The Many Battle Fronts of Content Owners

museumpeace writes "This community constantly chews on stories like the first sale doctrine and the endless maneuvering of RIAA, MPAA, follies of DMCA and DRM in general. I think of each of those stories as like trying to make sense of a particular earthquake. In the Huffington Post, blogger Jonathan Handel succinctly lays out six tectonic market and technology forces that provide a map for all of this. Sample his point #5, the media is the money: 'Fifth is market forces in the technology industry. Computers, web services, and consumer electronic devices are more valuable when more content is available. In turn, these products make content more usable by providing new distribution channels. Traditional media companies are slow to adopt these new technologies, for fear of cannibalizing revenue...'"

Comments

the term "disruptive technology"

[circletimessquare]

is often used, like the phrase "paradigm shift" to give oomph to other wise boring corporate blather

however, in this case, the term disruptive technology is entirely functional: the internet is completely destroying the music industry

the book industry and the movie industry are standing in handcuffs on the stairs to the guillotine, helplessly watching their brethren being beheaded. they watch in disbelief as the cheering masses they used to lord over relish the sight of the bloodsport of their demise

i'm sorry, but a free and open network where any media can be transmitted effortlessly and without interception is not a business opportunity. its a replacement for an industry based on distribution. people keep talking about the fact that the music industry could have gotten in front of changing technology and used it to their advantage, rather than change taking place without them while they sat in denial. i have the contrary opinion: i think the music industry would never have been able to get in front of this steamroller

they were never able to, no matter how much time they had to prepare. there is simply no way for the music industry to harness the internet to their continued existence. the internet, the substance of it, is simply anathema to what they do: charge a fee for music distribution. the internet is simply replacing them. effortless free distribution has no economics too it. there's no money to be made

of course there is money to be made in related industries: concerts, advertising tie-ins, band and brand building, etc. but anything having to do with distributing media is simply a free advertising platform, nothing more. the anicllary businesses is what the music industry will morph into, a decimated diminished form of its former self

the only way the music industry could survive unaltered by the internet is to invent a time machine and go back to the 1960s and murder the arpanet researchers. you cannot harness that which means your doom. asking or expecting the music industry to get in front of technological change and make it work for them is like asking the incan and aztec nobility to get in front of the spanish conquistadors and use them to their advantage. as in: no way that's going to happen

your doom is your doom. music distribution conglomerates are simply a business model for the historical dustbin. there is no other way to interpret what the internet means to them. the internet is not a "business challenge" for them to meet with fast footwork and fancy innovative thinking. it is simply an appointment with death. and i will be mourning their passing just as soon as i get over my shock and pain over the passing of the dtuch east india company. as in: who cares. the world keeps turning, life keeps changing. its a done deal. the story is over. goodbye sony bmg, bertelsmann, et al. buh bye. stop banging on your coffin. your dead. realize it

Re:the term "disruptive technology"

[steelfood]

i'm sorry, but a free and open network where any media can be transmitted effortlessly and without interception is not a business opportunity. its a replacement for an industry based on distribution. people keep talking about the fact that the music industry could have gotten in front of changing technology and used it to their advantage, rather than change taking place without them while they sat in denial. i have the contrary opinion: i think the music industry would never have been able to get in front of this steamroller ... This is the wrong kind of thinking, and the exact same kind of thinking which lead to the lawsuits and attempts to stamp down on digital distribution.

You are wrong because of the success of iTunes. That, in and of itself, shows that online distribution can be, in and of itself, a viable business model.

You are wrong because of the necessity of value-added services that big labels currently do provide. Marketing, for example, is still necessary to gain recognition. Instead of labels taking all of the profits of media sales, they could instead bill the artists directly.

The companies could have capitalized on value-added products, like t-shirts, booklets, pamphlets, etc. as well as the security of actually having a physical copy instead of a digital one. The labels could have used their big distribution network to sell other things besides CD's.

The only difference is that under the new model, the labels' profits wouldn't nearly be as high. They would have to move away from their gluttonous culture. That is, they wouldn't be able to afford to upkeep that tour bus with a built-in pool in the back or the million-dollar bling for their third mistress anymore.

