UMG To Price New CDs Under $10

marmoset writes "Perhaps a decade late, Universal Music Group has decided to try out sub-$10 CD pricing in the US. 'Beginning in the second quarter and continuing through most of the year, the company's Velocity program will test lower CD prices. Single CDs will have the suggested list prices of $10, $9, $8, $7 and $6.'" CD retailers are not convinced the price cuts will work out. For one thing it depends on whether other major labels follow suit, but the article notes that "executives at the other majors were nervous about the UMG move" and "privately, some appeared annoyed."

Comments

I Am Shocked!

[eldavojohn]

the article notes that "executives at the other majors were nervous about the UMG move" and "privately, some appeared annoyed."

You don't say. You mean to tell me that they might have to price their music competitively? That they might have to take a pay cut in order to compete in the market? That their 'silent agreement' of what all music should cost among the biggest labels is no more?

Music record contracts really annoy me in this respect. They are nothing but middlemen when it comes to publishing music. I understand their role in promoting and paying upfront cash for studio time but their role as publishers is leech at best.

If bands had the ability to pit manufacturers against each other in publishing their CDs and albums (and also if the band could decide what percentage they needed from sales) then we would see prices dramatically plummet. Look at CDBaby and think how inexpensive it could get if that kind of market was where we bought all our CDs. And in a capitalistic world, that's how it is supposed to work. But no, acts have contracts and the most popular acts love how the labels shove only those acts down our throats. The music industry is a sorry state right now and rarely do we hear news like this. At least UMG appears to be slowly realizing that it's adapt-or-die time.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Registered Coward v2]

If bands had the ability to pit manufacturers against each other in publishing their CDs and albums (and also if the band could decide what percentage they needed from sales) then we would see prices dramatically plummet. Look at CDBaby and think how inexpensive it could get if that kind of market was where we bought all our CDs. And in a capitalistic world, that's how it is supposed to work. But no, acts have contracts and the most popular acts love how the labels shove only those acts down our throats. The music industry is a sorry state right now and rarely do we hear news like this. At least UMG appears to be slowly realizing that it's adapt-or-die time.

We'll bands do have the ability to do that - it's just that an unknown band has to decide - do it myself or go with a label that may turn me into a hit? Most decide the later.

I'm not surprised that they are revising their pricing model - CD sales in the US are still significant (65% of sales) and with WalMart selling the highest share at 20% and driving pricing down to less than $10/Cd anyway all they are doing is giving in to the inevitable.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Jurily]

People still buy CD's?

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Anonymous Coward]

The way I see it, this is nothing more than a move to put them in a position to point a finger at music pirates and claim that illegal downloading is still costing them millions. This isn't about them making the music more affordable or reasonably priced. In a few months time, they'll come back with "People told us they pirate music because the legal channel is priced too high. So we lowered the price of CDs, but omg look - CD sales haven't gone up at all and they're still pirating our music!! We *must* use DRM and sue everybody in arm's reach to regain control!!!1!".

The companies are still thinking in terms of "CDs are the norm, digital downloads are an added convenience". This is false. Digital downloads are now the norm, CDs are left for collectors and the rare few who just like to own the physical media containing album art and inserts. The way I see it, a CD is a premium service that should cost more to have mailed to you. Digital downloads should be seen as the primary channel for distribution, and CDs are moot.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Rogerborg]

At the time of writing, yes, but ask again later.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[clone53421]

No, no, no... CD sales will leap, and they’ll then claim that piracy cost them ($20 – $8) x (increase in sales).

Re:I Am Shocked!

[MadKeithV]

I understand their role in promoting and paying upfront cash for studio time but their role as publishers is leech at best.

They only need to front studio money because they colluded with the major studios to ask for OBSCENE amounts of money for any kind of time in there. Really, it's NOT that expensive these days for acceptable quality, if you're not one of these people that absolutely wants to use 'vintage' technology for their 'warmth' and 'character'.

For a few thousand € you can get a very acceptable recording setup and practice yourself until you get good, there are plenty of like-minded people online to give you great advice and hints, and you can still send your stuff off to a "big name" to master and/or mix it if you want to do some name-dropping.

As far as promotion goes, if you're not Britney Spears, don't get your hopes up with a label. "Promotion" often means "we'll put your CD at the back of one of the flyers we'll send to record stores".

Re:I Am Shocked!

[White Shade]

For less than $10 I'd buy a lot more cd's than I do now. $9 to download an album, or $8-10 to get the better quality hard copy, it's a no-brainer.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Gr8Apes]

Digital downloads will be the primary choice as soon as the quality is on par with CDs. (ie, lossless compression)

Otherwise, downloads are fine for that one song or two to see if you like it, but mostly they still fail on decent audio equipment for regular listening.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't even remember the last time I've used an Audio CD.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[c6gunner]

Otherwise, downloads are fine for that one song or two to see if you like it, but mostly they still fail on decent audio equipment for regular listening.

Bullshit. Most DJ's I know have gone to using MP3's for their business needs. Any time you hear music at a club, bar, or formal function these days, chances are you're listening to an MP3. You may be one of those audio-snobs who insist that they can detect a difference but, even if we accept that silly claim, there's no way you can go from "a few people say they can detect a sight difference" to "lossy codecs fail for regular listening".

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Duradin]

If it is something I'll want to have around awhile and be able to easily shift formats, I'll buy the CD. Exceptions being when the music isn't available at reasonable prices (out of print, imports) for CD but are available at normal rates for download.

Like the Raiders of the Lost Ark and Temple of Doom soundtracks. The original CDs cost an arm and a leg and the recently re-issued versions changed up some of the tracks. E-Music had the import versions available for download and they were basically the original issue of the domestic versions.

If new CDs start out at $10 or less now I'll pretty much being only buying downloads for singles or absolute impulse buys, aside from my previously stated exceptions. Now if only they would include a re-release of the original Patton (and not the re-recording of it) soundtrack under this pricing scheme...

Re:I Am Shocked!

[tlhIngan]

Bullshit. Most DJ's I know have gone to using MP3's for their business needs. Any time you hear music at a club, bar, or formal function these days, chances are you're listening to an MP3. You may be one of those audio-snobs who insist that they can detect a difference but, even if we accept that silly claim, there's no way you can go from "a few people say they can detect a sight difference" to "lossy codecs fail for regular listening".

And those places aren't good listening conditions, nor do people really care about audio quality. Heck, I'd guess radio stations have gone MP3 as well simply because radio is a poor quality audio transmission medium to begin with. Plus, MP3 is great with some types of music (rock/metal/etc) where adding (dynamic-range) compression/distortions/etc and artifacting don't make a big difference, and can enhance the music. Hell, clipping can help, too.

But other types of music, like say, classical, orchestral and the like, (data) compression can add unpleasant artifacts to the sound. Add in clipping and it makes it even worse (this kind of music also often has huge dynamic range variations which is very hard to compress).

Finally, I will say that certain compression levels you can't tell, it's not being able to control the compression that hurts. I could buy reasonably sounding music through iTunes, confident in the 256kbps AAC to do a reasonably good job. But there's the little worry that if the music is too demanding, that 256kbps might not be enough (that's why people use VBR).

I personally buy CDs, that way I can control how it's encoded (I know that LAME presets do a really good job). Since the quality loss happens in the encoder, a good encoder and a lousy encoder will have visible differences in final quality.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[dc29A]

At least UMG appears to be slowly realizing that it's adapt-or-die time.

I was exited a bit, until I read the list of artists they have signed. 99% of it is commercial garbage I wouldn't even bother downloading.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[davester666]

It took this long for them to get the artists to agree to reduced royalties. Now, for these reduced price CD's, they only have to pay a penny to the artist and half a penny to the songwriter, per song. It's the only way the label can sell the CD for so cheap and still make money...

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Waffle Iron]

Any time you hear music at a club, bar, or formal function these days, chances are you're listening to an MP3.

I'm no audiophile, but even I can tell that the PA speakers used in those situations sound like total crap. Of course nobody would notice if the earsplitting output of those ugly black crates originally came from a less than perfect source.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Anonymous Coward]

Digital clipping would ruin whatever you're listening to regardless of the genre (unless live digital clipping is the music).
Also adding compression lowers dynamic range and I can't think of any genre where someone would want that to happen after mastering. They want you to hear it the way they made it.

Anyway, there is a large market for dj mp3s, they're usually at 320k which sounds rather good, while the crowd might not closely scrutinize sound quality, the dj (and any other nearby djs) will. You can also get stuff in uncompressed WAV.

Beatport is the industry leader for dj music downloads, here's what they offer.

Beatport currently provides music in MP3, MP4 and WAV file formats. All of the music on the site is sent in WAV format directly from the label partners (WAV Files are the original, uncompressed masters). Beatport then uses these WAV files to encode the MP3s and MP4s. MP3s are encoded at 320 kbps using the LAME encoder. MP4s are encoded using a Variable Bit Rate encoder at 192 kbps (or 170-205 kbps.)

Re:I Am Shocked!

[c6gunner]

He said "decent audio equipment for regular listening". DJ gear in bars and clubs certainly fall under that definition.

The rest of your points are more-or-less valid, although 256kbps AAC is overkill for ANY type of music, as long as you're only encoding 2 channels. 99% of people can't even tell the difference between a 160k MP3 and a CD.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[c6gunner]

I'm no audiophile, but even I can tell that the PA speakers used in those situations sound like total crap.

That might be the norm if you live in downtown Kinshasa. Here in North America - and in most of Europe - decent DJ gear produces much better sound than anything you have in your house.

Of course, if you're basing your estimates on the gear at the local strip-joint, you're probably right. I suggest going to places that don't cater to wasted, lonely old saps.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[umghhh]

I think there must be some confusion here.

Not sure how this works in US but in Europe at least the lawyers have discovered new paradise - mass produced requests to settle or face court case are being produced to get easy money although not all agree with this approach but it still works fine, Why bothering with actually selling stuff? Threaten to sue whoever looks like prospective customer of hard pr0n and you can be sure money will flow. How nice that legal system of big European countries (the same happens in Germany from what I know) go along.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[hondo77]

You're so indie that you don't even know that UMG is a major label group and that major labels sign commercial acts? And you just had to let everybody know, right? I guess you've scored your smug points for the day.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[StuartHankins]

Actually I'm of the opposite mindset. Not only do the downloaded versions not have to be ripped, but they cannot contain trojans from Sony. That's been one of the reasons I haven't bought any physical CD's in a very long time.

For me, the whole Sony problem was not academic as I was one of the people who had the rootkit. I wasted a lot of time researching and removing it and finally just wiped the system and started over -- with a Mac.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[xaxa]

Bullshit. Most DJ's I know have gone to using MP3's for their business needs.

