Slashdot Mirror
Legal Music Downloads At 35%, Soon To Pass Piracy
bonch writes "Entertainment Media Research released a study stating that 35% of music listeners are using legal download services, and that the percentage will soon surpass illegal downloads, currently at 40%. Slashdot has also previously reported on services like iTunes gaining in popularity over P2P services. "The findings indicate that the music industry is approaching a strategic milestone with the population of legal downloaders close to exceeding that of pirates," said Entertainment Media Research chief executive Russell Hart.'"
no, it means that 75% of music listeners download music.
Learn to read. It says 35% of MUSIC LISTENERS are paying for downloads, and 40% are downloading illegally. The other 25% is either buying albums at a store or listening to the radio. In other words... NOT DOWNLOADING!
The article says "35% of music consumers". Presumably, this means "all people who buy CDs" (or would buy CDs, if they weren't busy stealing the bread out of hungry record executive children's mouths).
This allows for overlap between the two groups; in fact, I'm guessing that the vast majority of online-music-buyers have also experimented with downloading.
If there is complete overlap, it would mean that 60% of music consumers have never downloaded music from the 'net. It would also mean that only 12.5% of illegal downloaders have not bought from iTunes or similar...
It would be interesting to see the actual numbers, and what questions they asked :-/
Repton.
They say that only an experienced wizard can do the tengu shuffle.
I am getting a response, and can see the site... Its at: http://www.hymn-project.org/
right?
If what you are reading sounds funny, or sarcastic, lame, or stupid
it is because it is supposed to be. just laugh
Sites like http://www.audiolunchbox.com/ Magnatune, eMusic and mp3Tunes are one main reason why this trend is happening. NO DRM, Oggs and sometimes even FLAC - I'd say that is one major reason for the shift. Smaller sites with less mainstream content that let their users actually own the files unrestricted seem to finally be catching on. RIGHTON
"The survey also found that 25% of 4,000 people interviewed said they were prepared to download music legally, up from 16% a year ago." (PCTalk)
I call BS. Of the several bands that I have known who got contracts, all of them paid for most of their own promotions, and virtually every dime the record label paid out was listed as a loan to the band against any future profits. Virtually all of them eventually sold enough albums to pay back the record label, but when the royalty checks came in, they tended to be less than a dollar. I'm not buying that the record label losses millions on small acts that they are loosing money on.
It was obvious that they were playing games with the accounting when they charged the band $5k for a "master" CD, when the company I was working for had 1000 CDs made with gem cases and inserts for $1500. (this was many years ago.)
The record label had conned these poor saps into thinking the the "master" disk costs huge amounts of money to make. (not the music production. A physical disk) And that this master is used to press other disks at a cost of ~$2 a disk.
The music industry makes a ton on iTunes. When the songs were $1, they took about $0.80 of that. Now think: They didn't have to pay any distribution costs on that at all, most production costs are taken out of artists' royalties, and they generally made any remaning costs up on CD profits. iTunes money is basically pure profit for them.
And they forced a price hike.
Not too long ago they forced Apple up to $1.25 per song. It was their cut that went up, not Apple's. Apple really isn't making much, since they recognise it needs to be cheap to be widely accepted and they want to corner the market, plus it sells iPods which is where they really make money.
Even that, however, is better than what the record industry wanted: $3/song for popular songs.
So really, that is the kind of thought that goes through their heads. They think they should just be allowed to squeeze every last dime out of people. That's the whole reason they are so paranoid about copying of music. The more outrageous prices get, the more likely people are to copy things and the more morally justified they feel in doing it.
> 75% of music listeners are using *A* download service
Nope.
If your reading of the article is correct, then there's no reason to exclude overlap between those group who download music. It might just as well be that 40% use illegal download services, and 87% of those also use legal download services, while 60% purchase media.
Something closer to that is certainly in line with anecdotal discussions with the people I happen to know.
But without more detail about how the study was conducted, it's tough to say anything meaningful.
$9.99 is expensive. I buy a lot of my CDs for $5.99 shipped. The rest of the CDs are purchased from local music stores or from various small labels on the net.
Plus that way I actually own the music instead of being stuck with a lossy file with DRM.
"I have a porkchop, you have a porkchop. I have a veal, you have a veal".
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/05/07/apple_itun es_price_rises/
I don't use iTunes so I accepted the story as is. Register is usually accurate.
Regardless, that they'd try goes to my orignal point. Heck, the current pricing distribution goes to my point. If songs were $1, Apple took half, and they didn't take all costs out of artists' royalites, I'd say it was fair. As it stands, they get the lions share of the money for the least work and risk.
Yes, thanks to the industry's "messages" most people do have a sense that illegal downloads hurt musicians. But in fact it's the opposite. Most musicians don't make any money whatsoever from CD sales, because under a standard recording contract all the expenses of producing and distributing the little plastic discs get deducted from the musician's royalties, usually leaving nothing.
Musicians make a living playing live performances, just like they did for centuries before recording technology existed. What they get out of CD sales is exposure, which translates to bigger and better paying gigs. They get that exposure whether you pay for the copy or not. The important thing for the musician is that as many people as possible listen to the music, because a certain number of them will eventually buy concert tickets. Controlling people's ability to distribute copies benefits only the record companies, not the musicians.
Long-time musician Janis Ian wrote a couple very good articles explaining in detail how this works . Here's an excerpt:
I would, but mine shut down recently.
The owner blamed it on pirated music, but I think he was just looking to blame those damn kids - I think it's more likely that when he opened his store, the only cd stores around were sam goody and musicland, or whatever was in the mall, and those places were selling CDs at $21.99/ea. Now, there's a best buy, a circuit city, and three super walmarts that have popped up in the area, not to mention online stores that cater to his demographic.
You can see my friend's blog on the subject.
sig?
Correct, the money goes to the record label. That's why it's mainly the record companies, and not the artists complaining about piracy & p2p nets.
You're also on the right track about supporting artists - if you want to support your favourite artist, go to their gigs, buy their merchandise (the stuff that comes straight from them, I mean, not stuff put out by the label), or, heck, just send 'em money direct.
Quite frankly the business practices of most of the large labels are obscene. Even a lot of artists who you'd think did really well - had top 10 hits, etc - end up in massive debt to the labels.
Just off the top of my head, do you remember the female R&B trio, TLC? they were around in the early 90's. They had 3 back-to-back #1 hits, a debut album that sold over 4 million copies, and a follow up that sold over 10 million. They won grammys, topped the album charts for 5 weeks in the US, the only all female group to have more #1 US hits than TLC was The Supremes.
So.. they must be millionaires now, right? I mean, that kind of success would set you up for life, surely?
In fact, they filed for bankrupcy due to a £3 million debt they owed to their record company, and spent ages in legal battles trying to untangle themselves from their contracts.
And that's far from being an isolated incident.
Remember that the next time you hear an RIAA/record label representative sobbing about the plight of the poor starving musicians.
Curiosity was framed. Ignorance killed the cat.