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2003 CD Sales Officially Down 7.6 Percent
Lust writes "CNN is reporting that global CD sales for 2003 are down 7.6 percent, and points to 'rampant piracy, poor economic conditions and competition from video games and DVDs.' More grist for the RIAA mill on P2P? I just haven't heard anything new I'd like to buy... how about you?" It's also mentioned that "a strong second-half recovery in the United States, Britain and Australia... has raised hopes that the worst is behind the beleaguered industry", although "evidence of a full-fledged recovery is flimsy."
Happy Trails!
Erick
http://www.busyweather.com/
I don't mind pay 15 bucks for a new full feature movie release but I'm not buying another 1 hit wonder that has only one song that I like for something around 18 bucks and listen to it only once.
No there isn't going to be a recovery until their business model is revised.
rampant piracy, poor economic conditions and competition from video games and DVDs.
Hmm.. they seem to have missed "boring bands, unoriginal music and inflated CD prices."
Here's a free tip from me to the music industry lurkers:
Shrink-wrapping dog shit does not create a market for shrink-wrapped dog shit.
Think about that, act on it, then give me 0.5% of the net.
Trolling is a art,
Itunes is selling 2.5 million songs a week. The declining sale of CDs does not necessarily mean the music piracy is going up; it means there are also new means of selling music, digitally, and very legally.
I hate it when declining CD sales is automatically attributed to piracy. The way music is sold is evolving too (and the labels are getting their share don't worry).
It is not enough to have a good mind. The main thing is to use it well. - Rene Descartes (1637)
> More grist for the RIAA mill on P2P
Not really. 7.6% is not that much, considering how many companies have moved to an online sales model. If anything this refutes the RIAA's claim that P2P has any significant effect at all. What kinda depresses me was the point in the article that the reduction of top acts helps to boost sales; that the reduction of variety means more concentrated gains in that particular market, is actually bad for the market in the long run, IMHO.
But what does that actually mean, beyond the fact that 2003 CD sales have fallen by eight percent? Can one reasonably draw any kind of further conclusions, or is everyone just going to jump on this result to further their agendas?
...the Clearchannel effect - the drivel gets all the radio airtime
To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt.
--E.C. Stanton
In a new report issued this week, eight-track and Atari 2600 game sales are down. Industry leaders blame rampant piracy and MAME.
Riiiight. And the introduction of the Compact Disc had absolutely no effect on the sales of cassettes and vinyl. It was clearly completely due to the "file-sharing and CD-burning craze". Uh-huh.
I think this is merely an effect of music going more and more for quick and easy commercial fixes. Even people who listen to dance music used to buy albums, nowadays the quality is just so shite there's no hiding it. Personally, I made quite a few new discoveries last year, but ofcourse I don't pay attention to mainstream music&media, so my total number of purchases should remain about the same.
RIAA will site this as proof that P2P damages record sales. But could it be that most new music SUCKS?
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
In the US, a new CD is now $17.99, sometimes even $18.99 or $21.99. When I was in college 3-4 years ago a new CD was usually $13.99 or $14.99 at my local bookstore. I was at Borders the other day wanting to buy a new album (that I couldn't download!) and was blown away that they wanted $19.99 for ONE CD. Screw that, I'll search harder and find it online somewhere...
When iTunes first came out I thought $9.99 for a CD was silly, but now 50% off is starting to make sense... (Speaking of iTunes this study doesn't seem to take online sales into account...)
NYTimes article TechnologyReview article
I think it's directly related to the fact that music QUALITY went down another 20% or so. Think Janet Jackson's breast will help sales, or will Justin Timberlake's musical talents sway yet another generation of gum snapping teens?
God, 'music' is the suck today! Either that, or I'm just too old.
Hey, you kids and your damn rap music! Shaddup!!
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
- Lame new music
- Increased prices of CDs
I keep waiting for a law firm somewhere to offer "RIAA insurance": pay $5/month and they offer to defend you if you ever get sued by them.
I Am My Own Worst Enemy
It should be interesting to see if the DVD sales rose up. If Ive to choose between a live CD concert and a live DVD concert, I get the DVD. Dont you?
How an industry that makes so much profit can be considered a "beleaguered industry"? I'm sure the gas and cable industries are suffering heavily as well these days, huh?
I haven't killed a man since 1984.
Just not sold by the RIAA.
There are some great artists. I buy their albums whenever they appear in concert, at the concert. Then I know that at least a fraction of the money will actually go to the artist.
For example, check out Vienna Teng. Great music and even better live!
"Trademarks are the heraldry of the new feudalism."
You know, I bet if you did a study looking at the increase of air play of songs compared to the CD sales you would see a decrease.
I for one may like a song at first, but when radio stations are forced to play it over and over (every hour...) I get sick of it. I'm not going to buy that CD anymore - thanks radio...
That would be an interesting study...
My sig left me for a younger user id.
An industry that has started a warpath suing children, the elderly, and many more of its potential customers is suffering from poor sales. Shocking!
"The market alone cannot provide sufficient constraints on corporation's penchant to cause harm." -- Joel Bakan
One almost has to wonder if some brilliant yet lazy executive proposed:
:) )
"Hey.. let's not work too hard this year.. Don't try too hard to find good talent, and don't go crazy promoting what we currently have. Sure we'll all pay in the short term, but we'll get what we want - a report of lost CD sales.. We'll benefit from whatever corrective measures are taken, and then we can sit back and make more in the long run without trying so hard to find quality work, because we'll have more rights on the music and stronger copyright laws."
(Cue the "you give them too much credit" replies.
..Jeff Keegan
seven syllables explain TiVo: kee gan dot org slash ti vo
Speaking of piracy...how long did it take you to plagarise that post?
If you go to the CRIA web page, you'll see that CD sales (and gross revenue, though not revenue from CDs) were up over the same month in the preceding year in both January and February. The CRIA is the Canadian equivalent of the RIAA.
DVD sales are way up in all of the months I looked at. VHS and cassette tape sales are down, which isn't too surprising.
This brings up a good point about what to buy. I've got ~10 free songs coming to me from the Pepsi/iTunes giveaway, and I don't know what to buy with them.
