"Music will become regarded as a throwaway item"

[MikeH]

One thing that might start happening soon is that people can start cutting out the middle man and selling their music direct to fans, for much less money. If an average act is making about £1 per album through a record company they may find that selling an entire album online for download for £2 or so makes it a price that people are willing to pay, just cut out the middle man and the budgets can be so much lower without massive marketing overheads.

I think it's actually worse with film than it is with music. A very small number of people with a small budget can make great music in their homes, but with TV and movies the required budgets are much higher, and these days people are just as happy to steal films as they are to steal music. DVD sales are already a massive source of revenue for film companies. On the other hand, we might get a much higher number of lower budget movies, which might actually increase the quality.

It's a very exciting time for music I think.... certainly talking to the guy from my bro's (small indy) record company there are some very interesting challenges. Major labels are apparently starting to ask for points in gig revenue when they sign bands because they are so worried about music sales.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Originally posted by Cort Haus


I'm not demanding instant success for anyone. Many musicians are prepared to gave some hard years, and most will need to subsidise their music with their jobs.

This is not a thread demanding that anyone who picks up a musical instrument gets immediately given a huge living by the world - as perhaps some people may have interpreted it, like Sirotnikov - it's simply saying that musicians are as entitled to get paid for their recorded music as any anyone else is entitled to get paid for their work which someone uses.

and if you are any good you will be making a good living as most of the artists who are not " mainstream"£ that is spice girls picked by simon & co...

true musicians who make it now, would have made it even easier if they were not competing with "stars" subsidized by that music industry oligopoly...

and how is a decent musician going to get his pay - how much money will the top earners make....

for the top almost nothing will change, they will just need to be a bit less extravagants when creating that Wembley stage (cost cutting there )

for everyone else that will mean more touring, more selling of various merchandize and what is wrong with making money like that???

The only ones who will be hurt by freeing the market will be the "made up" stars who are creations by the industry, but even they will continue to exist, it is only that the "no RIAA backup" musicians will have much easier time to compete with their business funded rivals... and of course the ultimate loser is the industry which has become obsolete in its current form, but is fighting to the end to justify its unncessary existance.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Originally posted by MikeH
One thing that might start happening soon is that people can start cutting out the middle man and selling their music direct to fans, for much less money. If an average act is making about £1 per album through a record company they may find that selling an entire album online for download for £2 or so makes it a price that people are willing to pay, just cut out the middle man and the budgets can be so much lower without massive marketing overheads.

I think it's actually worse with film than it is with music. A very small number of people with a small budget can make great music in their homes, but with TV and movies the required budgets are much higher, and these days people are just as happy to steal films as they are to steal music. DVD sales are already a massive source of revenue for film companies. On the other hand, we might get a much higher number of lower budget movies, which might actually increase the quality.

It's a very exciting time for music I think.... certainly talking to the guy from my bro's (small indy) record company there are some very interesting challenges. Major labels are apparently starting to ask for points in gig revenue when they sign bands because they are so worried about music sales.

and who was fighting AGAINST VHS and DVD when it first came out as a threat to their cinema complexes?

The industry.

So what will happen now? Absolutely nothing Spideman V
will still rake in over a billion USD in the boxoffice, and if the industry cannot live of that, than it better cut the costs down a bit

The only ones who have a legitimate gripe with the current state of affairs are software programmers, but even they can make it without the "law" support - look at STEAM, it is a totally viable business model, if there was no haggling in the law offices, Valve would just make more business faster for those who think they can charge as much as they want and still sell their stuff - who loses, again the "industry middleman". Overhead goes out, and that is all.

The only part that I would want to stay to be an actually punishable offence if you use it unlicenced/unpaid, is when someone uses software/digital product to make money himself (so in a business). But I think 99% of people do not want to skip on the (in that case trivial) cost of owning the product from which they make a living.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by OneFootInTheGrave
and if you are any good you will be making a good living as most of the artists who are not " mainstream"£ that is spice girls picked by simon & co...

As I keep saying, and as has been discussed at great length above, being good is not enough to be successful.

for everyone else that will mean more touring, more selling of various merchandize and what is wrong with making money like that???

There is plenty wrong with it. As I have said before, touring means goodbye to any home or family life. A certain amount of this is to be expected, but to do it all the time sucks. Demanding that musicians live their lives on the road and away from their loved ones as t-shirt salesmen just to allow selfish consumers to get something for nothing is grotesque, in my opinion.

If I like an album, I am happy to pay for it, as the joy it gives me is good value for money, and the creators are entitled to be paid for their labour and sacrifice. Demanding stuff for free, insisting that the producer goes and makes a living from other sources is just plain wrong, whatever wriggling justifications are cooked up.

