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Warner To End Free Streaming of Its Content
eldavojohn writes "If you have a license to stream content for free from Warner, be aware: Warner has announced plans to cancel streaming licenses. Major sites such as Last.fm, Spotify, and Pandora may be affected — Warner has not yet spelled out whether streaming restrictions will apply to existing licenses, or only to future ones. Warner's CEO Edgar Bronfman said, 'Free streaming services are clearly not net positive for the industry and as far as Warner Music is concerned will not be licensed.' You might contend that Warner gets a cut of the ad-based revenue these free streaming sites take in. While true, Bronfman contended that this revenue comes nowhere near what they need in compensation for each individual's enjoyment of each work. The article quotes spokesmen for other labels who disagree with Warner's stance, however. Music's digital birthing pains continue."
We tried streaming and working with those filthy nasty people pirating our shows.. And it didnt work! We need more laws quick! We must stop those dirty evil pirates!
>revenue comes nowhere near what they need in compensation for each individual's enjoyment of each work
Then they won't get anything.
It may be that the only reason I listen to Warner music is because it is streamed to me. I know if they no longer stream their music I will no longer listen to their music.
Hopefully that means Warner music will go the way of the dodo bird and we will not have to hear about such blind and bad business judgments.
They NEED me to pay them? Well I NEED to get my music for free!
...because I'm pretty sure this will only boost piracy...
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
Getting your song out for the masses to hear and possibly buy is clearly bad for business.
I wonder what the radio stations pay to play if Internet radio just isn't paying enough?
If I was witty I'd put something funny here but, as it stands, I am not and have just wasted seconds of your life
Say I had a bunch of bits on my server. Say those bits were recorded from people with talent and "permanently" placed on my server. I also have the right to sell those bits to whomever wants them.
The best part here, if you want to buy my bits, I send you a duplicate copy at next to no cost to me. Now you sell those bits or make money in/directly from them, I get a cut.
Now say a site out there wants to stream my bits to non-paying customers, but, I could see _some_ revenue from advertisements your site runs. How is this a bad thing for me as the bit holder? How is this hurting me?
Sure, I could let others stream my bits and get more money from them as they might have higher profit yielding business models. But in the end, site y streaming my music with advertisements isn't really going to hurt my profit from site x that charges an up-front fee (radio is unreliable if you want to hear x and y songs).
I guess my open question, to the recording industry is, if you can stream your bits to everyone and expect _some_ compensation from each, why wouldn't you want _everyone_ to start offering your products at whatever profit they can gleam for you?
If you're worried about piracy, well, that boat sailed a long time ago.
Profit is profit. You're not making a physical object that costs you x dollars. You're allowing others access to your bits that cost you next to nothing to duplicate (although, I know it costs _something_, it will be a lot less than physical items).
Obviously, that was rhetorical as the Recording Industry will never respond to me. But my own conclusion comes out as simple control, or at least their own illusion of control.
*Paying* Pandora Member/Customer
Warner, don't taze me, Bro!
yep, downloading some mp3s right now
I use Spotify a lot. But there's one huge problem: If Big Content pulls out then Spotify will wither and die. And if they do then my playlists, which contain the most valuable information for me, are also doomed. This is huge problem.
If I spend countless hours listening to music and discovering new artists without the ability to export my playlists in some open format (just the metadata, not the songs themselves), I'd get totally pissed if I can't access them any more. So as long as Big Content is threatening to pull out of these services (which apparently still pay more than radio from what I've heard) I'm not inclined to pay. I can always get the tracks themselves through some other service, but only if I know which they are.
I wish they would just friggin stop shooting themselves in the foot, and stop treating customers like the enemy. But I'm too idealistic, I guess...
.: Max Romantschuk
I like this line..."Bronfman contended that this revenue comes nowhere near what they need in compensation for each individual's enjoyment of each work" - it's a complete summary of the way the labels are thinking. Each time you do something - anything - that resembles enjoyment, their feeling is that somebody - somewhere - should be getting money from you. If you're thinking about a song but it isn't being played, in his mind, you owe for those few seconds. Consider that this is an industry that sells you a ringtone, then says you owe extra money when your phone rings because you just broadcast music in public. Stunning.
I guess the question is, what amount of money would he say is the right amount of "compensation" for each individual's enjoyment of each work? Because very few of these streaming services are making much money at all, and while I know executives in his industry have the feeling of "If we cut off access, people will pay us 100x more to listen to it! They'll be dying to listen to our music!" (how well did that work for online newspaper sites that decided to go behind a paywall?), the reality is, most people I know that enjoy listening to Pandora or last.fm would be perfectly fine if everything of Warner just dropped off it - they'd just continue listening to whatever it serves up on the various stations they've created and enjoy. They certainly wouldn't start paying big bucks to a Warner Music Station. The labels have tried that, they lose their shirt every time.
How is internet streaming any different than FM radio? Good luck with that, Warner.
That's bad news for people who post criticism of the music of an artist on a Warner label. Even though the fair use of a copyrighted work for criticism of that work or its author is permitted under United States law (17 USC 107), several venues for this criticism have a "remove first, ask questions later" policy that enforces a mandatory two-week downtime for any work that is the subject of a third-party copyright claim.