The DJs in the clubs that I go to round here use CDs. Maybe the DJs in the popular clubs use MP3, but I doubt it -- those are big venus, and can easily afford excellent equipment etc. Maybe it's only the "DJs" in tiny venues where you don't really go to listen to the music that use MP3?

Even the guys at the student union used CDs.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Bobb Sledd]

I produce MP3's for mass distribution, and also support them when they don't function correctly (encoding/corruption issues).

In my opinion, VBR is not supported well-enough for mass consumption. Too many players out there still dork up when VBR is used. Granted, it's typically older players, but they are still out there.

The majority of people cannot tell the difference between (get this) 32kbps and 128kbps. I'm talking about the general population, not music enthusiasts. Most engineers cannot tell the difference between 162kbps and 192kbs, and certainly less of them can distinguish 192kbps and 256kbps -- and even I have doubts that most of those can in a true blind test.

But consider this: I put forth that the reason the you don't need full 44khz 16-bit audio is that you'll never hear the music as originally intended, and that is because of the following factors:

1) You usually listen in your car, and road-noise alone will destroy your ability to discern slight volume changes and perception of frequencies anywhere near 12khz and above

2) If you don't listen in a car, you often use your cheap speakers on your laptop

3) Most headphones people use are either cheap (under $50), or they are biased on the lower-end, and most are not equalized correctly, or not equalized to your ear physiology (different sizes ear canals can cause resonance/standing waves that cause a different perception in frequency for different people -- each set must be tuned individually if you are a true audiophile).

4) If you're older than 21, you probably can't hear above 16Khz at all

5) Your ears are not perfect (many people's frequency response is different from one ear to the other)

6) Your player is not perfect

7) Your speakers are not perfect, and you most likely haven't calibrated them with an RTA for the room they sit in or for where people are actually positioned.

8) The humidity, temperature, air pressure, and even the air pressure on the other side of your ear-drum changes frequently causing a difference in frequency response.

And if I'm completely wrong on points 1-8, then you are now in the .01% of all listeners, and you are not the target audience for mass-produced and distributed MP3s anyway.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Waffle Iron]

louder != better

As for the rest of your comment - you seem like a real class act.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[ooshna]

Thats a good thing. If people actually buy CDs from UMG then other places will follow suit.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Threni]

> You don't say. You mean to tell me that they might have to price their music competitively? That they might have to take a pay cut in order to compete in the market?
> That their 'silent agreement' of what all music should cost among the biggest labels is no more?

Uh..no. This isn't about `music`, it's about CDs. They're on the way out. These are their death throes.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[wealthychef]

they only have to pay a penny to the artist and half a penny to the songwriter, per song. It's the only way the label can sell the CD for so cheap and still make money..

It almost sounds like you're serious, so I'll just go ahead and point out that at 1.5 cents per song, that leave $9.75 at least out of $10.00 that does NOT go to the artist. So blaming the artist for high CD prices is of course ridiculous.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Anonymous Coward]

FM Radio has a 15+ kHz bandwidth and you can clearly hear MP3 artifacts via FM broadcast.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[davester666]

Of course, the royalties are first put towards marketing expenses, production costs, daily hookers for the producer, and anything else the record label could conceivably bill before either the songwriter or the artist gets anything.

Because if it weren't for the label's, the entire music industry just wouldn't be viable. The world would be without music.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[c6gunner]

louder != better

That's the first thing you've managed to get right so far. Good job!

Re:I Am Shocked!

[brianosaurus]

Amen!

While it is conceivable that some super-hearing audiophiles can detect a difference when listening in their acoustically perfect sound-proof rooms, that's hardly "regular listening" for most people. In any other place where there is actual ambient noise, decent mp3s are probably indistinguishable from CDs (especially newer CDs where they over-process and compress everything so it seems "louder").

CDs will continue to be the primary choice as soon as music stores stop closing down.

Digital downloads are the primary choice for the younger generations, and the rest of the population is trending that way. Convenience is king. Physical media is becoming a niche market, much in the way vinyl records and tapes gave way to CDs (even though many people continue to claim that CDs "fail on decent audio equipment for regular listening" compared to dragging a small chunk of polished rock through grooves on a plastic disc).

Re:I Am Shocked!

[bluefoxlucid]

DJ equipment is unbalanced. The sound system in a church is often more balanced than the sound system in a bar. The sound system in a church is usually on par with a music conservatory or opera hall; whereas in a bar, the highs and mids often have more accenting and the speaker placement is sub-optimal (I walk around and find dead spots and frequency concentration changes all over the place, and other spots where I can't stand because the highs are piercing loud and the speakers are way far away). The distribution of warm bodies-- especially due to where they put tables and the side/center bars-- and the orientations of the speakers and even MISMATCHING (10 sets of speakers hung everywhere, 3 different models with different response characteristics) destroy the sound quality.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Anonymous Coward]

forget the diference between MP3s and CDs. Plenty of people can't tell the difference between Lady Gaga and good music ;)

Re:I Am Shocked!

[bluefoxlucid]

I've encoded a 48kbit/s MP3 to prove a point when someone was telling me there weren't artifacts in 128kbit/s. He said, "Holy shit, this sounds like it was abducted by aliens!" Then he started hearing those things in the 128 and 160 tracks, because he knew what he was listening for. Seriously, everything sounds like it's produced by modulating crash symbols and trashcan lids.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Rich0]

Well bands do have the ability to do that - it's just that an unknown band has to decide - do it myself or go with a label that may turn me into a hit? Most decide the later.

I don't think it is just whether the label turns the band into a hit. There is also what I'd call risk equalization.

If you strike out on your own the business model is simple. Either you lose a fair amount of money (whatever you spent on promotion/production/etc), or you strike it enormously rich (probably slowly since you won't have much capital). 99.99999% of the time you lose the fair amount of money.

If you sign with a record label the business model is also simple. You will not lose any money under any circumstances. You will definitely get to keep your advance, which for a 20-year-old artist is a fair chunk of cash. Most likely that will be the end of it, but there is a modest chance that you could make a little more money, and a very very small change that you'll be a mega hit and outlast your contract and be able to be super-rich.

Essentially record labels take money from the people who are hits and spread it out among those who don't become hits (while keeping 90% of the money for themselves). They also take all the risk - they're the only ones putting out hard cash.

For a new band they have the choice of making taking a $100k advance RIGHT NOW, or seeing how many CDs they can sell on their own - without serious promotion. Making even $100k selling CDs on your own is EXTREMELY difficult - especially without any capital investments. Sure, signing the deal means that you could end up getting $120k instead of $25M, but most likely it means you'll get $100k instead of ending up with a crate full of CDs and T-Shirts that you can't sell while you work at the pizza place down the street.

Don't get me wrong - the whole industry needs a major overhaul. However, most people critical of the RIAA miss the fact that it does provide one valuable service to the new artist, and that is the key to their success.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Bobb Sledd]

Generally, you're correct, it does. But I've found that it also largely depends on the encoder you've chosen, and the Quality Setting that you're encoding with (different from bit rate). Some encoders actually work really well at 32kbs (for speech), others make it sound like it's played under water. Some encoders sound trash at 32kbs with low quality, and sound good at 32kbs with high quality.

And also the content you're encoding can make a difference.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Bobb Sledd]

I don't think there will really ever be lossless compression for audio (at least for streamable media). I may be wrong, but the interest is always in saving bandwidth, not necessarily perfect fidelity reproduction.

There are (truly) lossless audio compressors that can gain better than 52% compression rates, which is far better than using ZIP or LZW.

But at some point, to get data at manageable sizes, you MUST go with lossy compression.

Nothing wrong with that, in my opinion. JPG, MPG (almost all streaming video formats for that matter), use lossy compression.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Anonymous Coward]

"The music industry is a sorry state right now"

No it's not, there is a ton a great music out there, probably more variety then ever before in history. A lot of it is free, or very cheap. It's just the major labels that are hurting because they are too slow or reluctant to adapt to a changing market. The Indy labels/artists are doing just fine.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Voyager529]

As a mobile DJ who has friends all over the industry, I can tell you that MP3 has become the de facto standard here. Sure, you'll find a few jocks who still spin pressed CDs and/or pressed vinyl, but they are a minority.

More often than not, you'll find that you're listening to MP3's anyway. Serato/Traktor/Torq/Virtual DJ have made serious inroads, and they all support timecoded CD and vinyl, so even if they look like they're spinning CDs, if there's a laptop in sight, they're spinning timecode and you're listening to MP3s off their laptop. Even if they have regular discs, companies like PrimeCuts, Promo Only, RPM, etc. also burn MP3 discs, and EVERY DJ-grade CD player plays MP3's nowadays. Finally, services like Crooklyn Clan and Crack4djs.net make their releases exclusively in MP3, so even if they burn Redbook audio CDs, you're still listening to something that started as an MP3.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Gr8Apes]

I'll respond to you directly on the couple of items I didn't see in the other replies:

1) DJs generally play dance/electronica - which are ideally suited for MP3 style compression. They are also more concerned with blasting it out loud than at a moderate level in an appropriate listening environment. (ie, not a dance hall or the like)

2) Most music at formal functions are the equivalent of FM radio in their sound output/speaker quality

3) Even my car stereo will allow easy discernment between a 192kbs MP3 and a full WAV file for some of the types of music I listen to.

4) Studies done on youth music preferences have discovered not surprisingly that they prefer the flatter MP3 sound than high fidelity recordings.

And no, I'm far far from an audio snob. I just realize that certain songs I listen to sound like crap in MP3 formats unless you go to 256kbs or higher, and some do not work even then.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Registered Coward v2]

Well bands do have the ability to do that - it's just that an unknown band has to decide - do it myself or go with a label that may turn me into a hit? Most decide the later.

I don't think it is just whether the label turns the band into a hit. There is also what I'd call risk equalization.

Snip

Don't get me wrong - the whole industry needs a major overhaul. However, most people critical of the RIAA miss the fact that it does provide one valuable service to the new artist, and that is the key to their success.

I agree - the labels assume all of the risk with new bands so they are going to get almost all of the money; especially since a few hits have to pay for all of the costs of those that don't even become one hit wonders.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Golddess]

It's the only way the label can sell the CD for so cheap and still make money...

Of course, the royalties are first put towards marketing expenses, production costs, daily hookers for the producer, and anything else the record label could conceivably bill before either the songwriter or the artist gets anything.

In other words, you were just being sarcastic in your first post.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[j00r0m4nc3r]

Of course, the royalties are first put towards marketing expenses, production costs, daily hookers for the producer, and anything else the record label could conceivably bill before either the songwriter or the artist gets anything.

Which are exactly the terms the artists agreed to when they signed the shoddy contracts.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[AmonTheMetalhead]

That's what you get for using Windows, seriously, settling for a lesser quality product because the OS you use on your computer is exploitable by just about any idiot out there is stupid.