I start looking around for a song I want, and I usually end up buying the entire album instead (latest purchases, Gershwin's Greatest Hits and Buffy: Once More with Feeling). My tastes in music are pretty varied, going from classical to hip-hop, but I'm having a tough time finding music I want to get.
I don't even look at CDs anymore. Too expensive and takes too long to find something you like.
I'm sure every record exec started shaking in their boots with the USA Today article that shows that a lot more youth are turning to their parents CD collection of Queen and ZZ Top. No new sales.
What, me worry?
...bites, from what I've heard. I can count on one hand how many CDs I have that were published this millennium. I'm sure there's lots of good stuff buried out there, but Clear Channel won't let me near them.
Plus, very few people even know how to play a guitar anymore (Joe Bonamassa being a big exception).
I didn't see a "it sucks" cause in the article...
Yeah, I'm geezing, I know....
Amen about there being nothing you want to hear available. I have 40 credits in itunes I need to use before the end of the month, and I haven't found anything good to use it for yet -- FOR FREE.
The other factor bringing down my music purchases, other than higher prices and a lower paycheck, is lack of quality. Most of what I listen too, you would never find in Best Buy or FYE. You're too concerned with "golden money makers" than with providing us with interesting original music. I understand the business principles behind trying to make a profit, but when you minimize your risk, you potentially minimize your return. Think of all the CDs in the past 2 years that you (RIAA) have released? I can't really name any that I've liked the entire CD, except for Coldplay's A Rush of Blood To the Head. One. Oh well, you may learn someday, and someday may be too late.
Amigori
"The quality of life is determined by its activites."--Aristotle
Pepsi gave me a couple of free songs on iTunes and I am hooked. I have spent over $30 in the last month from groups I never even heard of 2 weeks ago. Between iTunes and Rhapsody I have all the music I need. If there is something I want for the car or on my home server, I buy it(a track at a time). Because of this online model I am going to be buying far more music than I ever did(except maybe in my teen years). Frankly, I don't feel encouraged to by any music at the conventional record stores because it is usually noisy and I can't listen to it in my normal frame of mind while working or relaxing. Sure, P2P probably has an impact, but so does online, quality of releases, and most of all price. I agree that the CD business model is broken now that we have other alternatives for entertainment. I think that for most of us, Kazaa, etc. is too much a hassle when we can get the song we want for less than $1.00. I have better things to do with my time than wade through 2-3 songs to find one that was ripped half decently.
I'm a big indie rock fan and I find this site to be a good break down of non-RIAA bands:
RIAA Safe Top 100
RIAA Safe Top 10 Alternative Rock
all based on Amazon Sales
With the increased high prices I have almost completed resorted to buying used. I can usually find great buys at amazon, ebay, or half. I seldom pay more than $5.
There is so much good music from the past that I haven't heard yet, why do I need to pay full price for the new stuff.
When I do buy new I try to do so directly from the artist.
Dear RIAA,
HAHAHA! RIAA, the music industry has changed! Technology has allowed greater sharing and therefore we don't need to go to a brick and mortar store to buy your crap!! Information wants to be free, it's everywhere!!! No laws will stop this!!! YOU are the thieves!
Yours truly,
Slashdot Crowd
Dear Congressman,
Due to recent changes in technology, American businesses are now looking overseas to cheap labor to perform what used to be my job. This is economical for them because of increased ability to communicate cheaply and ubiquitously over the Internet.
THIS HAS TO STOP. You MUST do SOMETHING to protect my job. EVIL corporations are taking advantage of Americans by using new methods and technology to their advantage. This is not fair.
Yours truly,
Slashdot Crowd
If moderation could change anything, it would be illegal.
Uhhh, the economy is still flat!!
But for these morons, they prefer to scapegoat P2P, not their ridiculously expensive pricing, or stagnant artist syndrome. Irregardless of whether P2P existed or not, their model just don't work no more.
I'm making 60% of what I did four years ago, and I still have the same house note - oh wait I re-fied to pay the mortgage...
EITHER WAY I HAVE TO DISCUSS IT WITH MY WIFE WHEN I WANT TO BUY A CD !!
This is one of those common excuses, but I'm genuinely curious:
1) Who are these one hit wonders with only one good song on their CD? Can you cite the one good song on otherwise all-crap CDs?
2) Do you think such CDs are intentionally made with the idea that it's all crap, except for that one song? In other words, does the band, producer, etc, not stand by their work?
Here's what I do: Bitty Browser & Andromeda
Hilary Rosen, head of the Powerful Trade Organization for the $15 billion recording industry, is full of contrasts...*snip*
Fifteen billion?? May I please be next in line to be beleaguered???
Weaselmancer
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
As a person with a high level of interest in the music business, I've noticed (and heard, and read) that the actual number of releases from major labels is fewer than in years past. I don't think that CD's are the only thing being "manufactured" in this case.
Also, does anyone know any statistics for how much indie cd sales are up? Of course not. The guy selling his CD-R out of his car doesn't report to SoundScan. I am almost certain they have to be on the rise.
http://cassettefetish.com
How about a list of every other industry that's down 7.6% or more for 2003? I'm guessing music is far from the only one.
On second thoughts, never mind. The only conclusion the RIAA will reach by seeing such a list is that P2P hurts those industries too! AIEEE!!
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
The rate of sales for music has been increasing considerably faster than the rate of population increase for many years now. It's entirely reasonable that their last sales values exceeded the amount of money that people really felt comfortable spending on music and that, as a country, we've cut back.
One of the things that a lot of people have been incorrectly assuming is that music sales should react proportially to the economy. This theory doesn't hold true because (even at $15/CD), CD's are something that people can afford one or two of in order to nurse themselves through the disappointment of (for instance) not being able to replace their failing appliances, or remodel their kitchen. It's a small enough expense that people use it as "brain candy", or as consolation spending.
The drop in music spending may just be because more of us are back at work now, and don't have as much time to moon over the music that we don't have time to purchase.
P2P trading continues to be a non-issue (and possible a net positive) in the music industrie's income balance, they're just too greedy to realize it.