Didn't the laws for streaming compensation just change in the US because labels thought they weren't being paid enough? Now they want more money? Oh well, it's their loss. Streaming is the new broadcast radio. It's how people are discovering new music these days. If you don't have your music out on these sites then your artists will have less exposure. This is great news for the other artists (on other labels and independent) who will now have less competition on the streaming sites.
Cory Doctorow talking about cloud computing makes as much sense as George W Bush talking about electrical engineering.
Actually, I like these 'download-it-every-time-you-want-to-listen' streaming sites... I don't use it as my primary music collection, but it lets me experience music that I otherwise would not have heard. I've found quite a few bands that I otherwise wouldn't have even listened to if it wasn't for sites like Pandora. And TBH, listening to it on Pandora has lead to CD sales for me.
Yes, I do still buy CDs. I haven't gotten into the whole purchasing MP3s online. More often than not, I find that CDs are cheaper ($.99 per song vs $10 for a 12-15 song album). I do wind up ripping the CD into mp3s for my digital collection, but I like still having the CDs...
If a man isn't willing to take some risk for his opinions, either his opinions are no good or he's no good
When songs have been pulled from spotify in the past they have been left in my playlist but unplayable. This sucks for spotify tough, I'm currently paying for it so I can use it on my phone but if warner music gets pulled (no idea what artists they have) the value gets diminished and I bet the price will stay the same.
They just don't get it ey? People recognize music for what it is. Waves in the air. It has no value as such. Now they finally had a way to combat what is in some countries illegal downloading in a positive manner for both them and consumer and now they pull the plug. It aren't the downloaders who are killing the business, it's the business that is going for full suicide.
The streaming services are doing all the work. They host the songs. They pay for the bandwidth they use. Warner is doing NOTHING except giving permission. After that, they pay nothing. They do NOTHING.
Any money they get should be plenty, considering they do NOTHING for anyone. It's literally free money.
This is pure greed.
I'm gonna vent here because this just happened and is directly to do with digital media. A certain store that deals in tunes I emailed last week. My niece had spent over $150 on those 99 cent or so tracks there, at my encouragement. I really do want to see her at least start out on a path of compensating the artists (even though the labels can suck it). So, anyway, she had a catastrophic hard drive crash - everything gone. Reinstalled Windows no problem, go back to this tunes program, no option to re-download legally purchased music. A bit of Internet searching led to people referencing a mythical "form" which when filled out would get the Internet gods to flip a switch and give you a magical one-time additional download. Bandwidth doesn't really cost that much, this is a customer service issue here: it's different from physical cd's. So filled out the form and the days go by and no response. I'm disheartened. What did we do last night? I installed Limewire on her machine and I'll be damned if she's going to throw her money away again. $150 may not be a drop to them but to my thirteen year old niece it was a fortune I talked her into spending when she could have chosen to get her music the way everyone else does from the beginning. We'll try again in a few more years and see if the industry has smartened up by then. I don't have the heart to talk her into potentially throwing her money away again before then.
Shh.
Swedish text-tv had information yesterday/at night how Warner would cancel Spotify.
This morning however there was a new entry saying they where not and all their streaming services would remain.
Maybe they're trying to imitate EMI's recent success.
For those who don't know, EMI, who own the likes of the Beetles records and so forth recently just announced a £1.5 billion loss over the last financial year. They currently look like they could very well be heading to bankruptcy.
At least if they do end up that way, that's what, 1 down, 3 to go?
"I wish they would just friggin stop shooting themselves in the foot, and stop treating customers like the enemy. "
The more important thing I want to know is ... how many feet do they have to shoot? Surely they've run out of places to put the bullet by now unless they're putting the bullets through existing holes. ... Well, I guess that would explain why they seem pretty comfortable doing this by now.
How is internet streaming any different than FM radio?
Warner/Chappell, the publishing division of Warner Music Group, already gets money for its songwriters' airplay. As for recordings on Warner labels, 17 USC 106(6) states that the exclusive right to perform a sound recording publicly applies only to digital transmissions, not analog transmissions (such as FM radio), and 17 USC 114 states that it does not apply to a nonsubscription broadcast transmission licensed by the FCC (such as HD Radio).
Spotify denies that they're losing Warner.
To be clear WMG is not pulling out of Spotify. Media is taking things out of context. So don't worry-be happy :
http://twitter.com/spotify
I'm really getting sick of all this selfish industry news. Look, it is simple. We have the greatest tool the world has ever known to give our creations to the world and have it archived there for as long as humanity exists. If a business can turn any profit and keep people employed while at the same time sharing it with everyone then that is even better. They don't need record profits, they just need to cover their production costs and the salaries of their employees. As long as they are making enough to do that they should be happy.
Maybe Warner is ending their license, but can't the service just use the statutory license with SoundExchange instead?
What I think is probably going to happen is every Warner label artist, other than "Major" established bands (and possibly cultural phenomenons/one hit wonders) will never get off the ground.
I'm not a big torrent guy, and my wife only watches what is either on Hulu or gets caught by our DVR. Unless there are rave reviews for some show on cable, we don't see it, and don't care to take the time to find it. Music has become very similiar in its form of transmission. If I hear about a band directly from a friend that turns out to be a band I like, i'll go out of my way to find the band, but I would say 90% of the bands I find is through Last.fm and similar streaming venues. Warner now will not have access to the 90% zone of new music for me, which is about the dumbest move I could see a music label make at this juncture in the music industry.