Sure, Sony was in the wrong, but condemning a whole industry because one label was insidious enough to root people's (Windows based) computers is over reacting.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Yeknomaguh]

I was a mobile DJ a couple years back for awhile, and will back this up. The vast majority of the industry is using mp3.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[StuartHankins]

...settling for a lesser quality product because the OS you use on your computer is exploitable by just about any idiot out there is stupid.

As I explained, I do not feel downloadable music is in any way inferior to physical media, for the reasons I gave as well as I can't hear the difference. Maybe it's me, maybe it's my equipment (and far more likely it's me since I was a car audio enthusiast for my teenage years; I competed and placed in several IASCA events) but unless I'm listening to classical music I really can't hear 160KB vs 256KB vs physical CD anymore.

condemning a whole industry because one label was insidious enough to root people's (Windows based) computers is over reacting.

Huh? I switched delivery method for my music. That's hardly condemning a whole industry. They still get my money, but on my terms. Besides I'm still mad that I have to pay full price for new CD's that I bought and then lost / scratched / had stolen / etc. There's another reason for abandoning the physical media.
Or are you referring to my move away from Windows -- the OS which allowed this to happen despite having paid antivirus installed/configured/running at all times? The Windows security model obviously was seriously flawed enough to allow this to happen, so I migrated away from it.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Gr8Apes]

a 700kbs stream is starting to not be all that large (the roughtly 50% compression, although the best I've seen is 40% so far - but that was a couple of years ago that I ran those tests.)

I personally believe that within 5 years people will be asking why anyone ever compressed anything, as bandwidth and storage devices both increase capacity far beyond what's needed for audio. Video will take longer.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[b4dc0d3r]

"The way they made it" these days is highly compressed, so that it stands out as seeming louder. It also fits the radio or iPod medium better so you don't have to turn it up/down. There are piles of articles going back many years lambasting this technique, which more studios are using for more music. One example below.

http://www.stylusmagazine.com/articles/weekly_article/imperfect-sound-forever.htm

Also, lower bitrate mp3 tends to sound fine on standard equipment, but true high fidelity speakers usually makes it easier to hear the compression artifacts. So while I can't tell the difference on my home $20 speakers (which sound quite nice actually), having a DJ table at a wedding party as an example requires big speakers, which usually do good bass, which is what tends to get dropped. Not sure if LAME is as bad as others, but the average mp3 floating about has serious bass distortions.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[The New Andy]

There are still very good reasons to avoid buying mp3s:

1) Postprocessing (e.g. a graphic eq) might raise the volume of bits the encoder assumed were quiet enough to skimp on bits for.

2) For mobile devices, you might want to optimise for battery life. For my player, this means FLAC, for others it might be a different format... I don't want to be re-encoding an mp3 as something else lossy (or even just dropping its bitrate)

3) Getting gapless playback support isn't quite mature enough yet in my opinion (lots of players don't get it right).

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Kitkoan]

Otherwise, downloads are fine for that one song or two to see if you like it, but mostly they still fail on decent audio equipment for regular listening.

Bullshit. Most DJ's I know have gone to using MP3's for their business needs. Any time you hear music at a club, bar, or formal function these days, chances are you're listening to an MP3. You may be one of those audio-snobs who insist that they can detect a difference but, even if we accept that silly claim, there's no way you can go from "a few people say they can detect a sight difference" to "lossy codecs fail for regular listening".

I do notice the difference in MP3 quality, so do most GOOD DJ's. Though many DJ's know that even though their speakers show the difference, the clubs they play at have crappy speakers meant to play music loud, not good, to drunken listeners who don't really care. Lower grade MP3's tend to sound 'further away', like it sounds like I'm not listening to my headphones and more like listening to a speaker a few feet away. But it does depend on a couple of factors.

1) The audio device needs to be able to give a good quality audio signal. My old MP3 player, the most popular one on the market, was pretty good for sound. Did the job and it wasn't more of I could hear the sound quality but more that I got used to its lack of audio quality. But when it died I decided to get an audio player that was the best (at the time) audio playback. And it was the difference of night and day. Sounds you could barely hear or never hear suddenly came forth. It was the same MP3's, but the quality was much nicer and better when I played .FLAC files.

2) The music style. Oldies, acoustic and soft music tends to not lose much if anything in a decent encoding (128 is not decent, my dj friends showed me that years ago with their sound equipment). I listen to a lot of industrial music that uses bass and sound effects that, quite frankly, are chewed to hell and back by even 192kbs mp3's (songs like Girl Poison by Angelspit (some language warning) which is chewed already by this youtube video). Sounds like that need high quality encodings which are rarely sold through online stores.

3) Speakers are the final need. Again, you can hear a 'distance' when listening to a cheap pair of $20 dollar headphones, and notice the difference of quality in $60+ headphones. At first you might think the cheaper pair sound better, but its just difference. Once you get used to it, you'll notice the difference and its hard to go back. Just like HD. And if you think it matters take a XBox360/PS3 and play a game on HD for a while and then plug it into an old SD tv, you will see the difference.

As for this article, will it make a difference? Depends on what cd's. The internet has given power to the indie scene and now there is more music then ever to buy and in many styles. All the music I listen to, none of my friends listen to and I'm not alone in thats sense. Big companies have put all their money in pushing sales of Pop, Hip-Hop and Rap which I've seen a severe lack of listeners of unless you count the 18 or younger crowd. Its rarer to see 19+ people to listen to that style music. Not impossible but harder. If all the cd's on sale are just the same few tired bands that only kiddies want to listen to like Lady Gaga, Nickleback and D12 then I don't think it will matter much in sales. Music has many styles and tastes now, much larger selection all aiming for the same amount of money.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[amRadioHed]

Wow, way to ruin the poor guys whole mp3 collection.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[MacWiz]

For a new band they have the choice of making taking a $100k advance RIGHT NOW...

So let's say you've got a basic 4-piece band. That's $25,000 each -- to last you the term of the contract, usually 7 years. Or roughly $3,500 a year. WHAT A DEAL!!! So delivering pizzas is probably the wiser choice. They may even have benefits, which won't be a part of that record contract.

Most likely that will be the end of it, but there is a modest chance that you could make a little more money.

"Modest" as in "slim to none." You'll do better in tips at the pizza place.

If you sign with a record label the business model is also simple. You will not lose any money under any circumstances. You will definitely get to keep your advance...

And even if you pay off your advance, you will also definitely never own the recordings you created. It's kind of like a mortgage, except after you pay off the loan, the bank still keeps the house.

Or you can put your music on iTunes, skip the cartons of unsold CDs and avoid the fairy stories of how beneficial a record contract is. Play our every weekend. The local bar pays almost as well and no vultures are hovering over you, waiting to make sure that they get 85 cents out of every dollar.

More than 90,000 albums were released that way last year just through Tunecore.com alone. $50 for global retail distribution without the bullshit. True risk equalization.

The old way is dead.

most people critical of the RIAA miss the fact that it does provide one valuable service to the new artist...

The RIAA is a lobbying organization. It provides no service to the artists, unless you want to count suing their fans and driving sales down.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Rich0]

First - my figures were illustrative - I do no work in the recording industry so I do not know what their typical offers are. For some reason LOTS of artists sign on, so they must be offering (or at least promising) something decent.

If the records do sell really well you do get royalties beyond the advance, although the terms are pretty one-sided.

You say that 90,000 albums were sold online via one particular outlet. That sounds impressive, but what is the distribution? Is that 20,000 bands selling four albums each? Is that 10 bands selling 8,000 albums each and 1000 bands selling 10 each? Neither looks all that good to a new artist - sure if you're one of those 10 you could make as much per year as your advance (and you'd make more from other outlets as well), but if you're one of the 20,000 or one of the 8,000 that isn't much.

I know a couple of guys who are playing in small venues for fun and selling tracks on amazon and itunes. They do it because it is fun, and I'm sure they make enough money to pay for their guitar strings. However, I don't think they're under any illusions that they'll be quitting their day jobs, which are considerably better-paying.

The problem with selling CDs is that ANYBODY can do it, and most bands are one-hit wonders. A record company can milk that for all its worth and get teenagers to buy five follow-up albums for some reason I can't fathom, but most independent artists actually have to make VERY high quality music to accomplish this. Most people can't do this, and if they do it is still hard to get discovered.

Don't get me wrong - if I were going into music I'd be more inclined to be independent, but most recording artists sign these contracts when they're 20 years old, and they don't have any business sense. Maybe for them it is the right way to go - it takes some work to create a brand and I'm not sure the average singer or guitar player has the right skills.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[adolf]

Indeed. Some of the prettiest-sounding music I've ever heard has come from pro audio speakers, set up properly.

Well-designed horn loudspeakers are awesome things, for their almost complete lack of power compression, and their vastly reduced cabinet resonances in the 1-2KHz band where we hear things most clearly.

That said, there is a lot of trash out there on the market. And, unfortunately, in the tradeoff game between loud/good/cheap (pick any two), many club owners/DJs/whoevers pick "loud" and "cheap." But for those who pick "loud" and "good," genuinely excellent sound can result.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[MacWiz]

If the records do sell really well you do get royalties beyond the advance, although the terms are pretty one-sided.

Theoretically true, but this assumes that the label actually keeps their side of the agreement. Since they never do, "royalties beyond the advance" almost qualifies as a musician's urban myth.

Remember the Bay City Rollers? They sold millions of records. Never got a dime past the original $250,000 advance. Sony is currently holding about $60 million that's due to the band because they (Sony) lost the original contract and doesn't know how to pay it out. So they haven't. For 40 years.

The Beatles (what's left) sued EMI last year for skimming royalties.

The record labels are under constant audit by the artists. There's like a 5-year waiting period when you get in line to see their accounting. In 50 or 60 years of this, the record label accounting has proven to be accurate or a mistake was made in the artists' favor exactly twice, unless they accidentally passed an audit in the last couple of years.

If they get caught, they usually settle for like 10 percent, so they get to keep 90 percent of what they steal anyway.

You say that 90,000 albums were sold online via one particular outlet.

That's not what I said. I said 90,000 new albums were distributed via Tunecore. They went to iTunes, Amazon, Rhapsody, Napster and a dozen other outlets. The distribution is global.

The problem with selling CDs is that ANYBODY can do it...

Except the record labels, apparently.

If you really meant that anyone can MAKE a CD, that's not a problem, unless you're a record label and used to have complete control over who can and can't be heard. But the idea is to NOT make CDs beyond 100 or so at a time to sell at live shows.

...and most bands are one-hit wonders.

This has been true since I started listening to music in about 1960 or so.

it takes some work to create a brand and I'm not sure the average singer or guitar player has the right skills.

The very idea of creating a "brand" is half the problem with the music industry today. No talent? Can't sing? No problem! We've got autotune. Can't play a lick? No problem! Let's release a line of pants and perfume.