Wake up - the future is arriving faster than you think.
A look at the Billboard Top 200 is an easy way to figure out, at least on an anecdotal level, that popular music sucks right now. For the most part, it's the same old artists, singing the same old things within their same old already-established genres. It's the same problem with the video game industry that everyone always complains about -- it's a lot easier to go with established acts (or artists or licenses) than to risk capital on something new that has the potential to either suck or be incredible.
This general trend of homogeneity has really been brought to bear over the last decade, from what I can tell. Companies really like sustained sources of revenue...ok, yeah, that's a given and has been since the beginning. Companies need it to survive and to grow. But isn't it good to create some nice challenges so that the companies can grow?
Challenges, like, say, the removal of perpetual copyright? If, for example, Disney couldn't keep making money off of old cartoons, wouldn't they have to seriously start making up some new stories or at least go back to the children's section at public library and read some Brothers Grimm or Hans Christian Anderson?
In the end, it's all about how we the people want corporations to act in the context of our republic (both the United States and in the larger sense of the collective of industrialized nations). Do we want to give them carte blanche to not innovate? Or do we want to help them along by pushing them a little? Folks, from what I can tell, will almost always take the road that's easiest and offers the most return for the least amount of risk or investment. Sometimes you have to guide them down that road, or at least show 'em where it starts.
My 2 cents, anyhow...
I was about to post the EXACT thing you just said. I can't believe anyone is taking this post seriously. If you didn't chuckle at the first part of the post, then at least figure it out when it says " the powerful pirate lobby"
It's a pirate of a post about being pirated. If that ain't funny, I don't know what is!
"Look! There! Evil, pure and simple from the Eighth Dimension!" --Buckaroo Banzai
Eventually, on-line music distribution will increase quality, as artists will focus on making a couple excellent songs instead of many lame ones.
The Raven
Its ironic that the article points out how the total revinue of the industry has dropped 200 million so they ONLY have 32 Billion in sales. It does not make any mention of how much of that was pure profit. This industry is by no means hurting and still brings in far more money to some industries which provide more useful things then entertainment.
The 7.6% figure is for Global music sales. The article states that "Global compact disc sales -- the most often cited figure in discussing the health of the industry -- fell 9.1 percent in value in 2003, the IFPI said."
(Of personal interest to me, since I've <shameless plug>just released single on vinyl</shameless plug>: "Total sales of singles, including cassettes and vinyl, which have dipped significantly since the Internet file-sharing and CD-burning craze began in the late 1990s, fell 18.7 percent in value terms between 2002 and 2003." It should be noted, though, that quite probably the majority of independent record labels ' sales aren't included in these numbers: IFPI-related releases compete, possibly increasingly, with small independent labels.)
The idea of making huge amounts of money by selling patterns of air pressure change is kind of flimsy to start with. No?
But the fact remains that everyone else likes the music coming out, especially young kids. You guys sound like old fogies--actually, you sound like my parents when I was growing up and they heard my music. Meanwhile, a lot of people DO like today's music, from the Strokes to Clay Aiken to Norah Jones to so on and so forth. But downloading is so easy and convenient now, today's youth don't give a second thought about it anymore. And that doesn't make what they're doing suddenly a-okay.
Yet, you people don't seem to care because you've grown accustomed to the convenience as well, and in order to remove the label of criminality, you've tried to brush it off on to the record label lobbying group that just so happens to be doing the *exact thing Slashdotters said they should be doing* a few years ago--suing individual copyright infringers.
This is silly. There are online stores now. There are services like iTunes. How many knocked-down excuses will people keep using to justify that they've got eMule down there in their system tray right now?
Artists willingly sign their contracts, and I find it hard to feel sorry for them when they shit on gold toilets, have antique car collections, and do movies all the time. Yet, Slashdot pretends they're fighting for the artist by ripping them off and not paying for their music.
What's amusing is that there is somewhat of a stigma when it comes to pirating games and apps simply because a lot of people here are programmers. Are you guys going to talk about "sampling games" when Doom 3 gets leaked a month early (as they all are now) and kids, college students, and people on high-bandwith connections pirate the fuck out of it?
If everyone here at Slashdot was a musician, the message would be completely different. What I find most amusing, however, is the double-standard pointed out in my sig.
But go ahead and play the "b-but the RIAA is *evil*!!! That gives me the right to pretend their copyright was magicaly transferred over to me to illegally distribute all over the place" game.
99% of the users on Kazaa aren't "sampling" those albums. Hell, on eMule they're just RARing up entire discographies now and sticking them online. I'd respect pro-piracy people more if they just admitted what was going on and that it was legally and morally wrong. At least I can debate your position logically because you know where you stand. But this bullshit "it's the RIAA's fault we're illegally sharing all their copyrighted materials!" mindset will never, ever fly.
That's a great point. Just because p2p is on the rise and cd sales are down DOESN'T mean p2p caused it. Maybe consumers are getting smarter. Maybe people are fed up with greedy execs. Maybe I want to be able to have the quality of a Coltrane box set every time! I mean, the same argument could be made as to why VHS sales are down. Just because they correlate doesn't mean one caused the other.
You're right in that the RIAA will get their cut no matter what, however, depending on the size of the band/label/distributor, on who sets up tours, etc. the band might make more money on the cd from a tour. For a most "independent" labels (quoted because some labels called independent still may distribute through major label distribution channels, or may be members of the RIAA themselves), the band sees a larger cut of the merchandise sold on tour. I can't vouch for the specifics (i.e. whether or not it's because merch sold by the artist at shows doesn't officialy enter any distribution channels, and thus they don't get charged distribution fees) of the matter, but from what I've been told, it's generally the case for medium to smaller labels.
--- What
1/2 of those people couldnt sing their way out of a paper bag, yet that seems to be the kind of "talent" they are looking for...
Thanks to file sharing, I purchase more CDs
Thanks to the RIAA, I buy them used...
If you like 80s music, like Supertramp, then I am guessing that you might like other progressive rock music, like Yes, Genesis (with Peter Gabriel), Jethro Tull, etc.
And I recently discovered, much to my amazement, that progressive rock didn't die in the eighties -- it's still being made today (it just doesn't get played on the radio, or sold in the stores).