Whether or not there is some sort of god, I'm not supposed to say/god is a word and the argument ends there-Smog
having an existential crisis is a good definition of humor, but its not a business plan
the only amount people will spend on music (apart from upper middle class westerners) is zero
and the internet makes it possible
you can't beat an army of technologically astute, media hungry, and POOR teenagers. your bought and paid for legislation is unenforceable. your garrison of lawyers can only catch clueless soccer moms and grandmothers
your only option is to fucking die already, music industry
the future is artists giving away their recordings for free, and making money via ancillary means like concerts, endorsements, advertising, personalized content, etc
there is no place for the distributor anymore. some of you will morph into promoters for pop fare. the rest, you've been replaced by the internet. fucking deal with it and die already
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
How can you say you hate something thats free? If you dont like it then dont watch or listen to it! There are some people I am sure that dont mind and deal with it.
List of Warner Music Group Artists
I bought Octavarium based on hearing Dream Theater on Spotify. I won't bother with the rest of their albums.
I'll also post on their Facebook / fansites telling them so.
Finally had enough. Come see us over at https://soylentnews.org/
This will give much more attention to indie bands!
I'm not sure I get this... Right now WB is making *some* money from streaming sites. This money is 100% pure profit, since all expenses are borne by the streaming sites. It's money flowing in that they have to do absolutely nothing for.
Yet they want to shut down their content on those sites. This will take their profit from some number X > $0 to $0.
It will be a net loss for WB. No money at all from streaming services.
I'm not sure I understand their business model. How does this make sense? I thought the entire point of a corporation was to make money, yet they are making less money by doing this. The music industry is completely batshit insane!
I use Pandora all the time. I paid the yearly fee and use the app on my computer as well as on my iPhone. One of the main reasons I bought an iPhone was because at the time Pandora didn't have an app for Blackberry. I've discovered a lot of music through the use of Pandora that I most likely would have never heard otherwise. I don't listen to the radio. Haven't watched any of the so called music channels on tv in years, not that they play music anymore though. Have I heard anything on Pandora that belongs to Warner Bros? I dunno. But if I have, if some of the music I've bought because I first heard it on Pandora and really liked it belongs to them, then they've made more money thanks to Pandora than just the advertising revenue. Pandora is a music discovery service. I put in what I like and it suggests other music which I then buy. Who is the moron at WB that doesn't understand that customers won't buy what they don't know about?
How is it that one careless match can start a forest fire, but it takes a whole box to start a campfire?
I buy CDs too. I can only think of 1 CD I bought in the last year (out of ~15) that was NOT a direct result of last.fm. I think these record companies still don't quite realize that streaming music sites are also advertising...
Well, it's what this whole thing reminds me of. Music simply isn't worth what it used to be because there's now more competition, and more choice in the market place. Warner needs to get smaller very quickly to survive.
If I ever start a band I will name it "Watching Diplodocus Starve"
-- $G
Pandora is the only reason I would buy a CD anymore. If WB has decided to cut them
off then they are cutting their nose off to spite their face. Pandora is the ultimate
personal DJ and it even comes with links to buy if you are so inclined. You really
have to wonder what they're thinking over there at WB.
What are they on?
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
I think, in their addled brains, they think of it this way.
1. We're making $X right now for doing nothing by providing music to these services, and there are people listening to that music and enjoying it.
2. Those people must not just be casual listeners, instead they must be so excited about listening to Warner music that if we cut it off they'll pay WAY MORE to listen to it from a service WE provide (this would be the fallacy in their reasoning).
3. Therefore, we should stop the streaming and maybe set up our own much-more-expensive service that all those rabid listeners are guaranteed to pay for!
And of course, the eventual:
4. No one signed up for our super-expensive, probably lower-quality service! BLAME IT ON PIRACY.
they don't like that they're actually already getting paid to stream, so apparently they'd prefer that they don't get paid to have their music streamed.
Impressive, isn't it?
Note that correctly: they don't let people stream the music for free, they charge people for it.
Warner to stop advertising
Warner says "negative CPM ad rates are still too high"
Warner chooses to remove consciousness of their products from internet users
Warner to customers: just download the torrent
...with Warners today, all you have to do is contrast this money-grubbing douche with the likes of Ted Templeman, Lenny Waronker, and Mo Ostin. These were guys who staged and kept alive a renaissance at Warners for over thirty years. They signed amazing people like Hendrix, Zappa, Little Feat, the Doobies, and that's just for starters. Ostin in particular was so loved that artists actually wrote songs for him.
But this moron...the only thing he's interested in--forgive me for the cliché--is money for nothing.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, write technology blogs.
Is it still my fault when the systems as a whole are engineered stupid?
Yes, because you chose non-free, engineered-stupid music instead of Free music.
http://gizmodo.com/5469042/warner-music-doesnt-much-care-for-this-free-internet-music
Edgar Bronfman's comment on the Warner conference call was addressing free on-demand services such as Spotify that are directly licensed. Pandora operates under a different licensing structure and won't be impacted by Warner's apparent decision with respect to free, on-demand services.