A record company can milk that for all its worth and get teenagers to buy five follow-up albums for some reason I can't fathom...

Oh, you must be talking about Disney (Hollywood Records) which is the only label currently doing that. That's easy. They play it every day for a month for free on Disney TV. Repetition is the key here, just like Top 40 used to be. After two or three weeks, parents that have been listening to High School Musical or Hannah Montana are happy to buy a copy to go on the kid's iPod just so they don't have to hear it anymore.

I think we have a warped idea of what "popular" music is. In a country of 300 million people, selling a million records means you reached 1/3 of one percent of us. Barely even a niche market.

...but most independent artists actually have to make VERY high quality music to accomplish this.

Ever heard any independent music on the radio? I live in Phoenix, which is currently the 5th largest city in the U.S. In the past 15 years, I have heard exactly one song by a local unsigned act played on the airwaves.

----------

But this is all okay, even the part where we're not under any illusions that we'll be quitting our day jobs (our guitarist is a stockbroker and your theoretical advance doesn't even cover his salary alone). The industry is suffering, the audience is being sued, ASCAP is shutting down venues left and right, and the RIAA is trying to squeeze royalties out of radio, which they have steadfastly controlled through cash, cocaine, and hookers since way back.

Just like jazz, blues, country and western in the 1930s, we (the independents) have been judged not worthy. But one day, maybe as the royalty heari

Re:I Am Shocked!

[bluefoxlucid]

In the same way a bottle of Duvel ruins your appreciation of shit beer?

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Marauder2]

1) You usually listen in your car, and road-noise alone will destroy your ability to discern slight volume changes and perception of frequencies anywhere near 12khz and above

Actually, I usually have talk radio on in the car...

2) If you don't listen in a car, you often use your cheap speakers on your laptop

Can't say I do that either. Sure, sometimes I'll use the lower fidelity of headphones/earbuds hooked up to my iPhone, but that's not where most of my listening takes place...

3) Most headphones people use are either cheap (under $50), or they are biased on the lower-end, and most are not equalized correctly, or not equalized to your ear physiology (different sizes ear canals can cause resonance/standing waves that cause a different perception in frequency for different people -- each set must be tuned individually if you are a true audiophile).

Well, the headphone/earbuds I usually use fall in the ~$70-100 range, even though I'm not an "audiophile" since I refuse to pay $400 for magic ethernet cables...

4) If you're older than 21, you probably can't hear above 16Khz at all

Well, my ears aren't as good as they were ten years ago, but I've tried to avoid the normal things that cause hearing loss and damage (such as, I dunno, obscenely loud music?)

5) Your ears are not perfect (many people's frequency response is different from one ear to the other)

of course.

6) Your player is not perfect

of course...

7) Your speakers are not perfect, and you most likely haven't calibrated them with an RTA for the room they sit in or for where people are actually positioned.

of course......

8) The humidity, temperature, air pressure, and even the air pressure on the other side of your ear-drum changes frequently causing a difference in frequency response.

well, yes...

And if I'm completely wrong on points 1-8, then you are now in the .01% of all listeners, and you are not the target audience for mass-produced and distributed MP3s anyway.

Though I never said I was the target audience for "mass produced mp3's", your post really comes across as a snotty "audiophile"... I've pretty much stopped listening to the Mp3 format. The music on my iPhone is mostly 256kbit AAC with a sprinkling of Apple Lossless. One of the reasons I often buy CD's over downloaded is because I know I have them in the most lossless and unencrypted format available to me. There are a few high-end sites (such as Linn Records UK) that sell lossless FLAC format music not only in standard CD 16bit/44.1khz but also in higher resolution "Studio" quality formats 24bit/88.2/96khz, some tracks are even available in 192khz. The "modern" pop/rock/etc. stuff isn't as much of a big deal but when dealing with stuff that is a lot more about the acoustics then you better believe the audio fidelity makes a difference.

Of course music that is produced with the intent of distribution at the higher resolutions often has higher production values anyway since they are targeting a different audience that cares about such things as the dynamic range and who are more likely to pick up on subtle issues whereas many "joe listeners" prefer the sound of the lossy compressions since that's what they have been raised listening to... sad really.

Sure, I don't have $10k speakers or a $20k receiver, but I can hear subtle differences, even if some of it may be attributable to placebo effect. I do have equipment that can handle some of the higher resolutions both on my primary stereo system as well as my primary desktop system. It find is much easier to down-sample a 24-bit/88.2khz track for whatever my listening environment may be then to do the inverse for when I wish to really "enjoy" and "experience" the music.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Anonymous Coward]

You don't say. You mean to tell me that [...] they might have to take a pay cut in order to compete in the market?

Standard accounting practice is to count administrative pay as a fixed cost. Their salaries aren't going anywhere.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Bobb Sledd]

your post really comes across as a snotty "audiophile"

I'm sorry, didn't mean to come off that way. Actually, I had interpreted your post that way.

Here's where I'm coming from:

I have grown tired of the elitists who say "well if you don't have this certain speaker or that brand of amplifier, then you're shit."

Listen, there is so much stuff produced out there that is mastered on all kinds of different equipment, there is no way to get a guaranteed "this is how the artist meant it to sound" kind of sound from one set of sound equipment. Everything will add coloration of its own.

Even on the things I listed above, it's really a gross over-simplification. For example, on my #7 above:

7) Your speakers are not perfect, and you most likely haven't calibrated them with an RTA for the room they sit in or for where people are actually positioned.

Well, I did calibrate my speakers with an RTA for my environment. Still, that entire process is so subjective, and after you're done, moving just a few inches in any direction often causes different sounds to cancel/amplify; I'm not sure it's possible to get a 100% objective sound from anything.

I guess my message to the world is, there are so many factors in reproducing sound, just don't worry about them too much. Just buy and use what sounds good to you. So if you're happy with 128Khz MP3s, then that's great. If you feel like you need analog and vinyl records to make you happy, then so be it.

As long as you understand there's so much more to a good sound than just the medium itself.

(And I know you do, I don't mean any of that toward you specifically.)

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Gr8Apes]

I actually think you're doing listeners a disservice by promoting 128kbs MP3s.

They sound like crap, when you compare then against their lossless source on even mediocre sound equipment (well, for most music. There are music selections where it wouldn't matter....)

Note that I'm not comparing different MP3s against each other, but the MP3 against original source. From my own experiences, using a variety of encoders nothing under 192kbs is really listenable.

And no - I'm no audiophile snob. I just don't like my music flattened, clipped, or otherwise mutilated.

Re:I Am Shocked!

[Bobb Sledd]

No, I agree with you.

I'm just trying to point out that the majority of the population cannot really tell, and 128kbs is the current standard going bitrate when you buy online.

I personally like to encode things at 192kbs myself and when I market and sell my own junk from my own web site, I deliver in 192kbs (because obviously I want to sound my best).

I'm willing to bet, though, that you would rather have your music normalized, "flattened" (hard-limited or compressed) rather than have all your music at wildly different levels with full dynamic range. And it's what the studio does anyway before they put it to CD.

Shocking

[kseise]

You mean it doesn't cost $20.00 to make a CD? Really?

Re:Shocking

[Aphoxema]

It actually costs 40 dollars but the labels are so generous they were paying 50% of the cost out of pocket. Their hearts grew even bigger thanks to everyone being so happy with them, so they decided to pay 75%. Soon they'll just start handing them out for free!

I love our music industry, they're so nice to us little, unimportant people!

Re:Shocking

[locallyunscene]

Dammit, I was trying to moderate this comment as funny, but it registered as overrated. Posting to undo moderation.

Re:Shocking

[Life2Short]

I can remember the first CD's I bought in the early 1980s. The price was much higher than vinyl, but there were a number of advantages: easier playback, no wear to CDs, etc. The other "comfort" was that I was paying higher prices for CD's because I was an early adopter of the format. As the format became more mainstream, the price would drop. Shyaaa, right...

Re:Shocking

[FlyingBishop]

Not if you refuse to pay the artists!

Re:Shocking

[Richard_at_work]

Define 'make a CD'...

Re:Shocking

[clone53421]

Record the content, gather the raw materials, create the physical CD using equipment, and put the content onto it.

Divide by the number of CDs sold to find out the cost of a CD.

Divide by the number of CDs expected to sell and multiply by a reasonable profit factor to find a reasonable retail price of a CD.

Re:Shocking

[c6gunner]

To be fair, CD prices have dropped, especially if you consider inflation. How much were you paying for your vinyl records in 1985? When we account for the rate of inflation, paying $20 US for a CD today is equivalent to paying about $10 back then. The average price of a CD today - roughly $13 - is equivalent to about $6.50 in 1985. Were your records were much cheaper than that?

Re:Shocking

[Anonymous Coward]

I just love the irony of your post being moderated "Offtopic."

Re:Shocking

[Anonymous Coward]

Except they haven't. As an early adopter, most of my early CD's averaged $25-30, with the occasional 'bargain' disc going for ~$20.

Re:Shocking

[Life2Short]

True, with inflation the price of the CD has probably dropped somewhat since the early 80s. But compare that price drop with price drop of the CD player. I think you could argue that the savings in terms of reproduction costs, recording costs, packaging, etc. have not been passed on to the CD cost the way they were for the CD player. My first CD player had no features and cost >$500. I could buy one today that was a quarter of the size and a fifth of the price with LOTS of programming features and a remote control. The CD I buy today is cheaper to reproduce, cheaper to record, and cheaper to package (remember the big boxes they came in during the 80s?) but I don't pay a fifth of the price.

Re:Shocking

[c6gunner]

But compare that price drop with price drop of the CD player. I think you could argue that the savings in terms of reproduction costs, recording costs, packaging, etc. have not been passed on to the CD cost the way they were for the CD player.

The major costs of a CD player are development and materials. The major costs of CD albums are promotion and marketing. You can't really compare the two.

I agree that their business model is retarded, but it's silly to compare two completely different types of products. Otherwise, why stop with CD's? If you expect technology to provide a 80% price reduction, then you may as well bitch about milk not being 30 cents per gallon.

Re:Shocking

[bennomatic]

I read an interesting article in Wired a few years back--gee, maybe more than a decade ago--that put an interesting spin on the decision not to drop CD prices.

The idea is that as the cost to produce the new medium dropped, they could take that overhead and invest it in riskier artists. Where they used to only risk a contract with a band that might sell 100,000 LPs, they could now act like indy labels and take on bands that might only sell 10,000 CDs.

Doing so, according to the article, led in part to the explosion of options in music in the 90s. Rap/Hip-hop, grunge, etc., all would have been relegated to minor labels with minor distribution channels. Green Day would have stayed on local college radio. Snoop Dog would still be rapping in his parents' garage. Etc.