There are quite a few Internet-based progressive rock radio stations. For example, I enjoy listening to these two stations:
Delicious Agony Progressive Rock Radio
Canvas Productions
As a result of listening to these, and similar Internet radio stations, I have bought over 100 CDs in the last year. That's ten times as many as I had bought in the previous decade!
You might also like to check out the Gibralter Encyclopedia of Progressive Rock.
Lastly, check out CD Baby, which is an Internet music store that specializes in Progressive Rock and other esoteric music that you will never hear on the radio. Play some of their samples, and I think you will be quite surprised.
Spank the shit out of RIAA signed artists. Beat them until they bleed money - that's the only way change happens in this world.
And if you buy cds at shows you're still just feeding the RIAA - twice in fact, since you also pulled their pud with all that grand cash paid to get in the fucking door... do you think ticketbastard is some artist affiliated non profit organization? Pull your head out of your ass and maybe the sunshine will clear away the industry brainwashing that has befuddled your logical processes.
I just read in McPaper (USA Today) that Americans, on average, are listening to less music. Something like 198 hours (down from 216). This is especially suspicious since the decrease is similar to the reduced CD sales number.
Maybe people *just don't like* the music that is being put out, and as a consequence, aren't buying and/or listening to CDs. Maybe they're out having lives. Maybe they are listening to live music.
Every time I see something like this from the RIAA, it sounds like, "our business plan isn't working! It must be a conspiracy! Piracy on the high seas!"
Whatever.
Maybe you should produce some music that we want to listen to?
Maybe you should make it easier to find music we *like*?
In 1995, CD Prices at the Average Media Play store was $11.99 each. Now the average price is $15-$20 a CD.
The average job in this area pays $7.50 - $10 an hour. Minus taxes, which leaves people about $300 a week to cover living expenses. Fill your gas tank twice a week, there's $46. Pay Mortgage/Rent, Insurance, Electric and Gas, there's $200 a week. So we have about $54 a week left for food, and other life related items.... I don't think CDs are selling too good around here.
Music Industry: Piss Off.
President Bush: Go fuck yourself. Trickle-down economics isn't helping when most of the people with money were born in the 20s and feel the need to pinch their pennies with all their might.
Make America grate again!
But you're missing the point. You and I aren't the ones the industry cares about. It's all about the kids and disposable income.
Kids want to listen to what's 'cool'. To them, MTV and the radio shows/tells them what is cool and then they share this information with each other to reinforce it. Why is this so important? Peer acceptance - something some Slashdotters who had trouble getting dates will not understand.
I can look back at them and say, "What sheep! Back tatoos, piercings all over your bodies, wearing pants that would clothe 3 or 4 immigrants do NOT make you an individual!" But all of them will invaribly tell you that they are being 'different.'
You know what a joke THAT is, don't you? Or do you? Think back in school. What did you do to be different and how different were you really than anyone else?
Personally, I listened to Black Flag and the B52's (ok, I was a bit eclectic), but did that make me different? No, it put me in a strange minority, but MILLIONS of kids listened to them!
Those that are truly different - the true innovators and pioneers of our time are shunned or ignored, plain and simple. You can't be too different after all, then you're 'wierd', right? If it could happen to a guy like Tesla, you know it could happen to anyone.
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
For starters 250m/32B = .78%.
.4% of 32 billion.
Second, 2.5 million songs per week times 52 weeks = 130 million songs at $.99 each, or about
Third, $130 million spent on I-Tunes could be 130 million CD's not purchased at $15/hit (especially for the one-hit wonders they're publishing these days). Even after adding back the money for the itunes themselves, that's $1.82 billion in CD purchases, which is 5.6875%, which is pretty close to the entire decrease.
Although it is impossible to precisely determine how much effect iTunes has had on this number, it is really poor math (and thinking) to think that it had no significant effect.
Careful about criticizing other's nerdliness, for you bring your own failings to light.
Wake up - the future is arriving faster than you think.
... of times that the music on a CD may be listened to? Is the listening supposed to be only the person who actually purchased the CD? Where's the line on using this stuff? How much more money do you want for copies of work that was done in the past?
I have a solution for the artists and distributiors, stop distributing completely. don't try to pawn off copies of work as something it isn't. Don't keep forcing people to believe that a copy is somehow all that valuable. In the olden days, ya, copies of anything were ridicvulously expensive in termsd of time and effort and materials to make, but today? GET REAL. Make your loot from day to day *working* live concerts ONLY,stop milking technology and BSing the people by recording and copying, and make all recordings illegal, then there won't be any conflicts or confusion, would there be? I say, put up or shutup. I will pay to enjoy being in the presence of someone WORKING, I WON'T pay for some vaporus copy of that experience. That's where I draw the line now. Any human on earth can make their own copies now with a pittance worth of gear, so that is where I draw the line, a copy is worth a PITTANCE. Same with movies, make those sorts of fictional representations be done completely live on stage, don't copy them to any media for redistribution. Same with television. Radio re broadcast. If the artist want to dilute their work by copying and distributing, then they can be happy with smaller amounts for a larger wider audience, by doing less work. Right now they want it both ways,sweet deal fopr them if they can manipulate the laws and media brainwashing mind control, big bucks for live honest work, big bucks for trivially copied media and the means to redistribute. sorry, it ain't worth it to more and more people because they can see reality.
When you go to a restaurant, you pay for the food and service, do you EXPECT to keep paying for the service, forever? I don't think so. Do some actual work, bring me some chow, and I'll pay you again. Virtual representations of real live work are COPIES and as such not "worth" what a live experience is, and never will be from here on out given our level of technology now. that's reality. too bad, expensive copies are the buggywhips of the 21st century, un needed, un wanted, and they WILL be ignored, more and more, except as curiosities for museums.
As long as they make up their minds I don't care, I don't download any music or videos, zip, nada, nothing, I could care less about it so I don't got a dog in this fight, but I can reason a little, and there ain't a hardly piece of this "official copy of work long done awhiles ago" stuff worth more than 2 cents to me. I've enjoyed live performances in the past,paid for it, that's cool, but reproduced fictitios representational copies... really... is just..so so, I could care less, it's not even worth unfilled hard drive space to me.