To quote Forrest Gump "Stupid is as stupid does". don't forget this is the same company that thought it was a good idea a decade ago to shell out insane money for AOHell. They just don't seem to get there are millions of folks out there that simply won't pay .99c a track, period. Of course if these PHBs had their way tracks would be starting at $1.49 and go up to $3, making sure nobody ever bought tracks online. With streaming services they can run commercials and folks have gotten so used to radio that as long as they have less commercials than radio folks will tune in.
To me this is NO different than the game DRM fiasco. Look at Spore, many legit customers ran like hell away from it because the DRM was too nasty, and how many times was it pirated again? I'm pretty sure it was like the MOST pirated game that year. No matter how badly they want to go back to the 1970s, where the only mediums you had wore down every time you played them insuring a constant revenue stream it just ain't coming back. With the Internet we have just so many choices for entertainment even if you never pirate that getting someone to even listen to your product is valuable. Hell with Windows 7 HP and Internet TV I don't even have enough hours in the day to watch all the programming I would like to see, much less listen to new music. While I would listen to Internet radio or streaming services just to hear something new, I'm not shelling out cash to hear some bands I may/may not like. I just have too many choices now.
If groups like Warner pull all streaming services that will be just one more group of artists I will never hear, will never go see in concert, will never buy their merchandise. Smart move Warner, I can see now that the same great business sense that thought AOL was a good idea is still alive in you!
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
And before that we tried ad-based radio and television, and see how it worked out! There's no way the music industry can grow if anyone can listen to music broadcast on the radio bands without paying. How will the artists live?
I see "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries" in the US Constitution. I don't see "compensation for each individual's enjoyment of each work." Mr. Bronfman is neither an Author nor an Inventor, and I can assure him that I do not enjoy any of his music.
I live in Canada, so I actually pay for last.fm. I think $3/m is still a great deal, considering how much I listen to it. However, I wonder if last.fm would have statistics on how many customers they lost by charging and whether it was worth it or not.
I subscribed at US$3/month to last.fm and it's probably the best value I get out that three dollars. On the other hand, its the thin end of the wedge as far as the finances go - I've heard artists and music I would never have discovered otherwise. Bad news for the big media companies though - I try and buy CDs direct from the band or as close as I can get. No point paying $30 on amazon.ca when I can order it direct from the artist for $15 including shipping.
One last point - I have become very sensitive to bullshit in quotes.
Warner's CEO Edgar Bronfman said, 'Free streaming services are clearly not net positive for the industry'
That's an assertion, not a fact. And I suspect that it is totally wrong, at least if we are talking about the music industry as a whole. If we are talking about the increasing democratization of available music on the web and the reduced reliance on megamedia to provide music for the masses, then maybe he has a point. Sadly for Warner, I'm more interested in good music than I am in the lining of Warner's quarterly statements.
Cheers,
Toby Haynes
Anything I post is strictly my own thoughts and doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the opinions of IBM.
Before the internet, if you wanted to be a truly successful music group, you had to go to the labels. Otherwise, there was no easy to way to get your music heard.
Now, anyone with a guitar and a microphone can record themselves and post it up for everyone to listen to. There are some people that just shouldn't do this for lack of skill, but this IS a boon to the folks that do have some skill, but are ignored by the labels. The technology is cheap/free to record, mix and render some high-quality original music. You post it up to the 'net, advertise it and voila! The listeners are there. The listeners are the final judge. When their only choices were what the labels told them was good, that is what they bought. But, their available options are greater. They have greater access to music that truly appeals to them. They can now ignore more freely the crap they didn't really like in the first place.
The labels aren't paying attention. They are looking at the wrong thing. They are so focused on the decreasing sales of the current crap, that they are failing to see the greater choice in bands they could potentially sign and then control. Find the music that the people are wanting to listen to, sign those bands. You accomplish two things at once. One, you have removed something from the market stealing from your bottom line. Two, you are now making money from the fans of that band.
The big labels are just too big to see this, though. I feel sorry for them.
Bearded Dragon
These things -- bottled water, diamonds, and music -- have much in common. The vendors of these products have created an artificial demand for a plentiful product. We are told that diamonds are exceedingly rare. When someone invents a process to manufacture flawless diamonds, we are told that only "natural" diamonds are proper tokens of affection. Bottled water is the same. We pay more for a gallon of water than for a gallon of high grade 93 octane gasoline. The same with music. There is no shortage of great music. Sure, there are local bands that just suck, but there are many of better talent than the few who the industry highlights.
Imagine if every slashdotter just replaced the contents of their music device with some local, unsigned, or "open" bands just for a few weeks. Play only that music. Print the lyric sheets. Learn the songs.
The artists write the songs
Record labels actually discourage recording songs that you've written in favor of recording songs that someone else has written. See controlled composition clauses. I guess it has something to do with the fact that it's harder to withhold songwriting royalties until the album recoups than it is to withhold recording royalties.
"Bronfman contended that this revenue comes nowhere near what they need in compensation for each individual's enjoyment of each work"
What if I stream something to see if I like it, only to decide it sucks more massively than Jar-Jar Binks? Will Warner pay me?
