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Universal Music To Cut CD Prices
phlack writes "CNN Money has an article about Universal Music Group's plans to slash their CD prices to $12.98 SRP, in an effort to combat piracy and bring consumers back into stores. It makes me hope the other giants will follow suit, and wonder if the music industry is finally listening to some of the consumer's complaints."
How generous. Rather than making 90,000% profit on $0.02 worth of plastic, they're
taking it in the shorts with a measly 65,000% profit.
Give me a break. Like $12.98 is going to make me get excited about driving my car to a Brick and Mortar to purchase $0.02 of plastic. This is like Microsoft's strategy of settling lawsuits by selling software at a discount to schools.
Does it hurt to hear them lying? Was this the only world you had?
CDs in Canada are about the same price but in $CDN ($10-$14CDN for most discs at Futureshop is $7-$10US). A great side-business is buying CDs here and selling them on ebay. It's even better to use the columbiahouse canada discs which end up costing $7CDN ($5US) after all the catches.
Would be an interesting situation where one could get an artist's release from two different labels
None of the major labels' artist contracts would allow this. Most labels either take the copyright on the recording outright as a "work for hire" or (for the most established recording artists) demand an exclusive license for a long term.
Will I retire or break 10K?
We are fighting back. People are boycotting, people are buying used CDs, people are setting up sites like
http://www.downhillbattle.org/
And http://www.boycott-riaa.com/
The fight is just beginning! Its not even close to being over. This should prove that fighting back works more than begging politicians with emails and letters.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
have you considered iTunes?
Unfortunatly the iTunes store is not an option for me as I don't live in the US. I wish it were.
Cheers Koz
They're not really a competitor to a record company, but I think the guy meant that Best Buy is selling music for $12 already and now stores in the mall will have to follow suit since the MSRP is $12.
However, Best Buy does in fact publish music through their 'Redline Entertainment' division. But I doubt that it's any serious competition to a real record company.
Universal, home to Canadian artists Shania Twain, Remy Shand and the Tragically Hip, will institute a $14.98 maximum suggested list price on virtually all of its top line CDs and a $9.99 price tag for developing new artists.
Two things I have heard - you need to have a credit card with a billing address in the US. I could tell my powerbook that I lived in the US (versus Canada, where I really live) and plug in my brother's credit card, and all would be well. But it's a hassle. The second thing - supposedly if you buy in the US and then move to, say, Canada -- your music will stop working if you update your billing address to non-US.
FWIW - I could be wrong; I haven't tested any of this.
PS - iTunes in Canada this fall?
"30sec samples of every track in their catalog"
You'll get a lot of songs with real good openings and after 32-33 secs the songw ill become complete crap.
There's a growing sense that even if The Future comes,
most of us won't be able to afford it.
-- Lemmy
Universal Music cuts CD Prices
What's most interesting here is not the price of CD's, (which at $14.95CAD is about $11 US), but that they plan to offer Canadian downloads in October for 99 cents (Canadian) a song!
It's too early to say whether any of the other labels will participate, and what kind of restrictions are going to be put on the media. Still, it looks like the Canadian industry has taken a much more concilaitory approach to the problem of filesharing, by giving up on the price, and offering additional share of downloaded fees to artists as well - so at least they're trying to adress some of the complaints on this and other forums.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
I'm not shedding any tears for artists. They signed the contracts of their own free will. What Love fails to consider is how often a label advances a band $1 and presses cds for $500K, and doesn't get any of that money back because the band flopped.
She does not fail to consider this at all. The label absolutely gets their money no matter what happens, because the artist is liable for the production costs and must pay it back no matter what. They also cannot declare bankruptcy. So if they end up getting their Mcdonald's wages or any future album sales garnished, taht's all well and good with the label, because they *will* collect.
You also fail to understand that even when bands are wildly successful, they often end up in arrears to the record companies precisely because of the structure of tehse agreements. NO the label takes 0 chance on anyone, period.