I think artists (and sports stars and movie stars) are tremendously over valued except during live performances, and with the new ways of copying, they are seeing what their non-live performances are really worth, about zilch. Live performance, equals work, day to day w.o.r.k like everyone else does, reproduced is a dilution,a chimera, it's attempting to get a lot of expensive somethings (everyones money) for the same labor, and in todays world, tough noogies. You can't keep pulling that trick.
That's my opinion anyway. And I'm sorry if that is semi offensive to anyone, but really. This is the year 2004, making copies of anything audio or visual is EXTREMELY easy to do, it's just not worth that much money, it's not even worth a bucka song. It's worth maybe a buck a cd, and that to someone to lazy to make their own copy for a dime.
I know I can't keep making "royalties" off the work I did last week, work as in "sweat outside doing heavy nasty dangerous stuff", if I want another check, I need to do the same amount of work. That's how 99.99% of the planet earth makes their living, too bad most "artists" and their le
I considered most pop music crap twenty years ago and still do today. and guess what? All those hairy palmed dolts who thought Bob Seger was god STILL think Bob Seger is god. Journey still goes on tour from time to time because so many aging stoners still don't have an ear for originality. About the only "pop" music from my youth I can stand is R&B, a genre mercifully spared most of they hype machine back then because the record companies still catered primarily to the white boys and hadn't a clue what to do with "ethnic" demographics of ANY flavor.
The only thing that's changed since twenty years ago is now the music playing on "black" stations (if there is such a thing) sucks just as much as the music on most of the others. Most folks still have no tolerance for originality and most folks don't seem to care about any of this politic - the only reason the record companies are hurting is because their business model is utterly obsolete. You would not believe the number of burned cds trading hands around my office for two bucks each.
Burn, baby, burn. Fuck'em into the floor.
"b-but the RIAA is *evil*!!!
Yeah, it is. So? I never said anything about copyright, but you bring up a good point.
How long should a copyright be good for? You know there's this Elvis revival going on in Germany right now - know why? They have a reasonable 50 year copyright law. All of his works are starting to come out in compilations and it's free and legal to do so.
I'm not suggesting that breaking the law is the answer. I'm suggesting that CHANGING A BROKEN LAW is. The 55 MPH speed limit was broken by many (were you a nasty-wasty law breaker yourself?) That law was found to be stupid and fairly unenforceable (especially out West), and so it was changed.
I'm a musician myself. I've personally watched the struggles of others who have tried to make it. I also know that 99.5% of anyone who signs a contract with these music company bastards commit themselves to being BOHICA'd.
With the self-serving record labels and the RIAA re-writing copyright law every decade it will be a miracle if ANY music ever again sees the public domain in this country. Don't think that you can take a superior tone with me or anyone else just because we don't agree with that fact and want to 'fight the power', so to speak.
If you can't see how one-sided the whole industry is, I would suggest that you report back to your corporate overloads and request more instructions on how to deal with people like me.
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
Thanks for that brief history of musical innovation:)
My 2 cents was mainly focused on the larger issue of innovation and how it's difficult to get the desire to innovate, or change or do anything different without constraints. Perpetual copyrights (perpetual, for the sake of dicussion:) do little to encourage so-called content producers to make more content, when they can just grow fatter off of already established streams of revenue.
This behavior is ultimately dangerous for them, though, as you pointed out with your example of Norah Jones. Eventually people will get tired of the same-old distribution systems, same-old musicians, etc, etc. They'll move on (in NJ's case, they have), leaving the industry stalwarts in the dust.
Thanks again for the type-up, very nice and very informative. I hope you get modded up!
I would love to see sales volume in units sold, not revenue, and I bet the reason why we haven't seen that is because it doesn't reflect a decrease. Also, I'm so sick of seeing numbers showing net decreases since 1999 - what HASN'T decreased since then, except unemployment?
I do believe that slashdotters are from all earth citizens... the bunch who are nearer to understanding the problem.
That is however a problem in itself. Do the average Joe or heck.. do even RIAA or the firms they represent, understand the problem? not at all...
I am currently a postgraduate student in Economics, and I am writing my dissertation (Thesis) on all of this. Several top schools (Chicago/Harvard) can't even agree by using postgraduate economic measurements if there has been ANY impact of P2P on CD sales.
What are we to do then? The problem is, as I said, a monstrous amount of misinformation. The all time cliche that we fear what we don't understand is specially true now. Two centuries ago Luddites smashed machines in England to *prevent* technological progress from displacing artisans... and of course, the government supported them... until they needed the machines to combat famine and other economic shocks...
Is piracy wrong? of course. Are we, users of kazaa and bit torrent, to blame? partly... the other persons responsible to that are the record labels themselves that didn't provide a business model before Napster came along. Had they understood the market.. they would have invested on it ages before and we would be enjoying new technological progress on music.. and later movies and software...But no.. they decided to sit on their comfortable sofas and watch the eternal kingdom of CDs.
But businesses that forget to watch technological trends are just too many. And we never learn. Of course a natural answer is to use the law or some other means to savage whatever is left of what they don't want to believe, but definately is, a sinking ship... I can safely bet that if Kodak could sue digital camera users they surely would.. that is certainly less expensive than investing tons on R&D and assesing the new tech threat.
Our children will still be complaining of how a company should stop protecting its old business model instead of promoting innovation. It always happens.
The answer lies in the record labels themselves.. the CD market is a gonner... they have to provide new ways to entice users to buy content... Did anyone care to buy the same CD even if they had an old vynil record? of course not... Did anyone complain in buying the same DVDs again in order to update your VHS libraries.. of course not... and that is because there is extra value on the new technology... (nonlinear search and extra features anyone?)
Come up with a new idea to sell content, *that is your job* spend on Research.. and customers wil surely come in droves... just see the i-pod...
Just my 2 cents...