As such, even with the much higher prices, album sales soared. You can argue about where the value is, but clearly the buyers were interested in having the music that *they* wanted being available on the shelves.

Take with appropriate amounts of salt. It may be that without the majors seeing this opportunities, some of the minors would have become bigger, faster. But it's an interesting take.

That having been said, they also made a bazillion dollars of those risky investments, so it's time for them to stop living off yesteryear's biz model. I'm sure they'll come up with some new way to stay rich after the CDs get cheaper.

Re:Shocking

[StuartHankins]

I think if you're going to compare prices, you need to also compare the cost of manufacturing. Yes, there is a lot more money spent on marketing -- but there are also many times more customers -- so I think that portion of the cost hasn't significantly changed. I am just pulling a WAG here but I'd think that selling CD's for $5 would still be as profitable as those vinyl records were then.

Re:Shocking

[zmollusc]

So the prog rock CDs i buy are expensive because of all the saturation advertising and airplay?

Re:Shocking

[ICLKennyG]

You're missing the non-technical costs. That is there isn't nearly the same IP rights in a cd player (actually by now they are all but gone) but music still has life of the author+70 to contend with.

Additionally things get even more expensive in today's market with samples/covers/remixes and the big production costs. An old school singer/songwriter rock/folk album can be produced for next to nothing. On the other hand a rap/pop album can be 10-100 times this in production costs by the time the recording costs, producer fees, and applicable license fees have been paid.

Trust me, I think that album prices are way higher than appropriate or sustainable and this is definitely a step in the right direction, but your analysis is missing the true IP costs involved (which if you weren't aware was the real cost of a CD.)

Re:Shocking

[Anonymous Coward]

If you check the "Post Anonymously" box, it'll still undo the moderation. Coulda saved yourself from getting an offtopic from a stupid moderator.

CDs! How *quaint*

[gestalt_n_pepper]

I remember CDs. They made such pretty coffee coasters after I burned all their music to my MP3 player.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Pojut]

Especially the AOL ones...they seemed to soak up more liquid than any of the others.

Remember: if it ain't an AOL disc, it ain't worth jack!

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[eldavojohn]

I remember CDs. They made such pretty coffee coasters after I burned all their music to my MP3 player.

I believe the correct verb you're looking for is 'ripped.' But before you go on about how 'quaint' CDs are, keep in mind how nice it is to own something physical. You have, as a physical object, evidence of your licensing of personal enjoyment of that media. I do buy $5 albums on Amazon MP3 but I feel almost like I somehow receive less rights or a watered down licensing of that album as opposed to if I had purchased the album. If you find this concept quaint then why are vinyl sales slowly rising?

My favorite form of purchasing these albums is vinyl + lossless digital download. A lot of the indie record labels are adopting this method and you pay a $1 or $2 premium on the CD or vinyl album in order to have the music now with the physical artifact shipped to you later. I purchased my Cloud Cult albums in this manner and also She and Him. Instant gratification and I don't even have to take the album out of its wrapper. Don't expect the major labels or even Amazon to warm up to this idea though ... it's far too empowering for the consumer.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[WrongSizeGlass]

Especially the AOL ones...they seemed to soak up more liquid than any of the others.

That's because they were specifically designed to withstand the tears of users installing AOL.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

Audio CDs aren't quaint. They're reliable read-only long term storage media for losslessly encoded music. The data is unencumbered by DRM, you can lend CDs to your friends, you can sell CDs and you can listen to your CDs on as many devices as you like. I don't pay for downloads. I pay for CDs or get my music for free.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Jaysyn]

If you find this concept quaint then why are vinyl sales slowly rising?
 

Because the dynamic range of vinyl albums can't be compressed as much as they are on a CD resulting in better sounding music?

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Maxo-Texas]

CD's are much prettier coasters after you burn them in the microwave.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[somersault]

I don't even have to take the album out of its wrapper.

Yeah, that sounds really worth the extra money. I have barely any space to store my DVDs and blu-rays in my flat right now. I'm glad I could shove all my CDs into my mum's attic. I used to have some kind of sentimental attachment to them, but that starting going after Amazon began offering cheap MP3 albums, and completely evaporated last time I had to move flat. Storing and moving CDs and DVDs is a real pain - and records would be even worse in terms of space - not to mention more fragile. I don't see anything empowering about needing to keep highly inefficient backups of what is essentially just something you want to hear - not something you need to look at or touch.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[maxume]

Vinyl sales are rising because people are fools.

(There is some chance that the audio never experiences any filtering and the frequency response of the entire chain of analog equipment is such that there is no cutoff of high frequencies, and that the ears listening can hear the high frequencies, and that there isn't any dust on the record and that the record hasn't been worn by previous playback, but it isn't really all that likely)

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[afidel]

I can do all that with Amazon MP3's (well perhaps not lend them legally) without the inconvenience of physical media and with the ability to easily have a backup (Mozy for the win).

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Rogerborg]

You have, as a physical object, evidence of your licensing of personal enjoyment of that media

Not necessarily: you could have shoplifted it. Actually, given the RIAA's attitude to its customers, they'd likely assume that until proven otherwise.

why are vinyl sales slowly rising?

From your link: "To be fair, the number is still tiny compared to overall album sales."

Pop quiz: is the increase in vinyl sales larger than the decrease in CD sales?

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[geekmux]

If you find this concept quaint then why are vinyl sales slowly rising?

Because the dynamic range of vinyl albums can't be compressed as much as they are on a CD resulting in better sounding music?

Uh, that may be true, but it would also require that the overprocessed, overmodulated, autotuned, beatbox crap they're calling "music" these days be worth a shit to press onto vinyl. In most cases, vinyl is nothing more than turd polish.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

So you don't have a long-term storage medium (CD-Rs don't last as long as pressed CDs), your music is encoded with a lossy codec, you can't lend your music to friends, but really, there's no difference.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Aphoxema]

[...] before you go on about how 'quaint' CDs are, keep in mind how nice it is to own something physical. You have, as a physical object, evidence of your licensing of personal enjoyment of that media.

Though the short life expectancy of CDs appears to have been greatly exaggerated, they do have a finite lifespan while music in a more transient form can happily be saved from one hermetically sealed hard disk to the next. Either way, all the CRC checks in the world can't guarantee immortality of any data.

Speaking of transient... I've lived most of my teens going from one place to the next, often losing or giving away my possessions in the process. Those quaint, physical goods meant bullshit to me sleeping in an alley or at so-and-so's couch for the week.

What did comfort me was recovering collections of music from friends I shared with since the days of Napster, an impossibility if relying solely on CDs, regardless of the legality.

I'm an immaterial girl living in an immaterial world. Well, except for my recent journey into my PS3 and buying up used games for it. At least Blu-rays are a little sturdier than DVDs and CDs.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Animaether]

why are vinyl sales slowly rising?

In my view, from the situation in NL:
A. People like you who want to have something physical even though you "don't even have to take the album out of its wrapper". Which means it's going where, exactly? On the wall? Into a filing cabinet of some sort? A box in the attic? I suppose maybe 50 years down the road if the indie band got big the vinyl might hold some great resale value, especially if it's still in mint wrapped condition. I guess that might form a sub-section A2: those who think it's an investment piece.. but that's got to be extremely marginal :)

B. People who like to claim that vinyls sound much better, more warm, yadda yadda.. even if most of the vinyls today are mastered -from- the same content that goes onto the CD version. They can still be better technical quality than CD (16bit 44.1kHz vs 24bit 96kHz, for example), but any other argument is moot. This does exclude those where the entire pipeline went from the raw recording to the vinyl -with- the vinyl in mind (i.e. little to no compression, more careful stereo separation, etc.)

C. Pretentious people who just want the vinyl + player prominently presented in their living room for the sole purpose of having others comment on it.

D. DJs who prefer working with the tactile feedback of vinyl, rather than virtual mixing and scratching pads (or even just pushing sliders on a computer screen around) necessitated for CD playback (and at that point, you might as well use digital files all the way).

E. ?

Note that only one of those has a reasonably rational argument - but let's face it.. vinyl sales aren't targeting people who are thinking rationally any more than companies selling GPS bluetooth devices (where you're often far better off ditching your current phone/PDA and getting one with GPS built-in).. and I don't blame them... there's obviously an audience.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[jayme0227]

If you find this concept quaint then why are vinyl sales slowly rising?

Probably for the same reason that young people prefer MP3s to higher quality music. People grow up listening to music in a certain way and the cracks and pops of vinyls, much in the same way as the sizzle sounds of MP3s, are what the listener expects to hear in the music. Because they expect to hear it, the music doesn't sound "right" when they hear high quality recordings without it. So now that baby boomers are reaching retirement age, they look back at what they loved when they are younger and buy old vinyls.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[MBGMorden]

If you find this concept quaint then why are vinyl sales slowly rising?

Even the link you quoted shows that ALL forms of music - CD's, digital, AND vinyl - are rising in sales. Vinyl also, despite "rising" sales, is still not really selling in any significant amounts.

As the article pointed out, Taylor Swift's latest album sold nearly twice as many copies in six months as the ENTIRE SALES VOLUME of vinyl records in a year.

Vinyl is making about as much of a comeback as any other retro tech - some people are clinging to it, but you're dreaming if you think that there's going to be some mass movement back to the format.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[twistedsymphony]

You have, as a physical object, evidence of your licensing of personal enjoyment of that media

Not necessarily: you could have shoplifted it. Actually, given the RIAA's attitude to its customers, they'd likely assume that until proven otherwise.

I'd rather they assumed I shop-lifted it than I downloaded it... the penalties are less severe for shop-lifters.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[EvanED]

So you don't have a long-term storage medium (CD-Rs don't last as long as pressed CDs), your music is encoded with a lossy codec, you can't lend your music to friends, but really, there's no difference.

I've only done the Amazon MP3 thing once because of the lossy codec thing, but your other arguments are kind of dumb. It's probably *easier* to "lend" your music to friends with an MP3, and it's not like you're forced to store them on burned CDs. Passing the data from one hard disk to another is plenty sufficient. (And with the online backup he mentioned, he's got a distributed backup in case his house burns down.)

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

Because the dynamic range of vinyl albums can't be compressed as much as they are on a CD resulting in better sounding music?

More likely it's because of "retards" that don't really understand how "digital signal processing" works and don't understand that the "better sound of vinyl" is a result of more imperfections in the recording and reproduction cycle.

Oh wait, you think that 7th-order Chebyshev filter that eliminates the hiss and fuzz from normal analog playback somehow DOESN'T interfere with any of the music frequencies being played back? Do I have a deal on a bridge for you...

