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Would Free Music Sell Cars?
rhfrommn writes "An opinion piece on news.com says the old method of selling music CDs is doomed and suggests the best new method is to give away the content. No more 'piracy' or 'rights management' to worry about! The author discusses ad based models, giving music away as a promotion (buy a car, get 1000 hours of music free type stuff) and other methods. All based on cheap hardware like MP3 players as the new medium to replace CD."
Buy 1000 hours of music, get a free car!
:-)
I'm sure more people would fall for that
Daniel
Carpe Diem
I'm sure I'm missing something, but why do artists need labels any more?
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
Unless and until you become a monopoly, you can give away whatever you damn well like.
First go read about the Sherman Anti-Trust act, and then familiarize yourself with the concept of a "loss-leader".
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
I know your post is meant as humor, but it reminded me of something I was thinking about on the way into work this morning.
I was listening to the radio and there was a song I liked - don't know the name, don't know by who. There was no DJ break at the time, and by the time there would be one, I would no longer be in the car
Now *THAT* would be something that I would like
When I hear a song
That way, music would become an impulse buy. Same way they leave the candy bars next to the cash register at the supermarket.
See/Hear it
oh yeah. that would be the way.
It was Mc DLT and someone from Salem, Virginia won the contest when they pulled the winning record from a trash bin, IIRC.
I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
Besides the nice packaging, universal portability, and feeling of having a tangible product, there's the all-important issue of sound quality. I'm sorry, but 192kbps MP3s are just unacceptable if you really want to appreciate Dark Side of the Moon. There's also something about the cohesiveness of an entire album as opposed to individual songs. Again, Pink Floyd is the most obvious example, but you can find many "concept albums" by many artists that have to be listened to in full, in order to fully appreciate the music.
LOAD "SIG",8,1
> I was listening to the radio and there was a song I liked - don't know the name, don't know by who. There was no DJ break at the time, and by the time there would be one, I would no longer be in the car
What I usually do then is memorize a line or two and google for it next time I'm online.
God bless lyrics pages.
if the answer isn't violence, neither is your silence / freedom of expression doesn't make it alright
Sorry, the coal-stealing analogy is a little off.
In my opinion, being a recording artist is going to be closer to being a visual artist. There are tons of similarities - you usually have a single talented 'artist' that creates for the joy of creating, and little if any support structure to get the 'art' out there. Most people have very selective tastes in what they like, and collect a little bit to decorate their life with.
Fine artists have a hell of a time supporting themselves making gallery art, and they typically have to get a 'commercial' style job to pay the bills - graphic design, web design or equivalent. I see this happening with recording artists soon too - the bottom is dropping out, and recording artists will have a very difficult time supporting themselves, and will have to find other means to pay the bills (tunes for commercials maybe - I hear Moby sold every track on his last album to corporations before it went gold), and make their own music on their own time.
In the future you'll have very few Picassos and Monets, and very few rock stars. The content these people create will be viewable (listenable) for free, and you'll have to find other means to pay the bills.
D
Sad, pathetic, losers unite - www.zerosexlife.com
Ok, people. The guy gave the example of buy a car, get free music. Come up with your own example of what product you might buy that getting some free music along with it might motivate you to buy (And no, saying a CD is not a viable answer) - for example, what if one company started giving away free music with their MP3 player to make it more attractive than an iPod? Someone like a Big 3 automanufacturer could certainly negotiate a deal with the content companies that would allow you to pick your own music. That would probably be valuable marketing data for both the car manufacturer and the record company. (The car manufacturer would have an inside track on what music to use to advertise which cars to specific demographics, for example.)
/.ers are a creative bunch - what other business models could we propose that would keep the media companies from trying to pass new laws that limit piracy, keep artists alive and fed, and allow us to use entertainment data in the ways that we want?
The point is to come up with a vaild scenario where entertainment companies continue to make money, artists continue to be compensated for making art, and people get to use it whatever way they want.