The music industry is failing to see that this was the same problem, in general, that the United States and Europe faced right before the Great Depression: Big firms would sell things and expect that to be the reason for people to buy their wares. Not until they realized that they actually had to meet the demands of their customers! Determine the needs, the wants of the market Develop products that cater Continue at step 1 Has the RIAA forgot the basics of business?
I am never buying a CD again. Ever.
The RIAA regularly insults my intelligence, and if I want music, then from now on I'll just make it myself.
I'm serious. I've got everything in my collection... from Bach to Tool, every genre. And Abba is some pretty terrific stuff. They wrote music people love to sing - even today. Their music, decades later, is still in the public consciousness.
In fact, I was listening to a live cut of "Does Your Mother Know" yesterday.
Personally, this is what I have tried to do. However, I generally expect that as a product ages, its price tends to go down, CD's just don't seem to do this. Having been stuck in the 80's, musically, now for quite some time, I tend to look at the prices of CD's of artists I like from time to time, and am shocked to see them at $15 or more. While I will grant that the distributor needs to make money on the sale, I simply will not pay that much for a CD, new or old. So, the end result, I do without. I only listen to CD's in the car during my commute to and from work, and can put up with not having anything new. Also, half my drive is covered by a radio station that isn't horrible, and one that used to be ok but is starting to suck. The radio station's problems can mostly be blamed on the trend towards more talk and less music. Afterall, when a radio annoucer says, "comming up this hour" followed by snippets of three songs, and they aren't kidding, those three songs will be the only ones you hear for an hour on this station; there is a problem, in my view.
In all, I think the RIAA labels are just facing the results of more competition, in the form of games and movies (I know that I don't listen to music much at home), and also people not spending as much on luxury goods right now. Also, as someone else mentioned earlier in this thread, the buying from conversion, from tape to CD has probably just about ended, so sales are going to go down. Now, should this absolve P2P and piracy for its role, no. But, I somehow doubt that dumping millions of dollars into chasing down the pirates is going to have a very good ROI. Even ignoring the PR aspect, are they ever going to recover that money? I doubt it, the pirates will simply fold up shop, move to a different street corner, and re-open. There may be a short term slump in piracy, but long term it won't matter. Better yet, they are also educating people in how to pirate along the way. Personally, I had only heard of Napster in passing, before it became national news. And it was in one of the articles about the Napster case that I read about Audiogalaxy, Kazaa, etc. Also unknown to me at the time. I have to wonder how many pirates got their start thanks to those articles?
Necessity is the mother of invention.
Laziness is the father.
You get a shiver in the dark
It's been raining in the park but meantime
South of the river you stop and you hold everything
A band is blowing Dixie double four time
You feel all right when you hear that music ring
You step inside but you don't see too many faces
Coming in out of the rain to hear the jazz go down
Too much competition too many other places
But not too many horns can make that sound
Way on downsouth way on downsouth London town
You check out Guitar George he knows all the chords
Mind he's strictly rhythm he doesn't want to make it cry or sing
And an old guitar is all he can afford
When he gets up under the lights to play his thing
And Harry doesn't mind if he doesn't make the scene
He's got a daytime job he's doing alright
He can play honky tonk just like anything
Saving it up for Friday night
With the Sultans with the
Amd a crowd of young boys they're fooling around in the corner
Drunk and dressed in their best brown baggies and their platform soles
They don't give a damn about any trumpet playing band
It ain't what they call rock and roll
And the Sultans played Creole
And then the man he steps right up to the microphone
And says at last just as the time bell rings
'Thank you goodnight now it's time to go home'
and he makes it fast with one more thing
- Internet Sales
- Cassette Sales
- Total Sales
- Number of new CDs produced
- The Economy
I think that once you add all those up, you'll find that there was an actual INCREASE in profits.CDs is a medium that is slowly being replaced by mp3s & other digital music players. I would fully expect the sales to drop. Soon, it will be the same as vinyl records.
Get over it. Move on. The world keeps turning even if you refuse to come along.
"I drank what?" - Socrates
What was the last few CDs you bought?!? Myself, I tend to buy more independant music then major label work, only because I like to meet the band and swing them a few dollars to show my appreciation (I bought 2 CDs this weekend from bands I saw, total cost = $8!!!). Perhaps this is where the major artists go wrong, if they were more fan friendly and sold there CDs at the gigs, then more fans would buy there CD. But alas, I babble. Peace...
I have purchased more CDs this year than in all other years of my life combined. I attribute that to three things:
sig != null
Well, almost no impact. According to a new study, "downloads have an effect on sales which is statistically indistinguishable from zero". Monday's NYTimes (free registration) describes the study, in which two economists analyzed file-sharing and sales data over a 17-week period in 2002, using "complex mathematical formulas" to determine that "spikes in downloading had almost no discernible effect on sales", and estimating that "it would take 5000 downloads to reduce the sales of an album by one copy". Naturally, some organizations disagree. Also, according to the RIAA's 2003 year end numbers [PDF], sales of CD singles were up 84% from 2002, while overall revenue shrunk from $11.55 to $11.05 billion... which makes perfect sense when you consider economic tendencies since 9/11.
According to this artical on The Register..
l bu m_sales_rise/
1 22 34274.html
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/03/29/uk_oz_a
which also links to Syndey Morning Herald.com.au
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/03/28/10804
sales toped 50 Million albums, for the first time ever *increasing* over the last 4 years despite music downloading etc..
dont listen to all the bull shit that the Music Industry is trying to feed you.
(ps sorry for the txt links, my brain is too mushed for html this time of hte morning )
A study of file-sharing's effects on music sales says online music trading appears to have had little part in the recent slide in CD sales.
r t= rss&tag=feed&subj=news
For the study, released Monday, researchers at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina tracked music downloads over 17 weeks in 2002, matching data on file transfers with actual market performance of the songs and albums being downloaded. Even high levels of file-swapping seemed to translate into an effect on album sales that was "statistically indistinguishable from zero," they wrote.
"We find that file sharing has only had a limited effect on record sales," the study's authors wrote. "While downloads occur on a vast scale, most users are likely individuals who would not have bought the album even in the absence of file sharing."
The study, the most detailed economic modeling survey to use data obtained directly from file-sharing networks, is sure to rekindle debates over the effects of widely used software such as Kazaa or Morpheus on an ailing record business.