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[PitaBred]

With a CD you can turn the loudness up as high as you want when mixing it. With vinyl it'll physically pop the needle out of the groove so it forces the music to be properly mixed. Audiophiles give some stupid reasonings for music sounding better on vinyl because it's "warmer" or whatever, but there is a very real physical reason why vinyl can often sound better than the CD. Some CDs are properly mixed, but there's no guarantee with it like there is with vinyl.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[SatanicPuppy]

I've still got vinyl gear, and vinyl media, but I'd never buy anything new (aside, obviously, for maintenance items on my turntable).

It's just not very convenient, and, frankly, a lifetime of listening to loud music has left me ill-equipped to appreciate any subtle difference in quality.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[afidel]

CD's aren't long term, not compared to a digital file. CD's break down, get lost, or scratched. I have never lost a single MP3, I've losts or damaged plenty of CD's. Also high bitrate LAME MP3's are completely transparent even on my new Vandersteen speakers (with a very few exceptions where cymbals get muddied). If you're really worried about compression artifacts then buy the lossless files from itunes.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Nethemas the Great]

If you like hissing an popping sounds in the music you play then you may have something there but really it's just nostalgia and novelty. Vinyl fit the bill during a certain technological time period, CDs, the same thing 20-30 years ago. Today there's no excuse whatsoever to have anything less than music sampling exceeding the capabilities of the human ear to distinguish between live performance and reproduction. Storage volume, the last hindrance, became a non-issue nearly a decade ago.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

A CD is a storage medium. Digital files are data. Apples and oranges. A hard disk fails after an average of 3 to 5 years. Unless you run a more stringent backup regime than most people, you can expect significant data loss about twice a decade. All my Audio-CDs, some of which are 20 years old, still have no uncorrectable errors. I have CD-Rs which are no longer readable.

Besides, how sure are you that your MP3s are still correct? Home computers have a surprising (to people who haven't looked into it) rate of data corruption errors (due to software bugs, hardware problems and user mistakes).

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[moosesocks]

Tears.....OF JOY!

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[maxume]

My 'people are fools' argument still works. All the fools are tricked by the loudness, driving people that are worried about dynamic range to vinyl.

This reasoning is entirely retroactive on my part.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Hatta]

Sure it can. It just usually isn't. The dynamic range of vinyl is less than that of CDs, so if you had an uncompressed (dynamic range) digital music file, you'd have to compress it more to put it on vinyl than on a CD. If you chose to compress it even further, you could do it on either vinyl or CDs.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Hatta]

If you find this concept quaint then why are vinyl sales slowly rising?

Hipsters. This is the same crowd that has sequin sweater parties. Somehow in their mind vinyl (and sequin sweaters) are better *because* they're crappy.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[c6gunner]

I don't see anything empowering about needing to keep highly inefficient backups of what is essentially just something you want to hear - not something you need to look at or touch.

Ah! You hit the nail square on the head, and didn't even realize it. People keep vinyl records not because they need to look at them or touch them, but because they want others to look at them. It's like the people who have a bookshelf stacked with all sorts of classic literature, none of which has ever been opened. It's all about appearance.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Duradin]

Mythbusters proved that polishing a turd can be rather effective.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[imakemusic]

Vinyl sales are rising because people are fools.

Or they like mixing/scratching and there is a growing culture of DJs (and wannabe DJs) out there. Final Cut and its equivalents are ok and getting better but there's something about the direct physical control you have over a piece of vinyl that puts it above the rest.

Unless of course you were implying that DJs are all fools?

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[afidel]

Like I said I use Mozy online backup as well as having my MP3's on 3 local PC's, that's 3 more backups than you have with a CD =)

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[ceoyoyo]

"I believe the correct verb you're looking for is 'ripped.' But before you go on about how 'quaint' CDs are, keep in mind how nice it is to own something physical. You have, as a physical object, evidence of your licensing of personal enjoyment of that media. I do buy $5 albums on Amazon MP3 but I feel almost like I somehow receive less rights or a watered down licensing of that album as opposed to if I had purchased the album. If you find this concept quaint then why are vinyl sales slowly rising [latimes.com]?"

Well, you seem to have a sentimental attachment to vinyl discs, perhaps you have a sentimental attachment to plastic ones as well. The music on the CDs is just as much "licensed" to you as the music in a (legally) downloaded MP3. All you "own" is the plastic disc, and some would probably argue that you don't really own that either. If you really want a physical object that testifies to your "licensing of personal enjoyment of that media," print out your mp3 purchase receipt.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[afidel]

Do you REALLY want to compare the bit error rate of HDD's to CDDA?!? Many orders of magnitude difference and the winner ain't CDDA!

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

Because the dynamic range of vinyl albums can't be compressed as much as they are on a CD resulting in better sounding music?

The dynamic range of CDs is actually at least three orders higher than that of vinyl (120dB dynamic range for high-end vinyl equipment vs 150dB for CDs). The reason that CDs sound worse is because of the skill (and agenda) of the sound engineers, not the medium.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[dubbreak]

Vinyl sales are rising because people are fools.

Or maybe they are nostalgic, or maybe they like the physical medium (i.e. packaging with artwork and liner notes, the physical aspect of setting up a record and having to flip it).

I have a pretty decent vinyl collection. Yeah, CDs in general are a lot more reliable but vinyl is fun. For some reason flipping through records is a lot more fun than CDs. Listeing to music only vinyl is more of a ceremony than with CDs or pure digital formats (mp3s, flacs etc). Ever sat around with your friends, a stack of records and a bottle of fine hard liquor? Doing the same with mp3s or cds just isn't the same.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[LanMan04]

They're reliable read-only long term storage media for losslessly encoded music.

"Losslessly" doesn't mean what you think it means.

All music is composed of analog waveforms. Waveforms cannot be perfectly represented in a digital sample of said waveform. As you increase your digital sample rate toward infinitely small samples (in time), the accuracy of your digital model of the waveform will increase, but it will never be lossless.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Aradiel]

Sorry, as soon as you said "unencumbered by DRM" I remembered Sony's Spiderman soundtrack (as well as a few other albums at the time, e.g. Depeche Mode's Playing The Angel) and stopped reading.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[ArcCoyote]

What Vandersteens? 'Cause if you're talking the $10K+ models... Your CD player, MP3 player, and the amp you are using to do the comparison might not be as transparent as the speakers are. Hell, your ears night not be as transparent.

Even on my average car stereo with the windows down, I can tell the difference between uncompressed, a 256K "iTunes Plus" AAC, and a high-VBR mp3/ or 128k aac... anything below that is crap. On my home gear, which is nowhere near as high-end as Vandersteen, it is even more evident.

I've been re-ripping all the CDs I own to 256k AAC, and I can still hear a difference when I pop a CD into the PS3

It's not always treble loss or bass distortion that ruins an encoded track. Muddy bass and treble can be from insufficient bit rate but is more often from an encoder that doesn't know how to optimize for the bit rate allowed. The biggest loss is dynamic range and stereo separation. Not something you immediately notice because you can't hear it when you compare short sections... but eventually you'll realize the encoded version just doesn't sound as 'real' as the source. Modern overcompressed junk won't really degrade because it has had the life squeezed out of it already. Live recordings really lose the presence factor.

CAPTCHA: "Rewinds" ... Let's all just go back to cassette tapes!

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

They're reliable read-only long term storage media for losslessly encoded music

The digitalization process is never lossless (due to quantization, lack of resolution, imperfection of equipment), so describing CDs as losslessly encoded is not entirely accurate. And given that most current master tapes are 24bit/96kHz (or higher), the claim that encoding a CD is lossless is entirely false.

Also, long-term implies (to me at least) that the medium will outlast the copyright protection of the contents. I don't think that's the case.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[RapmasterT]

Vinyl is rising because it bottomed out and is doing the proverbial "dead man bounce".

The reason some people like vinyl better than digital, is because it sounds "warmer", which is just a positive spin on "muddled" or "lower dynamic range". They complain that digital sounds too harsh.

The unpleasant truth though is LIVE music is harsh, that's the sound you don't like. You just won't find self-proclaimed audiophiles proudly saying "I don't like how live music sounds, so I prefer it run through a distortion filter first".

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Sloppy]

CDs are awesome. They come on their own backup medium. Read it, store it in a box, and it's there in case you ever want it again. Like, for example, when you realize that hard disk space is so cheap, that you don't need MP3 or Vorbis anymore and wanna move on to FLAC.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[rickb928]

That's "dead cat bounce". A term I first heard from the financial industry, referring to a failed company's stock that changes price at the bottom of the range, essentially zero, but these changes are insignificant. As in going from $.05 to $10, a 100% increase, but of course proving the worthlessness of the stock that traded last month for $65 before their CEO went to jail for tax evasion and corporate chicanery. Thieves^H^H^H^H^H^H^HBrokers often use these price changes to sell stock to the unsuspecting fool and others...

'Dead man bounce' would come uncomfortably close to reminding them of the unpleasantness back in 1929. We should be more sensitive, I think... Cats can take care of themselves, and most don't really care about us anyways.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

They're reliable read-only long term storage media for losslessly encoded music

I guess you've never heard of or experienced CD rot? How many Nimbus pressed CDs still work without skipping?

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[afidel]

Man I was so reminded of how absolutely terrible vinyl is when I went to audition my new speakers. All the HiFi shops use a mix of vinyl and CD's because that's what their clientele expects but I honestly can't understand how people who profess to love music can stand vinyl. The pops and hissing 10-20 times per track even with multi-thousand dollar turntables was unbearable. I'll gladly stick with MP3's that I can't ABX distinguish from the source material (even if the source is 192/24 digital) the vast majority of the time (I can FLAC any CD's that have a serious problem with LAME).

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[517714]

Be careful on throwing around certain terms. "Losslessly encoded music" does not assure quality, it applies only to post sampling processing. CD sampling is at 44kHz and is filtered so that nothing above 20kHz is sampled. A tiny bit of audio information is lost in the process, although dogs might contend that the sampling rate is too low. If I "losslessly encode" music that is sampled at 5 Khz the recording will be undeniably distorted from the original music, and inferior to a very lossy MP3 sampled at 44 kHz with the same data rate, but it will be a 100% accurate representation of my sampled data. Everything else you say is spot on.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Jeff Carr]

I remember DVD's, They made such pretty coffee coasters after I ripped all of their video to my media server.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Jeff Carr]

...and you can listen to your CDs on as many devices as you like.

Really? Where did you find a phone with a built in CD player? I want one! :-)

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Lattitude]

But what are you going to throw at the zombies if you get rid of all your vinyl??

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[domatic]

They still smelled like crap though.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[RapmasterT]

That's "dead cat bounce". A term I first heard from the financial industry,...We should be more sensitive, I think... Cats can take care of themselves, and most don't really care about us anyways.

No I mean "dead man bounce" a term referring to suicide jumpers off of buildings, which is far more applicable to the vinyl market than financial metaphors.