This is one inherent fallacy of attempting to monetize intangibles.
Another is that someone in the equation will likely overvalue their piece / portion / place, and thereby decrease the enjoyment of all.
It's obvious the suits running media companies are not paying attention to what works,.
Some days it's just not worth
chewing through my restraints.
The big media companies are still thinking in 20th century terms of creating scarcity and profiting from standing between people and what they think they want. The biggest challenge of the 21st century is the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those thinking in terms of scarcity, as you gave an example of. The irony goes for media publishers, who want to be compensated every time someone enjoys themselves and prevent others from being happy, rather than everyone just help each other be happy through gifts. But it also goes for things like military robots, used ironically to enforce wage slavery and other related hierarchical social processes instead of building robots to do the work. Or it goes for nuclear missiles, ironically to fight over land with oil on it, instead of building habitats in space for more land, or building power systems on earth from renewables or nuclear energy.
So, this is all part of a widely unrealized irony now that we are in the 21st century of potential abundance, not the 20th of real scarcity anymore. Now that we have so much technology, so many networks, and so much knowledge about better design, we need an economics of abundance for the 21st century. An economy of abundance might involve things like a gift economy (especially for things that are easy to copy), improved local communities with local production (like 3D printing), a basic income for all (like in Alaska, from the shared bounty of collectively owned natural resources), and better accounting, planning, and regulation for resource use given externalities like pollution or social problems caused by various economic strategies.
The alternative is just more artificial scarcity and make-work, which overall seems immoral to me if we understand the alternatives. Of course, given that only some people see this, how do we survive as individuals with one foot in 20th century economics and one foot in 21st century economics (Wikipedia, Debian GNU/Linux, RepRap, etc.)? Coming up with a good transition path to a society built around the assumption of material abundance is the short-term problem we all face.
Humor on this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midas_World
""The Midas Plague" (originally published in Galaxy in 1954). In this new world of cheap energy, robots are overproducing the commodities enjoyed by mankind. So now the "poor" are forced to spend their lives in frantic consumption, trying to keep up with the robots' extravagant production, so that the "rich" can live lives of simplicity. This story deals with the life of a man named Morey Fry, who marries a girl from a higher class. She is unused to a life of consumption and it wears at their marriage."
Seriousness on this, from the (sadly) late Howard Ziss:
http://www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/zinncomrev24.html
"""
However, the unexpected victories - even temporary ones - of insurgents show the vulnerability of the supposedly powerful. In a highly developed society, the Establishment cannot survive without the obedience and loyalty of millions of people who are given small rewards to keep the system going: the soldiers and police, teachers and ministers, administrators and social workers, technicians and production workers, doctors, lawyers, nurses, transport and communications workers, garbage men and firemen. These people - the employed, the somewhat privileged - are drawn into alliance with the elite. They become the guards of the system, buffers between the upper and lower classes. If they stop obeying, the system falls.
That will happen, I think, only when all of us who are slightly privileged and slightly uneasy begin to see that we are like the guards in the prison uprising at Attica -- expendable; that the Establishment, whatever rewards it gives us, will also, if necessary to maintain its control, kill us.
"""
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
I love streaming radio, in fact, the only radio i still listen to is last.fm and i'm actually a paying customer (European here), there is a huge market out there for streaming radio, the reason why i use last.fm is twofold: it plays the music genre's i like and i can listen to my radiostation for any internet connection that's fast enough, and i absolutely love it!
If however, if the costs of using last.fm rise due to these arses, i might stop using a paid for service and go back to carrying a hard drive filled with ripped cd's, that'll probably be net positive for Warner...
Incidently, i wonder if any of my favourite bands are actually signed up with them or not...
If you have a license to broadcast content for free from Warner, be aware: Warner has announced plans to cancel broadcast licenses. Warner's CEO Edgar Bronfman said, 'Free broadcasting radio services are clearly not net positive for the industry and as far as Warner Music is concerned will not be licensed.'
FTFY
Last year, I figure I spent close to $5000 on music (II am a Neanderthal collector).
And what informed a lot of those purchases? Listening to new music on Youtube, streaming networks, and sometimes Myspace.
And I can tell you straight up musicians who don't have a strong presence on the web got nary a red cent from me simply because I never knew they existed.
There are billions of recordings out there. I have become slightly dejected at the idea that I will never live long enough to hear a fraction of the best music available to me, but still, there is more than enough music to sort through. And way too much to purchase.
When a company like Warner performs a move like this, they figure they are increasing the value of the titles they own through exclusivity. Bzzzzt! Wrong: you have just removed those titles from my vocabulary, and any hope of me purchasing said titles drifts completely off the radar.
"The number of potential subscribers dwarfs the number of people who are actually purchasing music on iTunes," said Bronfman.
My bet is that Warner is gearing up to get behind the iPad. Warner is currently eye-balling the inventory of EMI which will probably be on the chopping block once Citigroup takes possession of EMI from Terra Firma. And Warner stands to gain immensely from any success Apple has furthering the portable business-in-a-box model. And Apple has already succeeded in changing the valuation of the eBook without delivering a single device, and Bronfman's statement is all about iTunes. He's a mercenary gearing up for war, and 'free' is not in his arsenal.