Big record labels have seen their sales slide precipitously in the past several years, and have blamed the falling revenue in large part on rampant free music downloads online. Others have pointed to additional factors, such as lower household spending during the recession, and increased competition from other entertainment forms such as DVDs and video games, each of which have grown over the same time period.
Executives at file-sharing companies welcomed the survey, saying it should help persuade reluctant record company executives to use peer-to-peer networks as distribution channels for music "We welcome sound research into the developing peer-to-peer industry, and this study appears to have covered some interesting ground," said Nikki Hemming, chief executive officer of Kazaa parent Sharman Networks. "Consider the possibilities if the record industry actually cooperated with companies like us instead of fighting."
The study, performed by Harvard Business School associate professor Felix Oberholzer and University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill associate professor Koleman Strumpf, used logs from two OpenNap servers in late 2002 to observe about 1.75 million downloads over their 17 week sample period.
That sample revealed interesting behavioral, as well as economic, data. Researchers found that the average user logged in only twice during that period, downloading about 17 songs. Some people vastly overshot that average, however--one user apparently logged in 71 times, downloading more than 5,000 songs.
The two professors narrowed their sample base by choosing a random sample of 500 albums from the sales charts of various music genres, and then compared the sales of these albums to the number of associated downloads.
Even in the most pessimistic version of their model, they found that it would take about 5,000 downloads to displace sales of just one physical CD, the authors wrote. Despite the huge scale of downloading worldwide, that would be only a tiny contribution to the overall slide in album sales over the past several years, they said.
Moreover, their data seemed to show that downloads could even have a slight positive effect on the sales of the top albums, the researchers said.
The study is unlikely to be the last word on the issue. Previous studies have been released showing that file sharing had both positive and negative effects on music sales.
The Recording Industry Association of America was quick to dismiss the results as inconsistent with earlier findings.
"Countless well-respected groups and analysts, including Edison Research, Forrester, and the University of Texas, among others, have all determined that illegal file sharing has adversely impacted the sales of CDs," RIAA spokeswoman Amy Weiss said in a statement. "Our own surveys show that those who are downloading more are buying less."
http://news.com.com/2100-1027_3-5181562.html?pa
Things like the records companies shoving $100 million into Mariah Carey's comeback.. followed by her going nuts and trying to slit her wrists. Heads rolled at the record companies... but we're to blame for them losing money, somehow.
-Copyright law #69:Whenever Mickey Mouse is about to enter the public domain,copyrights get extended by 25 years.
"Timberlake helped boost the business in the second half of 2003."
Is that a fucking joke? That's the problem right there!
CD sales are down 7.6 percent. What about MUSIC sales? To my knowledge most European countries have MiniDisc as their standard music format these days; so globally yes CD sales should be down... right?
- They don't have a broadband Internet connection.
- They don't have a CD writer.
- They don't want to hassle with it and just want a CD.
All of this represents well over 50% of the market, probably something more like 80%. So, there is still a need for shipping physical products to record stores.I haven't seen anyone come up with anything except a lot of whining about how the RIAA and rest of the record industry just doesn't get it and how physical distribution is a dead end. Maybe someday when we all have fiber-to-home connections. Not today and not likely for years at least.
Here are the reasons I'm not buying as much:
1. Um, the economy is in a slump, stupid. I'm not spending as much on anything I don't need because I don't want to be caught flat-footed in a layoff the way I was after the crash.
2. There hasn't been much new music in the last year that I've liked. What I have liked, I actually have bought.
3. I'm so disgusted by the RIAA that I've made a conscious effort to spend my spare change elsewhere. Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble, and Borders have been the primary beneficiaries of this shift. They have these neat-o products called books that provide days and days of quality entertainment for less than the cost of a 74-minute CD. (Lately, for example, I've been rocking out to Ursula K. LeGuin in the cross-platform paperback format.)
4. CDs are still too expensive. For $15-$20, I expect to see the band live. In fact, I've been patronizing a lot more of the relatively unknown bands that roll through town because they're not regurgitating the same focus-group schlock as the big-name "artists".
Since four items is a bit much for the RIAA to absorb, let me summarize: "I don't have much money these days, your products suck, and I don't like you."
Please note that I did not say, "I am downloading MP3s happily," though that's what they will surely hear.
Proud member of the Weirdo-American community.
Why are these numbers reported year after year without taking into account the shift amongst comsumer dollars between DVD, CD, video games, etc?
So if CD sales are down 7% and DVD sales are up 10% is it a crisis due to file sharing or is it just consumers spending their money where the find more value for the dollar?
The only problem with the "artists should do live performances" and "there should be no royalties" is this: incentive. The industry would collapse, and a whole lot of other industries dependent on that business would be hurt, too. So, great utopian theory, but no. It goes back to the argument, "Why should I pay for someone's software?" Because they gotta eat, that's why.
This idea is not a brilliant leap forward, but rather a backslide to how things were in the Bad Olde Days hundreds of years ago, when artists didn't get paid crap to do what they did. Limiting reimbursement to live performances, etc., is a sure way to accomplish two things: put the artists out of business, thus reducing our cultural heritage. Also, by limiting their exposure, you again reduce our cultural heritage, since without those vaporous media previews, nobody will have ever heard of them.
Why do artists get paid royalties? Usually, they're not that high, and if you don't like the royalty, you don't have to license the work. If the royalties demanded are too high, the artist simply can't get any contracts. On the other hand, it doesn't do for the distributors to make money hand over fist for sales while the artist gets paid only a pittance (which seems to be the actual fact in the music industry.) If you can't get paid everything up front, then get paid back in smaller installments over time. You know, like when you sell copies of software, you get reimbursed for the development costs. Same idea.
The better argument is, "Why should we pay high prices for complete crap?" Easy answer: don't. Nobody's forcing you to. There is a lot of so-called art out there that is truly drivel, but enough of it is good (despite the best efforts of the suits) to justify spreading it around. Bet you paid to go see Lord of the Rings, didn't you?