I'm sure you'll be sensitive enough for both of us.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

You have, as a physical object, evidence of your licensing of personal enjoyment of that media.

What license? Buying a CD does not involve a license of any sort.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[hondo77]

Add to that the vinyl produced today is higher quality than back in the day because the volume being produced is so low and people are now willing to pay a premium. The crap that used to be present on an LP for a million-selling act right after you brought it home from a record store was amazing. I, for one, don't miss vinyl at all. Been there, done that, moved on to something better.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[IDtheTarget]

I remember CDs. They made such pretty coffee coasters after I burned all their music to my MP3 player.

I believe the correct verb you're looking for is 'ripped.' But before you go on about how 'quaint' CDs are, keep in mind how nice it is to own something physical.

If I recall correctly, all of the MP3's that I've purchased from Amazon have some kind of code embedded in the meta data that shows that I'm the one who purchased the song. I don't really mind, since I've never been interested in giving music that I've paid for to others...

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[gknoy]

Axes, molotov cocktails, Fiona Apple albums.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[xaxa]

Ever sat around with your friends, a stack of records and a bottle of fine hard liquor? Doing the same with mp3s or cds just isn't the same.

For the youngest generation, CDs are nostalgic.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[oogoliegoogolie]

I don't! Just how old are you, grandpa?

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

You say this as though audio fidelity is the only reason anyone listens to music. Similarly, why would anyone listen to mp3s instead of FLAC?

Vinyl offers:

1. larger album art
2. more inserts
3. greater engagement in the music listening experience
4. a smug sense of superiority over the plebs

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[rickb928]

They aren't going to jump. They still have more lawyers, and other people's money, to use.

When the money is gone, then they jump. And the lawyers leave when the money is gone. Usually.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[rickb928]

They won't jump. They still have lawyers, and other people's money.

When the money is gone, then they jump. The lawyers usually leave when the money's gone.

Usually.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

Clue: It's not the baby boomers buying vinyl of this summers hottest club tracks you ninny.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[UnknowingFool]

Also they have to prove you shop-lifted it. With downloading the RIAA feels it can dispense with due process and evidence of wrongdoing.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[hal2814]

"But before you go on about how 'quaint' CDs are, keep in mind how nice it is to own something physical."

I own something physical. It's called an MP3 player. And yes, it's very nice.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyone I know with a large and growing LP collection is 20-something hipster with a USB turntable.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

I would also add: 5. actually being able to play an album after several decades.

Had "Tone Float" by Organisation (an early Kraftwerk band) been released in digital format, then I strongly doubt that it would've ever been heard. I can't even find MP3s that were released by some dork webmasters a couple years ago (e.g., Something Awful, Fucked Company, and others).

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Improved Silence]

If you find this concept quaint then why are vinyl sales slowly rising?

Hipsters.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

I would be sad if Vinyl went away as it is my preferred source for DJ'ing.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Voyager529]

Final Cut is Apple's Prosumer video editing software. The context of your post implies Serato, Rane's product that allows the use of timecoded vinyl to manipulate the playback of MP3s, yes?

Standard vinyl has its advantages (no latency), but Serato solves lots of problems that make it convenient enough for the top jocks in the world to have a copy at hand (no buying two of every record, no worrying about scratching one of them, carrying every track ever to every gig, independent pitch/tempo lock, etc.).

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

Yeah, that sounds really worth the extra money. I have barely any space to store my DVDs and blu-rays in my flat right now. I'm glad I could shove all my CDs into my mum's attic. I

Might be doing it wrong -- you don't need jewel cases, just toss 'em out and stick everything in CD books (which also work for DVDs and games). We turned a ton of CD jewel cases into 6 thick books and saved a ton of space; and we're currently going through the same process for DVDs/BD. (The books are now in either one or two boxes in the basement storage.)

don't see anything empowering about needing to keep highly inefficient backups of what is essentially just something you want to hear - not something you need to look at or touch.

By following the above, it's not particularly inefficient. I guess you would be better off by ripping to lossless and burning lossless to BD, but having physical storage kept separate from your single hard drive copy is not a Bad Thing to do. Of course, it gets easier still if you're not concerned with lossless.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[vertinox]

Vinyl sales are rising because people are fools.

I recently went into a local indie record store a few months ago and saw a stack of new cassette tapes for sale at the register.

And I was like: "Hah! Did someone find these in an old factory somewhere unopened?"
Indie store guy: "No, these are brand new from a local artist."
Me: "Ummm... Why?"
Indie store guy: "Yeah its a new hot trend for local bands to make cassette tapes now instead of releasing them on CD or Vinyl"
Me: "Ok... But can you even buy cassette players anymore?"
Indie store guy: "Nope. But they still sell for some reason amoung the hipsters."

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

Posting AC as I've already moderated- including your post above, as I agree with it mostly, but...

Probably for the same reason that young people prefer MP3s to higher quality music. [slashdot.org] People grow up listening to music in a certain way and the cracks and pops of vinyls

I grew up listening to cassettes on a cheap non-Dolby player, and I really don't miss the hiss (*). Listening to MP3 transfers of stuff I did from cassette it's actually quite distracting now.

The only thing I'd say is that *specific* recordings- more ones taken from LPs- sound slightly wrong without the odd pop and click in the place I'd expect it, or did until I got used to the CD/digital version. But do I want the sound of cassettes in general back? No.

I always thought cassettes got more criticism than was warranted to be honest, but I'm also bored by the fetishisation of them as a retro-symbol that emerged almost exactly at the point that they became commercially obsolete.

(*) Okay, to be honest, I didn't really notice it at the time probably because it was all I knew- I didn't listen to LPs (they were what my parents listened to, *boring!*) and CDs were some years from being mainstream.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

Had "Tone Float" by Organisation (an early Kraftwerk band) been released in digital format, then I strongly doubt that it would've ever been heard.

Oddly enough, I have it on CD, bought from cduniverse.com a few years ago, but I assume that's not what you meant by "digital format". That said, how many people do you suppose have heard Tone Float even though it was on physical media (vinyl and I would guess 8-track, at least)? [I also have an original vinyl Autobahn from my dad. I'm still missing Kraftwerk 2.]

Plenty of music, some of it good, that was released on physical media is no longer published and difficult to find. IIRC, at one time Henry Rollins intended to start a label for the sole purpose of resurrecting music like that (mostly with a focus on contemporaries of his early bands), but I don't know if anything ever came of that. Just try completing a Black Flag collection solely from newly printed albums/CDs. Even some stuff from once popular bands like The Fixx are out of print. Sadly, if the labels were ever to start re-issuing back catalogue titles, they'd probably go all Disney with the "going back into the vault soon" artificial scarcity scam.

Like naked (or just embarrassing) pictures of someone on the internet, digital music has similar potential to stick around long enough for someone to stumble on to it, and either bring it to the forefront, or be influenced by it to create something new.

- T

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

It's on the HTTP sites. Search Google for "Organisation - Tone Float (1969)".

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[asolidvoid]

E. Album Art anyone?

Nothing gets me into the mental soundscape of an album better than 2, 4, or sometimes more square feet of sweet graphics designed to project a visual grounding for the audio content. Those silly itunes previews and even CD slips are a joke in comparison. Poster-size graphics and legible fonts are what do it for me.

That being said, if CD's came in 12"x12" glossy books, I would be all over it, esp. at a sub $10 price point.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[rdnetto]

Don't forget, CDs have higher audio quality than MP3s. They're still the only choice if you want a lossless format (i.e ripped to FLAC).

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[rdnetto]

I grew up listening to music over the radio and via MP3s (I'm in my late teens now), and I still prefer FLAC over any lossy format. When I first came across FLAC I did a comparison and it's amazing how much more detail you can hear compared to MP3.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[amRadioHed]

I would bet the people increasingly buying vinyl are not the ones listening to "overprocessed, overmodulated, autotuned, beatbox crap". As much that does cover a lot of what's on the radio, there is still as much good music being made today as ever.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[amRadioHed]

You missed his point. It's not all about nostalgia, it's about how you interact with the medium.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[amRadioHed]

You can't buy new cassette players, but you can get them at tag sales and second hand shops. Not that I approve of that trend, cassettes are truly an awful format. Do they have any redeeming value? I can't think of one.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[amRadioHed]

What is so pretentious about having a turntable on display? At least it does something, unlike most decorations.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

True, the Internet is great because now a lot of people can listen to Tone Float. Great for distributing music. But what if it was released only on some format unreliable for archiving? My point about vinyl was that the music is printed, it can be stored somewhere for a very long time (and I mean decades, or even centuries), and can be retrieved. Of course, Tone Float was difficult to find, but given enough time, it was rediscovered.

To elaborate on the dork webmasters thing, Fucked Company's webmaster and AdBrite founder "pud" used to be in two bands, "The Spel" and "Beef Savage" from ~2002. Some funny, some bad music. I thought it'd be funny to revisit some of those songs and possibly make fun of him, but a lot of them are gone. Only pud has access to those songs now (if he even still has them), despite it being released on the Internet when he had a lot more fame than he has now. It was never even released on CD.

I think it is huge misconception that "if it's on the Internet, it's on there forever." Hell, most of Fucked Company itself is gone now and it used to be popular. Another anecdote is my cousin's band demo used to be on a recording studio's MySpace page. Now that the studio is gone, so is the MySpace page, and even the song. Not even his band has the recording! Tons of more obscure stuff is destined to be gone.

P.S., I'm pretty sure you were referring to Infinite Zero, which had some releases. Also, my argument could've included CDs, but at least a CD has at least 20 years of empirical longevity. I wonder if there would be an archival crisis 40 years from now.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

I know that (just click on the discogs link) and that's not my point. My point was that it's was released in a good, archival format and you are able to listen to it now because of that. Copies of Tone Float managed to survive for 40 years despite once being very obscured. There is no reason why a vinyl copy of that album would last for another 40 or even 100 years. I doubt those websites hosting the digital version would last that long. Nevertheless, the Internet made it better for more people to hear it, which is great.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Hadlock]

But before you go on about how 'quaint' CDs are, keep in mind how nice it is to own something physical.

On the flip side, there are some of us who think large collections of useless, shiny baubles are gaudy and take up too much space. Don't get me wrong, my buddy has two DVD-bookshelves *full* of DVDs he's never even opened, but he's ok with that because it's his "collection" and they're *his*. On the flip side, some of us just want to be able to turn on their music player and hear something good.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[imakemusic]

Doh! I meant to say Final Scratch which was made by Stanton and Native Instruments and was premiered in 1998, 6 years before Serato was released. Stanton only make the ScratchAmp interface these days, not the software.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[Voyager529]

I actually have a copy of the original, hockey puck ScratchAmp and Traktor Scratch software. I got it for $5 at a Guitar Center blowout sale. It was ONLY worth that because the vinyl that came with it was very high quality and works with other software like Deckadance that can derive the timecode signal from any record. The interface was nearly useless (was it REALLY that hard to make it a regular class-compliant sound card instead of being specific to Traktor?), and the software was as buggy as a beta copy of Windows ME, but it did pave the way...

