't be surprised if things changed, but things are constantly changing. Ultimately though, people won't stop writing music, playing music, or performing music. The tendency of the human race to make music didn't start with the record industry, and in fact didn't start with musicians being able to get rich off of their talent. The fact is, Homo sapiens are a musical species. You'd have a hard time getting us to stop making music if you tried. If all the governments of the world made music illegal, people would still do it.
Re:So long Music Industry... (Score:5, Insightful)
The point I'm driving at is that the high-end studios that attract all the (current) A-list clients also drive the technological innovation for studio equipment. Mics. Mixers. Sound isolation. Software. Media (as in DAT, etc.). While that innovation wouldn't go away, it wouldn't see the same level of development that these studios enable through Creating A Need, and early adoption of new technologies (because they can afford the latest and greatest).
Re:So long Music Industry... (Score:5, Insightful)
Kind of missing the point, no?
Think about a music industry where artists don't need labels to get "beer, coke and groupies." Imagine an industry where new channels make it easier for unknown artists to get noticed. It's hard to get noticed right now because you almost can't do it at all without going through labels. Right now, labels are necessary because the system has been architected such that you can't go it without them. That is what stands to change.
So far as online delivery goes, I think you're flat-out wrong. iTunes accounts for more than 2% of music sales on its own, and in an increasingly "green-friendly" world the concept of digital distribution, which requires no printing presses, no petroleum-based products, etc., is the way forward. That's why I laugh a little every time I think about the BD vs HD-DVD argument. In a few years when DOCSIS 3 is ubiquitous, and fiber is available to many homes, the idea of having to go buy a little round piece of plastic looks increasingly stupid.
Labels = VC for artists (Score:5, Insightful)
Small start-ups can self fund, but the largest companies continue to have significant VC backing because it takes a lot of resources to make products and grow. Companies sign with VCs because they want that upfront investment. Unsigned artists can promote/distribute, but the biggest artists continue to have major label backing. Most serious artists continue to want label deals because they want the upfront payment and marketing/distribution muscle that allows them to focus on their artistry and not how they're going to feed themselves tomorrow. As proof, notice that even the big YouTube/MySpace artists are signing label deals.
So what's changing is that the labels will have to provide more services for artists and get things other than CD sales in return. But the need for "venture capital for artists" isn't going anywhere, so long as there are people who want to make music for a living.
Re:So long Music Industry... (Score:5, Insightful)
Right... because iPod and iTunes sales are only to techies. While I agree that not everybody is ready to give up on CDs, iTunes and P2P have made significant inroads into the way that people get their music. Downloading music is definitely not just for techies.
Re:So long Music Industry... (Score:3, Insightful)
The reality seems to be that new media will replace old formats if you consider it in just such a manner - Formats change, content doesn't. Paper replaced papyrus, telephone replaced telegraphs (I know, I know, not really the same, but still
We're at the point where one doesn't need to know how to "rip" a CD in order to get the songs in a more useful format. One can simply download a digital version of the song (set asside DRM considerations.)
The music industry as such will never go away. Why? Because right now, it's just not possible for a band to get a major concert together, get billboards in every city for their new album and get their faces on a happy meal all by itself. So it needs the music industry to do that stuff. In the future, the "music industry" might just morph into a specialized PR industry, where they take the product the artists produces entirely by themselves and then market the heck out of it. No CD sales, no mandatory 10-record deal, etc. Just "You get us the music, we'll get you the ad space."
Re:Recruit Better Talent (Score:3, Insightful)
In the fifties and sixties, it was mostly young people with funny hair playing the music and old crusty businessmen who owned the clubs and record labels. These crusty old men didn't seem to understand the music itself but they could see what "the kids" were buying. Since they weren't in the least hip, it wasn't all that hard to get them to try marketing some slightly avant garde or even outright experimental music. After all, you could luck out and be on the ground floor of the next big thing.
At some point, someone got the big idea "Why don't we get some of these young kids to scout out the talent and pick what to promote. They 'get it' because they have the same hair......" Once that happened, what was currently cool just seemed to last forever because everybody started imitating everyone else. They made sure kids "with the same hair" were in the radio stations, vetting acts for the clubs, and deciding who would get signed. Once this process was complete, there was less room to try new things. You had to sound like whoever was currently "big".