Taken to its logical conclusion, the current model (as the RIAA sees it) is that record company supports artist, record company distributes music, one person buys CD, rips it and sends it to everyone on the web so no one else has to buy the CD. That's a financially unviable proposition for both the record company AND the artist. While this is not reality, this is the way the RIAA sees it, and, importantly, this is the way they are convincing your government to see it - which is why we get things like the DMCA. (On a side note, how many of those of you who say, "Music should be free!" ever send money to the artist to make up for the fact that they didn't get _anything_ for making the track that you downloaded? Artists may get screwed by the content companies, but at least they get something.)
The important aspect of the article is that in the coal scenario, the coal providers were subject to theft, so they came up with a way to sell in bulk to someone who provided the associated service to consumers. They changed their business model. So,
What if, for example, a building had a central entertainment server that stored music and video, which would be accessible from an entertainment station in your apartment? Rather than pay-per-view, the data was just there for you to use as part of your monthly rent. Watch movies or listen to music all day - download it to your MP3 player to take with you, whatever. It's included just like your utils.
Or, if you're not a heavy entertainment consumer, perhaps some buildings might treat entertainment data more like telephone service, rather than heat. You get charged on a per-use basis.
Some buildings might go one way, some might go another way, or those might just be alternatives that you could select.
In both of those scenarios, the building could track data for ASCAP so that artists were appropriately compensated. Artists might even try negotiating with certain buildings/realty companies directly. Larger buildings might be able to provide anonymous demographic data back to the media companies which would enable the media companies to track what is popular - you might even get a discount off your rent if you agreed to that.
There are probably lots of reasons why what I'm suggesting won't work. It may even be a bad idea. But, don't just be critics - if you don't like my idea, tell me why you don't like it or you think it won't work and come up with your own.
John
"The plural of anecdote is not data."
I think that insurance/finance companies will bundle cars with their services. Basically like a lease, the insurance company dolls out the car to you and you pay them a monthly fee with covers the insurance for the vehicle.
The companies would buy at large fleet discounts and offer safer vehicles.
Potentially they could use their lobby to get government to give them insentive credits on using certain better energy resources/methods that are currently stalled.
Oh yeah and they could offer free music too.
members are seeing something, your seeing an ad
Almost understandable, considering that Honda does make F1 cars. However, the real question is why? The amount of money you're going to need to put into that civic to make it run well (more than just engine and exhaust mods, but also suspension, tires, brakes) could be put toward a better car instead. I can understand modifying a Civic for the race track (not drag strip, FWD drag racing seems silly), but I would still have to question it. If your goal is to have a cheap way to start racing, there are better alternatives. For instance, the SCCA spec Miata class is relatively cheap to get into (a couple thousand for a starting car, and maybe another grand or two in modifications, and then you just need to budget for tires and fluids) and is amazingly competitive. On the other hand, if you have a loyalty to Honda then go for it.
If it's a "bling" thing, I think it's a little silly. Really, why does a FWD car need an F1-style spoiler? Adding an "aggressive" body kit is just adding extra weight for your few horses to haul around, and the 5" fart-can exhausts sound like crap and don't do a thing for power (riiiight, you got 30hp from that tip, I'm sure ...). And that's not saying anything about adding the really outrageous stereo systems and A/V systems (do you really need a playstation in the center console to distract the driver?).
It seems like everybody missed the point here.
The giveaway does not even have to be 1000 actual MP3 files. Just 1000 download slots from mp3.com or whatever. Some suitable website where all the artists upload their music.
And it doesn't have to be 1000 either, you could get 5 slots with you Happy Meal, 100 with a plane ticket. That wau you get the music you want for free, and it adds value to the item being promoted, like any other giveaway - it doesn't HAVE to be a car.
When this happens all the music is competely commoditized and all that is really being traded around are download slots. And hey, maybe you use 4 slots to download the audio uncompressed, then, if you care about sound quality, you get it.
Think about it, it's like Frequent Flyer Miles, you get 'em for signing up for a credit card, when you fly, when you buy a car, when you win a contest, or when you use you coupon card the the supermarket, or whatever.
If you get 1000 slots with your car, over the next few years, whenever you hear a song you like, you download it until they are used up. Then you can either buy more, or get them free somehow. If there are this many "free" download slots floating around the incentive to copy from a friend is diminished, since you probably have a few hundred slots laying around, so why not use them ? you know that the money goes to the artist.