Adaptation is necessary for survival. The music industry as it is now is incompatible with online distribution. But that doesn't mean the labels can't adapt to the times and continue to remain afloat.

Re:the term "disruptive technology"

[davester666]

I shudder to think of how 'television' would work if it was being invented now in the US. There would be multiple, competing broadcast formats (why would the FCC require the use of a single standard, because multiple standards are working so well for the cell phone industry]. Content providers [both for movies and episodic shows] would sign up for exclusive deals with specific carriers, so you would need to choose the carrier based on what content you wanted [still happens now, but is generally quite limited]. If any carrier got too large of a market share, content providers would band together and offer better terms to other carriers in an effort to decrease the dominant carriers power.

Industry 'sectors', once they become established, tend to keep functioning in a certain way out of inertia and because it's in the best interests of the people making the most money from that industry. The music industry makes too much money and 'owns' too much content that people want to buy for them to just call it quits. They will fight tooth and nail to make sure they get to stand between artists and consumers.

I would say that is the main reason for why they keep pushing subscription plans. These plans would make it impossible for artists to get paid if they don't belong to a label. There would be no way for an artist to determine what amount of money they should be paid from the amount of money the label receives. And from the labels point of view [since they would get to define the interface to this system, as they 'own' most of the content right now], the important thing is the labels share of the monthly subscription fee, so it would be cheaper, easier and better for the label to emphasize the name of the label over the artist [because the label doesn't care which of their artists get money, just as long as a consumer listens to music from their label].

Re:the term "disruptive technology"

[Smauler]

Someone still needs to scout talent; just because you can pound out off-key versions of your classic rock favorites, that doesn't necessarily mean anyone else wants to listen to it.

What, without record companies to help us along we'd have to sift through every dross song released to find something good? Lots of new bands are being "discovered" by record companies now because of online communities that supported them, and found them, previous to their "discovery". Artic Monkeys is one such example. Without record companies, this could well be the way of all bands - the popular will get noticed, the less popular won't. I assuming those who are crap will be in the latter category. Anyway, if you're completely honest, can you really say that record companies have done a good job of scouting musical talent for you?

Someone needs to work with artists, to help them develop and hone their craft.

Plenty will do this for not much money - money most 1/2 way decent bands can get doing gigs

Someone has to put up the money needed to record CDs and produce videos, and put the artist together with the right producer, the right engineers.

This is the tough bit. However, gigging and selling cheap CDs can generate enough revenue to fund a cheap first decent CD. The right producer, the right engineers are generally currently vastly overpaid (most people higher up in the music industry are, if you haven't noticed). You do not need a great producer, great engineers, or great anything if you've got great music. If your pretty crappily produced first CD sells ok, get an OK producer for your next.

Much of I'm talking about only works ideally - that is if there weren't corporate sleazebags to contend with. However, the corporate sleazebags are getting more and more superflouos currently. Music is being discovered and published online more and more, and the role of the sleazebag is diminishing. He'll always be there, and if I'm honest I do think there will always be a Britney or someone sat up there in the charts because of the backing. However, the tide is turning for the better...

Content is king... if you're making platforms.

[Anonymous Coward]

I always interpreted "Content is king" as a mantra which indicates that content is a value-add for devices and platforms. Having content available for your device/platform makes it more valuable, but that doesn't mean that the content itself has intrinsic value.

You can consider content support to be like software support. There's an inherent network effect in having each for a platform, which drives consumers to it, which in turn drives more of the original draw. But (text/video/audio) content has more immediate appeal to people since they don't need to ask "What would I use it for?" So the Web, the iPod with iTunes, desktop OSes with media players out of the box, the DVD, and the MP3 format have been dominant categories of consumer goods.

The problem is that companies who produce content want to maximize profits, in doing so maximizing restrictions, in doing so minimizing availability, in doing so reducing the intrinsic value of platforms which invest time and money to support them, and more severely reducing the intrinsic value of platforms which are locked out from them. Thus we get Vista, a stream of failed online music stores, and artificial barriers to FOSS operating system adoption (mmm, tasty karma).

Piracy isn't intrinsically good, but breaking format lockdown on media increases the value of platforms and devices across the board. This is why content is king.