Don't forget, Warner publishes all types of media, and the iPad will soon be delivering all of them, nearly anywhere and at anytime, to anyone who decides they should afford themselves the luxury. And Apple has reproven that it can change the digital media consumption game by increasing the price of e-Books without so much as delivering a single device to a paying consumer.
To me that's a game changer in one other respect. Increasing the price of any retail asset is supposed to be difficult if not impossible, according to the B-school pundits. But Apple, Amazon, Macmillan and the mainstreaming media all acted in unison to make it look like it's natural. Amazon only screamed for a day when it was thrown into the briar patch. And I haven't been treated to any meaningful portrayal of the response from any of the consumer class who own a Kindle or a Barnes and Nobel Nook-e.
-- You there, on the chopping block... mind the shiny big sharp thing at the end of that hooded man's stick. --
... and nothing of value was lost.
There is no -1 Disagree mod. Slashdot.org/faq defines mod options. USE IT.
Also the alternative that these services need WB so much that they are willing to pay licensing fees to play the songs. This would change WB's profit to $X + $Y (where Y is licensing fees).
I don't even know what music WB owns. I stopped liking the music I was being fed since high school and that is when I stopped playing their game. No music is much better than crap music.
But as others have said, it's *always* really been your responsibility to protect the goods you purchase. If she had invested even $79 or so for an external USB hard drive (a lot less money than she spent on the music itself!), and did regular backups of her data to it, she wouldn't have had this issue in the first place.
I wouldn't get the ability for a "one time free replacement" of my collection of physical CDs and cassette tapes if they were all destroyed in a fire tomorrow, or they were stolen, or ??
On the other hand, I *might* have insurance that would pay for their replacement ... and I suspect that's another thing we could start seeing more of, as things go digital. Perhaps companies will start pushing insurance policies covering your expenses for intangible works, like software titles downloaded onto your Playstation 3's hard drive, or iTunes music purchases.
Big corps are a lot slower on the uptake, requiring massive change to several thousand people and not to mention investors to make a simple change. That is why it's always best to build in open mindedness into the business model from the get-go, like Google. Not to mention the fact that Warner has a clue from it's experience with AOL.
Quite true .... but most houses can't be protected against a flood as easily or inexpensively as a computer backup solution, either.
-1 Troll... Really? Mods?
Wait...TV is just a different form of TV streaming then internet streaming. In TV the ads are fairly general (shotgun). Online the ads can be tailored towards the viewer (it stores your watching habits, asks you questionnaires when you register an account, etc). Basically the advertising done for internet can be targeted for YOU which makes it more valuable to ad companies...more value = more money. Add to that fact you can keep a sidebar open with the ad so the person watching the view always has a picture of that burger king whopper. Basically..how are they not making MORE money on internet streaming then TV streaming...oh and btw, they don't have to pay cable providers a cut of the ad dollars.
I do not support "The Man". I also do not support your irrational stupidity
I downloaded the 52nd annual grammy awards show from usenet last week.
I was watching it last night and something ocurred to me that should have cut like a knife to those in attendance. Stephen Colbert was the introductory emcee for the show and during his monologue, he said something so poingant and pertinent that it bears repeating. He said, "... This year your industry was saved by a forty eight year old Scottish cat lady in sensible shoes... Congratulations to her!" This rang so true that it made me think about the industry itself. They are giving out the major category grammy awards based upon what pre-teens spend their money on. I guess this is why the album of the year went to a teenager who can't sing on key without IEMs.
The industry executives are still out of touch with reality. You don't get a grammy for selling your own music via itunes or magnatune or something else. You also don't get a grammy for being a musical genius. The industry perpetuates their own woes. They wonder why they're not flourishing in new media.
The executives aren't harnessing new media properly. They're not selling a product people want to buy. You can't cram your product down people's throat and expect happy customers. The music industry has become so complacent that they are treating their product like a commodity. It's not. It's highly subject to market forces and cultural preferences.
Until they learn to adapt to new markets and sell a product which people like, I won't be spending a single dollar on music.
They're using their grammar skills there.
This one's been in labor far too long. We need to perform a Caesarean section, stat!
I think we should start a 'legalise all torrents' campaign similar to the 'legalise weed' one.
And while we wait for legalized torrents all we'll get is medical torrents?
Help fight poverty: Punch a poor person.
...can make sense, if you make it competitive to other options available to consumers.
If you're charging $5-$10 a month to download 100s of DRM free mp3s per month that can be easily synced with mobile devices you may have a model on your hands. Want 1000s a month? Want 1000s a month and FLAC? $20 and $30 a month respectively.
The labels could make this work because:
1. People like novelty. Publish a great song this month? People stay subscribed.
2. People like feeling like they aren't being taken advantage of. Being able to stop at any time and keep the tens of thousands of tracks you've downloaded removes the fear of joining in the first place.
3. People like having their friends know what they like. Syncing up "official" subscriber downloads with social networking sites helps show who the "true" fans are.
Of course anything Warner does will suck, have horrible design, have tons of DRM and only work on Windows.