In the end, art is a luxury item. You can argue all you want that the prices are unfair, but since it's not actually a necessity of life, you don't actually have to buy it. I don't like the RIAA and I don't like the high prices. I think they have a truly retarded attitude towards copying and file sharing, as, despite their bitching about loss of sales, they're still raking in obscene amounts of money.
I've lived in Germany, the US, and Japan, and I have a pretty good idea why the sales are going down. In the US and Japan, the prices are simply too high (Japan is double that of the US, for absolutely no good reason at all.) Germany is actually half the price of the US (in other words, a fair price), but has the highest piracy rate in Europe, be it software, music, or movies.
Japan has one situation that makes piracy even more likely, and is pretty humorous: rental stores not only rent CDs, they actually put the play time and how many tapes or MDs you'd have to buy to record it, so no surprise at the problem there. Not exactly discouraging people, are they? "Let's charge some of the highest prices in the world and then encourage people to pirate the media!" Interestingly, people are still willing to buy the original when it's someone's music they really like.
"Give a man fire, and he'll be warm for a day; set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life
... on your major points. Right now we are barely even entering this paradigm altering time frame, so of course we need to sort all this out. I fully acknowledge that an artist in a lot of cases has years behind say a performance or a painting, years of skill developing for that few hours performing, etc or that one painting, or one..whatever.. Guess what though, so does the plumber, the carpenter, the mechanic, etc, and they don't charge royalties or get residuals for their work. Lots of training, lots of skills, applied effort, one check, done. Skills +native ability+ applied effort= something built, you get paid. You can't realistically keep insisting on getting paid over and over again for the same thing, or a weal copy of the original..
Yes, that's how things happen. The difference is, the artist makes it all at once for that effort, then he wants to keep getting it, and keep getting it, ad infinitum, the other sorts of employments build to it gradually, but there is never a residual.(patents are exceptios to this rule, and another discussion, although somewhat related),
The other point is, the artist knows in advance that even giving it his best shot, he might not be well received, and his efforts,past the origignal, will become intangible products, except for copies, and now, those copies can be reproduced very cheaply. My postulation is- we need to accept that, and get on with adjusting. We can't hang on to past levels of what those copies represent in terms of skill+ native ability+ effort, but it's orders of magnitudes easier now to make those copies. That is the central point.
ART is now a cheap mass produced product in it's copied form. In it's original form, it is little changed since way back in history, this is a given, and why today still originals fetch so much more, as they should. The business models around the COPIES though are skewed way out of prtoportion to their actual value, at least to untold millions they are now. You are being told, shown, and you can see it happening, wishing it wasn't so will not alter it. The two distinct data points need to be dramatically altered to reflect the changes in technology. Being drug kicking and screaming to the reality table does not bode well for the acceptance of the artist (and his retinuie of expensive copy peddlers), going willingly and accepting the changes as they exist and as they are rapidly changing is the correct business plan.
Again, IMO of course.
And like I said, just as soon as the tech is there, I mean the minute it's there, as soon as the combo of my skills + native ability + effort is cheaply replicable, for the use, benefit, advancement and pleasure of anyone else who desires it, anyone can have a copy,can trade it, share it, expand and expound on it, whatever they choose to do, gratis, my treat, have at it. I'd like to make a few clams off the original, then next week I'll do another original. but the copies, cheap, have at it. That's the best I can do now, and if I think I might like your work, I will purchase an original, or attend a "live" original, but don't expect me to pay much of anything for what I know for a fact are very inexpensive copies. I might pay a small sum, but nothing more than perhaps double the construction cost of the replication media + distribution, or perhaps double the bulk rate download bandwith. I think anyone should be happy with doubling their money with little effort, seems most reasonable to me. But 10 or 20 times? Magnfied by other millions? Nope, not for me. That is gouging, plain and simple.
Whoa buddy, hold on there with the thinking that the whole world can and will make copies for a PITTANCE. The simple fact is that outside of the Slashdot bubble, most people like to buy REAL things. While CDs were a step back from LPs in terms of purchase-as-object, they still have shape, form and liner art. They also last at least twice as long as a CD-R and you have a master when your HD goes up in smoke. That's tangible value. One of the reasons we need real things around is that not all artists are still alive! How are you going to buy a CD from John Coltrane or Johnny Cash at their show if they're dead. Real things serve as tactile links when artists aren't around. Having a song on your iPod or your HD of some 30s blues singer is so far removed from what they actually are about. The idea that $15 or even $20 is too much for a piece of art made by a genius makes me laugh. Honestly, people think that great new artists will develop out out thin air if there's no support of their work. The RIAA may have made lots of condemnable moves but buying music is a form of democracy - only buy the CDs you like and the RIAA will make less you don't. If anything, it's the mass stupidity of people who want the Britney Spears album for $10 that has encouraged the production of so much crap and the piracy of such crap. Wake up, quality costs money. Money supports quality. It's a simple cycle, vote with your wallet.
The RIAA is now "beleaguered"? Wait, does this mean its dying, like Apple?
Free yourself. Everything else will follow.
For a long time, I couldn't figure out why the RIAA was so upset about P2P. It really, honestly didn't seem to be hurting their sales numbers significantly. Maybe they kept worrying about future losses, but as time wound on, that seemed less and less likely.
Based on your actions, P2P does have a good reason for worrying the RIAA:
(a) makes it easier for indie artists to get exposure
(b) thus makes marketing (the primary incentive the RIAA has to offer artists) less valuable
(c) because pop artists are the most common, they are the easiest to pirate, and thus probably suffer the greatest sales reduction -- some of this money may be spent on hard-to-find albums for lesser-known artists.
So, while an equivalent amount of money might be spent on music, it drastically decreases the effect and influence of music publishers, and damages the marketing-driven idea of the "pop star".
That doesn't mean that I think that P2P is necessarily *good* for artists as a whole, just that it finally manages to explain something that's been nagging at me for a while.
May we never see th
What the hell is going on today? Everyone misspells "definitely" and puts it as "definately". It became some sort of trend on slashdot already...
Seems like bying CDs used to serve educational purpose as well - at least one could read what's written on the cover. But now kids just download, and have nothing to read. You can't even call them "read-only users".