Fast forward a few years and this process of fed-back self-imitation was made even worse with payola to the radio stations. Once upon a time, local radio stations would throw some local guys or just some funky record from these new guys in L.A. on the turntable to see if people liked it. Not now. The music industry fell into the same trap the movie industry fell into: They'll only market what "know" will sell. The only things that they "know" will sell is what has been sold already. Everything just collapses into tapioca with no room for innovation whatsover. Even those occasional new tunes you hear don't stand out in any way.
The Internet self-distributing independents have really been taking off lately because that is where there is still room to try something different. It isn't always wonderful but at least the bits that are good aren't strangled in the crib by some studio marketing flack.
Re:death of the industry or of the album? (Score:3, Insightful)
I like some albums too, but some good songs only exist in isolation. Stuffing them onto an album full of filler doesn't make the album worth listening to but rejecting the song because of the album is just silly.
Anything more than that, and I skip the album.
Which makes sense from an economic perspective, but raises two questions:
1) You are missing out on a lot of decent songs, just because they were released on poor albums.
2) How do you -know- an album will be good before buying it. Very few albums get full airplay, anywhere. Do you d/l them first? Listen in store? Some albums take time to grow on me; and some of my favorites I didn't care for on the first or second listen. [Really, its a testament to my appreciation for the artist, and/or a particular reviewers opinion that would get me to listen to the album multiple times if the first impression wasn't great.]
One more reason (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Recruit Better Talent (Score:3, Insightful)
iPods have delivered us from the slavery to radio. For a very small price you can listen to what you want, when you want, skip what you want, and all without commercials. Only a fool would continue wasting his time listening to radio.
And you are correct, ClearChannel is absolutely to blame for that. Radio sucks because ClearChannel *is* radio and ClearChannel sucks. Don't buy inferior products; don't listen to radio.
Re:So long Music Industry... (Score:5, Insightful)
I see statements like that all the time, and I just shake my head in disbelief. The reason that comercially-architected pop groups succeed is simple - more people like them and are willing to pay for their music than that of the "truly talented artists". Deal with it.
We see this all the time, in different areas. Windows outsells Mac OS, and both are more widely used than Linux. More people watched "Transformers" than will ever see "No Country for Old Men", regardless of how many film critics rave about it. More people will read Harry Potter books than will read "War and Peace", despite English Lit being a required course in most (U.S.) schools.
You can't force people to like something against their will, and ridiculing their taste will just piss them off.
Re:So long Music Industry... (Score:3, Insightful)
You're all Missing The Point (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:So long Music Industry... (Score:3, Insightful)
Selling songs individually helps a lot but the average Joe will sill just buy the whole fucking album because iTunes will offer a discount on buying it all at once, they don't know any better, and (most importantly) they want to have more then one song to listen to. So just moving over to the pay per song model is not enough to improve music. The average Joe needs a way to buy good music with confidence and with out spending a ton of time and money looking in to new bands. I think that forcing a rating system in to the mix would work. Hence my end suggestion. In retrospect the price does not need to be rating based but a rating system MUST be included somehow so that good music sells better.
Just like iTunes saved the record industry? (Score:2, Insightful)
Retail shops (amazon, hmv etc) are going to take perhaps a 20% cut from the retail price. Then there's the physical cost of shipping, CD duplication and printing... so perhaps there's about $6-7 going back to the record company - that's $6-7 for 10-12 songs.
Or on iTunes - 10-12 songs cost around 10-12 dollars.
Presumably the costs of distribution are quite low on iTunes - after all there is no physical product or shop, and minimal staffing needs.
Which looks 'better' from a record industry point of view?
They're able to sell random old songs, and suffer (I presume) no limitations of keeping physical stock. Customers can pick random tracks and buy them as they see fit - classic long tail stuff. My hunch is that people will buy the same number of tracks (or spend the same amount on music at least) regardless of whether they're going for digital or 'hard copy' stuff... they just get to buy a better range for their money when it's digital.
Re:One more reason (Score:3, Insightful)
At least the Internet music distribution model makes it more likely obscure bits of music will remain in the available catalog... something that's a huge problem in the present paradigm.