WMG own a big chunk of Spotify. Giving the Big Four effectively controlling interests in Spotify was the only way Spotify could get their song catalogues. So yes, they're shooting themselves in the foot. But also: if someone is bitching about not getting enough for play on Spotify, guess who's responsible for that? The Big Four is who. It's all smoke and mirrors. The Big Four aren't going to be big much longer. They've known that for years. Since the days of Napster. They're just bullshitting. I'd be surprised if the WMG statement wasn't to see who of the other monster companies would come around. But admittedly Bronfman is weird.
Or brain damage for that matter - you don't need any way to back up those pesky thoughts, especially if it's free. Those thoughts don't even belong to you, they are other people's interactions that you steal from them. but i digress.
If only someone could invent a way for me to get back those things that i lost. Like - electronic banking! WOW! Technology is amazing! i can lose cash but this electronic banking is way better than cash! Look, it completely changed how the world works! How cool, right?
Truth is, getting those songs back from iTunes would be more headache for Apple than it's worth because of companies like Warner. That's why Steve Job's younger brother invented Bittorrent.
And everybody knows that CD's are indestructible - http://englishrussia.com/?p=1579
As I tried to explain in my other comment, Warner employs recording artists. Streaming services do not employ recording artists.
I have no idea what this article is talking about. The source is apparently an interview with BBC news, so I'm wondering if this is something that only applies to Britain or maybe Europe in general.
In the US we have a fantastic little organization called SoundExchange. You may remember them from previous stories on slashdot about how they were trying to destroy internet radio by charging massively inflated prices. Part of the reason it was big news is because in the US internet radio broadcasts fall under a compulsory license. Even if you're an independent artist who is not represented by any of the labels that SoundExchange represents, broadcasters must pay SoundExchange to play your recordings.
Warner is in the same situation, and cannot opt out of this no matter how much they want to. They could make specific agreements with each and every internet radio station, but all the stations would have to do is say no. If no agreement could be reached it goes right back to the standard terms of SoundExchange.
I'm not an expert in licensing, but I do work for a radio network that also broadcasts on the internet. During the big SoundExchange debacle last year this is how everything was explained to me. I highly doubt any internet radio service in the US will be in trouble.
There's no guarantee it's ever less.
Given that Radiohead have tried with selling to distributor B who GIVES IT AWAY (while you pay them in your bandwidth costs), and merely ASK that they try distributor A who sells (and who costs you in bandwidth, however, because you're A, that's a null cost) and, in this case, made MORE profit than when they merely went through distributor C who was a label and their only distributor, this would indicate that it's highly unlikely that you're at a loss letting a cheap distributor have your digital music files.
From what I've seen it's all mainstream crap that I would rather than hear it either turn it off, if that is not an option....I get up and leave the room. Although, I am quite an asshole when it comes to music.....being a musician and all.
The more I listen to Pandora, the more cool indie artists I discover. I won't miss the Warner catalog at all.
The more they tighten their grasp, the more of us listeners slip through their fingers.
Here's a list of their artists, since I'm sure not many people know (or care) what label has which artist.
-chris
Did you read the "nominal fee"? No, because your knee jerked into the way.
And DRM copy protections and so on ALL make the digital music or CD uncopyable, so you are NOT ALLOWED to make a backup of your stuff in case there's a flood etc. The only one allowed is the one you bought the goods from. Except you're arguing they shouldn't have to, it's up to the customer.
Well, I'm afraid DMCA style laws make that impossible.
How, for example, am I supposed to make my DVD collection safe? NOTE: they're even fucking with the disk to make it uncopyable by computer, so don't give me "dd if /dev/dvd of=mydvd.iso".
Because every time I listen to "Boris the Spider," I go into throes of ecstatic pleasure, the mad fits and aftershocks of which last for hours. I must owe them millions. I wonder what the going rate for particle of dopamine is? Of course, if I have to listen to the crap my coworkers play on the radio all day, I think that maybe the record labels should owe ME a considerable compensation for my pain and suffering.
Warner got their ball, so they make the rules or else they take their ball home with them.
And for some reason, the rest of the world cares and can not simply pick up a snowball and give this Warner brat one to the back of its head.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Actually, from what I've heard it pays WAY less.
http://paidcontent.org/article/419-fair-dos-a-million-spotify-streams-earned-gaga-167/
Looks like a simple business decision to me.
I somehow find it hard to believe that last.fm , owned by CBS and charging their users doesn't already pay to WB. Or, spotify and pandora which are backed by huge venture capitalists. last.fm even pays per each user listening the entire song.
Also, these sites/services have reached to a popularity that, it is up to WB to beg for more spotlight. If they really think streaming to general public and let me remind you, paying for content public hurts their business... Well, they will be out of business soon with such thinking. If I was a shareholder or artist, I would look for a different company.
Funny thing is, they don't see that in 2-3 years, the entire industry will shift to streaming rather than "sell mp3 files" model.
"People want to see our movies and listen to our music. How can we stop them?"
Free streaming services are clearly not net positive for the industry
Blows my mind when they say things like that, it contains implicit assumptions about what "the industry" is. E.g., many indie labels are gaining significantly more exposure as a result of sites like last.fm. I'll agree that it's not net positive for Warner.