Does anyone know what the typical record label contract says about funds mailed to 'the band'. I always thought it was possible that the label might have some rights there, and take a cut... unless you find away of mailing the band without being screened by thier label, which I've never seen a band be like 'mail us at home at 42 sunnydale drive...', it's always 'band', c/o xx record label, ny, ny
...Universal is in talks to be purchased by NBC. NBC would own 80% of the post-merger company, and retain all control rights. Thus Universal is not fiscally responsible for any fallout of this price decrease... Kinda makes you think...
I have little to say to this decision than "too little, to late". I am reminded of the recent lawsuit of Kazaa vs. major record companies (Time-Warner, Virgin Records, etc). of Kazaa vs. major record companies (Time-Warner, Virgin Records, etc), alleging that these record labels conspired to increase the price of CDs. Results: "This settlement will put cash in teh hands of millions of consumers and music CDs in libraries and schools throught the country, and will ensure that the challenged distributor/retailer practices will not resume."
Full results of the article can be found here.
Well finally, lowering prices. That's a relief. But to 12.99? Who are they kidding? They're still hitting profit margins like popcorn at a movie theatre, and CDs are clearly above what any sensible consumer would consider a "fair" price. But they are clearly not lowering prices enough to "bring consumers back into stores."
Instead, they sic the RIAA on everyone, start spitting out scare tactics, threats, seizing bank accounts, etc, then there's the MPAA whining about Warez, then text messeging. Countless US citizens, many whom honestly pay for and purchase music legally and download some music (who clearly pump money into the music/entertainment industry as a whole), are getting tangled up and crippled just so others will be scared to do the same.
And what does it all boil down to?
The music entertainment is simply charging too much for second-rate products/servies (anyone see Gigli recently? I didn't think so). They are doing so because it has historically worked befor p2p alternatives (such as freenet) started showing up. Now, faced with fair prices, they panic and sue by the thousands, which isn't helping them long-term. Millions of people worldwide are getting soured by US entertainment industries, and the entire United States looks like one giant ass as far as other countries may see us (whatever happened to that free country thing we had going a couple hundred years ago?).
The Bottom Line
I absolutely, blatantly refuse to support music/entertainment industries while this chaos is going on. These lawsuits spitting back and forth do not represent the ideals that our country was founded upon. I for one, spit in the music industry. I blatantly refuse to support any industry that practices such childplay.
As for the artists I suppose there's little to do other than say tough beans, cause I'm not paying for any of your crap while it's mixed up with RIAA. Or is there? There are plenty of ways to make lots of money that stray far from CDs in retail stores. Put your mp3s up for free download, the fans will come. New services like iTunes are a great alternative to Records, or even better, record your own!!. I am in full support of music artists, and I always will be, and I will never stop pouring dollars into concerts, special events, etc.
If you are an artist or an end consumer, don't be pushed around by bully tactics. There is still plenty you can do to download your favorite music, support the artists, and still keep the RIAA out of your face. They may look tough now, but don't back down; they're only eating themselves.
Partial Credit: The Engineer's Best friend
"Well, the bridge didn't fall all the way down!"
I might be wrong, but don't the record companies recoup their money spent on the artist before the artist even sees a dime of it? Some times with interest? If that is the case please don't act like the record companies are helping out the artsits. And helping a few of the 'current hot' cliche is only helping those few. Look at all the other artists that aren't getting any promotion.
They say that 8 of 10 artists lose money, 1 breaks even, and 1 makes the money to support the rest. So by that assumption you'd think that at least 2 of 10 (1 of 5) artists get some decent promotion. How many bands/artists are signed by the RIAA? A thousand, maybe just hundreds, I'd think? But it's laughable to think that 1 out of 5 artists gets decent promotion.
Actually, thinking about it, what does one consider promotion? Magazine ads? Posters? Commercials? Signings? That's it, right? Surely they can't legally call payola-ed airtime "promotion", can they? Do they just count up the value of the tickets/swag they give away?
Jeffool.