[Shrapnel12]

How'd we go from "The customer is always right" to "You'll pay my overinflated prices and like it!"

[Wezil]

The customer isn't always right.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Shrapnel12
How'd we go from "The customer is always right" to "You'll pay my overinflated prices and like it!"

Total. Bullcrap.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Originally posted by Cort Haus


As I keep saying, and as has been discussed at great length above, being good is not enough to be successful.



There is plenty wrong with it. As I have said before, touring means goodbye to any home or family life. A certain amount of this is to be expected, but to do it all the time sucks. Demanding that musicians live their lives on the road and away from their loved ones as t-shirt salesmen just to allow selfish consumers to get something for nothing is grotesque, in my opinion.

If I like an album, I am happy to pay for it, as the joy it gives me is good value for money, and the creators are entitled to be paid for their labour and sacrifice. Demanding stuff for free, insisting that the producer goes and makes a living from other sources is just plain wrong, whatever wriggling justifications are cooked up.

being a sailor means being 6 months away from home, being a journalist means going here there and everywhere and being at home a little, being a middle level manager in international corporation means travelling 1/2 week every week... being a miner requires spending most of your life in a hole etc etc

if you don't like it don't do it.

If you are special, than you will do 5 concerts a year and make a million on that and one advert appereance... if you are average, well than be happy to play some festivals now and again and enjoy your work...

nothing wrong with that.

What is wrong is that in this particular situation you want the people first to listen to your work, than love it, and in the end you want to jail them if they have other means of listening to you "other than approved by you - the producer" well the reality is that there is nothing inherent in this type of work that guarantees such kind of ownership (other than corporate lobbying induced ... and flawed... laws)...

Musicians can still make money, and the best will still make tens of millions, it will only be different. What you want is a protectionist world, well I as a consumer say - let the market work, and you might be suprised it might work in your favour - if you are good enough off course.

Btw I am getting that £40 radiohead box - so what if I can get just the musc for free, I want the box as well

In other word you/RIAA/artists need to get out of the "box" and once you accept the change which will reverse the oligopoly created during "forced distribution" times, you will be better off for it.

[Arrian]

I really don't understand this. What it really seems to come down to, from my point of view, is that a bunch of people have become accustomed, thanks to the internet, to getting songs for free, and now think that this is the "right" way for things to work.

-Arrian

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Arrian
I really don't understand this. What it really seems to come down to, from my point of view, is that a bunch of people have become accustomed, thanks to the internet, to getting songs for free, and now think that this is the "right" way for things to work.

Actually, you understand it perfectly.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

well if you think that protectionism is the way forward and that you have the right to prevent people from sharing stuff you made (but it at close to 0 cost to them to reproduce and they purchased it) good for you...

I obviously do not share that view, and just discuss the effect of accepting the market realities on the industries/affected people of the change in the market conditions.

edit: to add so in this particular case if Cort instead of wishing that the old ways are still here, goes out, does a gig, shares his website/torrent link with his music where it is free for people to download.

if his music is good, he will greatly increase his chances to have people start to listen to it, and if the music is great - it's history, he WILL make millions, not via cd sales, but other means.

But of course as is anyone was making millions during the cd/vnyl era. Of course not, but at the time sleeping with producers could have a great impact on your marketability, with this system pure music does the job. The amount of $$$ spend on music/art related items will still be in billions but just differently (more fairly, as the market is always more efficient than some oligopoly lead by man in suits) distributed.

[Aeson]

Being entertained is not a right.

You can say that the good content will be compensated for in other ways. But what you mean is that you want to get something for nothing.

The end result of this line of thought is that we get sensationalistic crap. Anyone who produces anything of value that isn't lowest common denominator is stomped out of the market. You get huge disparities in compensation that are more tied to marketing than content. The content suffers, the consumer gets crap, but it's crap you can take at will. Gee, thanks.

Got Britney?

[Arrian]

Practically there doesn't seem to be a good way of preventing it. But yet I think the musicians have a right to get paid for their work.

They may indeed be pissing against the wind. I'm just saying I think the wind is wrong.

-Arrian

[Arrian]

You can say that the good content will be compensated for in other ways. But what you mean is that you want to get something for nothing.

The end result of this line of thought is that we get sensationalistic crap. Anyone who produces anything of value that isn't lowest common denominator is stomped out of the market.

Exactly what I was thinking

You do this often (say what I was thinking, better).

-Arrian

[Kuciwalker]

well if you think that protectionism is the way forward

Check the definition of protectionism, dude. It has nothing to do with copyright...