But this is a Good thing. Sure, producer surplus (profit) for the most major players has decrease somewhat, but consumer surplus (total benefit minus cost) has increased tremendously as we can now get tons of music for very cheap. But this is what happens when monopolies fall, they have to drop prices in order to compete and we are the beneficiaries. Who cares about Warner, people will always be making music, probably more now than ever since we're able to be exposed to so much more and culture begets culture. And now we have the tools to distribute that music without the big media companies.
I looked at Warner Music's website, this is their contact page: WMG Contact Us. I figure it can't hurt to politely express how you think free streaming improves their product and helps their bottom line. At the worst they'll send out a bunch of form emails about how hard it is to make profit these days and give you a good laugh. If you care enough to contact them, you are probably a good customer to keep happy, as you care about their product enough you likely talk about it (i.e. you like to talk about your favorite bands). They're a big company that probably thinks their marketing department can make up for any amount of angry customers- at the least we can confirm if that's true.
My webcomic
Do they hope legal purchases will fill the void? ...because I'm pretty sure this will only boost piracy...
I'm starting to think that is the plan.
Piracy has been the best thing to the music industry since, well, ever.
Before, they would charge maybe $10 per CD. These days easily up to $20 for the same CD.
With piracy in the picture, they got laws put in place so they can get just a few grand under a quarter million dollars for that one CD.
But when all they have to do is make it very difficult, or in this case impossible, to actually give them money for their product, in order to get $250000 for a $20 item, there is zero doubt in my mind this plan is working for them exactly as desired and that they planned.
Not sure exactly how Spotify works, but this is what I like about last.fm. I pay three bucks a month to listen to music on their servers. There's no multi-month discount, so I have no incentive to renew for many months at a time.
If their library gets gutted by Big Music, the most I'm really out is three bucks, and I move my listening time and money elsewhere.
- RG>
Hey pal, this isn't a pleasantforest, so don't waste my time with pleasantries!
Wouldn't a company say that regardless, if they stand to lose business?
If I spend countless hours listening to music and discovering new artists without the ability to export my playlists in some open format (just the metadata, not the songs themselves), I'd get totally pissed if I can't access them any more.
"Low Barrier to Exit" - a great phrase I read in Scott McNealy's recent farewell. Its a concept that Google seems to get with all their efforts to make sure you can get your data out of their various services and apparently Spotify doesn't.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
Like the saying where one can't see the forest through the trees, the record execs cannot see the OBSCENELY HUGE profits through their greed. They have a fixed idea stuck in their head, kind of like an autistic child who also has OCD, and cannot grasp the potential of making a couple of small changes and conceding a couple of points.
P2P results in a net gain of market share because it provides for free advertising.
Pandora results in a net gain of market share because it provides for almost-free advertising, but the advertising becomes a surgical strike, and you know with absolute certainty what your potential customers' musical interests are. If nothing else, at least you are creating "buzz" and ever-expanding the potential customer base.
Or, you assholes at Time Warner, etc. can continue down the path you're heading, and a lot of us will just say "no" to listening to pop radio, continue to not buy CDs, and continue to not participate in P2P networks (because redistributing your product helps promote its popularity).
So, go ahead and yank your content from Pandora. You've been suicidal for a while, so why not shutter the doors now while you're at it? Someone else will take your place on Pandora and earn the revenue that can come of it.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
A brilliant, masterful, and devious plan by the Music Industry. BraVo.
Oh wait..... The average piece of shit torrentin' piratin' scumbag does not have $250,000. *MAYBE* 3 years ago if you tried taking home equity into account in the US for some people, but the greedy bankers screwed that pooch. :)
So just where is this $250,000 dollars going to come from again?
If that plan really got going I could see the Music Industry getting a real fight from some other businesses. Specifically, credit cards (if they are still alive) and any other company that is collecting on the vastly huge amounts of debt the average American has.
What is really going to happen is a ton of people not being able to defend themselves (the EFF and others only have so many lawyers to defend the Jammie Thomases') and just going bankrupt.
That has to be a reaalllly good idea that is going to work out real well in the long run.
Unless of course they use their bitches in congress to make those judgments stick even after a bankruptcy. Ohh, and the Music Industry has the legal right to own a person as a slave when they don't pay the judgment.
LOL.
Yes, brilliant minds in that industry.
Yeah, I think it is enormous, that streaming content blows away from the internet. It is crazy! Because following this way it's possible to make all radios, and portable devices with loudspeaker out-of-law, (they're also make all audio content streamable through air and available to all people around :). And the climax point of this craziness is a something like was shown in "Equilibrium" movie. If you remember, all audio-video and printed forms of any art was prohibited :)
First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak out for me.
Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.
Oh noes! What will we do without free access to over produced, auto-tuned, pop BS from Time Warner?!?
I like this line..."Bronfman contended that this revenue comes nowhere near what they need in compensation for each individual's enjoyment of each work" - it's a complete summary of the way the labels are thinking.
It might be that, but it's also a complete fabrication. Here's what TFA actually said:
Free streaming services still pay royalties for each song played, usually supported by ads. But Bronfman contends that those royalties are far less than what Warner earns on download sales or from its cut of a monthly subscription.
Kind of different, no? In particular, the one that isn't made up says nothing about "needing" compensation for "enjoyment," it just says they make more money doing it this way than doing it that way. But that just makes them sound like good businessmen rather than social parasites. That won't do at all.