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[adolf]

What do mean when you say that? Hmm?

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[geekmux]

I would bet the people increasingly buying vinyl are not the ones listening to "overprocessed, overmodulated, autotuned, beatbox crap". As much that does cover a lot of what's on the radio, there is still as much good music being made today as ever.

Oh, don't get me wrong. I completely agree with you there. It's exciting to see some reissues of classic albums from Hendrix, Marley, and others who shaped generations of musicians.

And no doubt there is good music being made today. It's just a shame what "engineers" are doing to that good music to "compete" in the loudness wars that is broadcast radio. It's sickening, and why I'm finding more and more enjoyment out of live recordings, as it can be a bit more of a challenge to ruin those with over-processing. I can also respect an artist that oversees the recording process all the way to the end product to ENSURE that it's not ruined. Most don't though.

Re:CDs! How *quaint*

[caitsith01]

Uh, that may be true, but it would also require that the overprocessed, overmodulated, autotuned, beatbox crap they're calling "music" these days be worth a shit to press onto vinyl. In most cases, vinyl is nothing more than turd polish.

You certainly are lucky to have had the golden age of modern music coincide with the years of your life when you were aged 15 through to 35. How I pity today's youngsters for missing that magical window of time.

Only ...

[6031769]

25 years too late. Oh well, better late than never.

0$

[krapski]

I get them for 0$ in pirate bay, how do you compete with that!?

Re:0$

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Its like Canadian complaining that there isn't any caribou when he visits miami. Obviously the miami supermarkets are crazy to offer so much chicken and so little caribou. How will they ever survive?

Re:0$

[afidel]

That $0 comes with a !=0 chance of a six figure lawsuit attached.

Re:0$

[NeoSkandranon]

Many of us place a nonzero value on being a mature adult and either paying for entertainment we consume or abstaining altogether.

Re:0$

[krapski]

it is not called being mature, it is called taking it up the ass from the recording industry

Re:0$

[krapski]

risk times cost: risk!=0 cost=0 risk*cost=0

Re:0$

[Capt.DrumkenBum]

Most Canadians have never eaten Caribou. Moose on the other hand is quite tasty.

Re:0$

[bzipitidoo]

Mature adult? You tool! The industry is keen to exploit that attitude. It's the biggest reason their war on progress and technology has had some success, why the immense savings of switching from physical to electronic distribution has been mostly unrealized, or diverted into the pockets of leeches. You enable them to continue to deny reality. Artists must switch to another model, one where they want their music freely shared as much as possible, and people aren't "pirates".

$10 is too little, too late. CDs should die. What still exists should be under $5, and they should drop all the smug, self-aggrandizing and expensive anti-theft measures such as the jewel case and its oversized cage. I imagine the typical record exec as a shriveled Gollum like creature hiding in a cave, wearing a CD on his finger-- after the Lord of the CDs had already fallen.

Re:0$

[NeoSkandranon]

So take the latter of the options, and don't have anything to do with them or their product.

Re:0$

[NeoSkandranon]

Look man, I don't know if you read too much into what I said or something. I'm right alongside most of what you said.

My point is: If you are so rabidly opposed to record companies (which is totally fair IMO) then Stop. Listening. Find something else, there's plenty of small label music out there.

Taking a "neener neener I'll just pirate it" approach reminds me a lot of a roommate of mine who was adamant about it being his right to see 3 or 4 movies on one ticket at a theater due to ticket prices.

Maybe he had a point, and certainly most of the points about CD/music prices are totally valid, but cheating the system is wanting to have your cake and eat it too, and makes it much easier for your point (ie, dissatisfaction) to be dismissed out of hand.

Re:0$

[krapski]

why should i take it up the ass from RIAA like you and lose 10$, when i can take it from pirate bay and RIAA takes it up the ass

Re:0$

[krapski]

i am not against RIAA, and i am also not against copying from RIAA. but i am against those who take it up the ass from riaa, and want me to also take it up the ass from riaa. "but cheating the system is wanting..." the system is broken, so cheating the system is ok "makes it much easier for your point (ie, dissatisfaction) to be dismissed out of hand" this is logical fallacy: you cannot dismiss my argument because i copy, it is like saying: your argument is false because you are a pirate. there is no logical implication there

Re:0$

[NeoSkandranon]

Because...they don't "take it up the ass" you nimrod. You are still listening to their product, and they have lost nothing.

Much like how Microsoft would much rather you pirate windows than use Linux.

Re:0$

[krapski]

hehe, if i am nimrod, then i am nimrod with 10$ more than you

listen to me: i dont care if microsoft or riaa are happy, or sad, or angry, or scared about what i do. i just care to have their music, software, movies, etc.

so i take them, and i can do that for the same reason a dog licks his own balls: because i can.

Re:0$

[krapski]

plus i am nimrod with 10$ more than you, and also anus ten cm smaller than yours

Re:0$

[Anonymous Coward]

It occurs to me that you're a plant - someone who is intentionally trying to obscure the real reasons that pirates exist; you are trying, unsuccesfully to me, to paint your opposition as having no REAL reason to dislike the MAFIAA. you can do better then that.

Re:0$

[krapski]

tell me, what is the *real* reason pirates exist:

Re:0$

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the cost you should be using in your ``risk × cost'' scenario is that of the aformentioned six-figure lawsuit. I don't want to equate downloading with theft, but your equation would make risk × cost zero for any kind of theft as well.

Re:0$

[bzipitidoo]

I'm right alongside most of what you said.

Glad to hear it.

But don't be too dismissive of particular protest methods. Myself, I have stopped listening. Don't bother much with movie theaters either. (The last time I went, was to see the new Star Trek.) But if others want to protest by pirating, that's fine with me, if perhaps not you. I agree that particular method of protest is easily misinterpreted.

I'd love it if we could break the copyright cartel with a massive boycott, but I just don't see that being realistic, or in our best interests. Such a method, while perfectly legal, smacks of the sort of "chop-the-baby-in-half" destructive court decisions that cause unwarranted harm because unlike Solomon, they weren't bluffing. So if a boycott isn't feasible, what does that leave? A letter campaign to our representatives? Election of Pirate Party candidates? That got noticed, and it's fine, but it's slow. What else? A hunger strike? A million man march? And meantime, how else can we learn the nuances of sharing if we don't share? How was Prohibition repealed? So I think piracy is necessary, until such time as proponents of this Copy Prohibition give it up. And I don't think it is necessarily immature.

Just like cassettes

[commodore64_love]

...when they still existed. I remember having the option between a $13 CD or an $8 "inferior" cassette version, so I picked the cassette. I didn't see why I should have to pay a $5 premium for the disc version.

Now it appears the same pricing has come to CDs. Why pay $13 for a CD when I can just download my favorite 2-3 songs at about $3. The internet is forcing music companies to drop the pricetag for the "inferior" CD format to about $8.

Why inferior?

CDs aren't portable. And take-up a lot of space.

Re:Just like cassettes

[Pojut]

CDs aren't portable. And take-up a lot of space.

My binder with 300+ death metal CDs and the jewel case inserts in it from high school would agree with you -_-;;

Re:Just like cassettes

[floatednerd]

Maybe I'm going into the future kicking and screaming... but I don't feel like I "own" a song unless I have it on CD (or cassette, vinyl, etc). From my point of view, CDs are the "superior" product verses the MP3 from iTunes or Amazon.

Re:Just like cassettes

[SimonTheSoundMan]

Ok, but you have a physical copy that hasn't been compressed to 256kb/s or lower MP3/ACC files, the disc will last hundreds if not thousands of years, and best of all you can do whatever you want with it.

CD's are cheaper in the UK than downloads. £5-£7 for the CD album, whereas on iTunes it can be £6.99 to £8.99. I think it is great he USA have matched our prices.

Re:Just like cassettes

[ajlitt]

I have about the same number in a random collection of CD binders. They take up a tiny fraction of the space on my shelves, the rest being populated by books. In digital form, those books would all fit on just a few CDs. By the OP's suggestion I should ditch all my books and scan/torrent/rebuy them in PDF.

Re:Just like cassettes

[jedidiah]

Yes. A CD is a token of ownership. While the CD certainly isn't convenient
to deal with, it's easy enough to convert into an mp3. Once you have that
then how to you tell your own copy from someone elses? How do you prove
you really have the rights to that file? You can't really. If it's a DRM
server or your sales history at Amazon, your still dependent on data on
some server somewhere to validate your right to that file.

Re:Just like cassettes

[clone53421]

Why would I want to “own” a song? I just want to listen to it.

Re:Just like cassettes

[whisper_jeff]

Did you seriously just write "CDs aren't portable"? Really? I know nerds have the stigma of being out of shape, but really?

Re:Just like cassettes

[Anonymous Coward]

but I don't feel like I "own" a song unless I have it on CD (or cassette, vinyl, etc).

What difference does it make? You are only renting it from the record company until a new audio format comes along and they demand you make a new payment on your 'subscription' anyway.

Physical media doesn't mean jack anymore, especially with the DRM crap packed on.

Re:Just like cassettes

[andi75]

Why would I need to validate that it's mine? It's not like the RIAA has a right to search my mp3 player and demand that I produce a licence for all songs on it.

Re:Just like cassettes

[tomhudson]

the disc will last hundreds if not thousands of years

Even if it did, that wouldn't matter - how much longer do you think spinning optical media readers will be around?

Audio went from 12" 78 rpm to 10" 78 rpm to 12" 33-1/3 rpm and 7" 45rpm disks to tape, which went from reel-to-reel to 8 track to cassette to DAT, to hard drive/flash memory.

CD *tried* to go from 5" redbook to SACD (failed) and mini-cd singles (failed).

Video recording went from celluloid to reel-to-reel tape to tape cassettes / dvd / hard drive / solid state devices / bluray

Still photos went from celluloid to digital.

Most homes can no longer play audio records on vinyl, or reel-to-reel, or 8 track, or cassette, or DAT - just what's stored on a file in a device.

Most homes don't have movie projectors, or even functioning VCRs any more.

Cameras that use film? How quaint.

Optical media will be the next to go over the next 2 decades, same as all the others.

Re:Just like cassettes

[ZOmegaZ]

Yet.

Re:Just like cassettes

[omnichad]

I think they mean entire collections of CD's, as opposed to an iPod or a portable hard drive.

Re:Just like cassettes

[Yaa 101]

Nothing keeps you from burning that song to CD.

Re:Just like cassettes

[introspekt.i]

By the OP's suggestion I should ditch all my books and scan/torrent/rebuy them in PDF.

No, he didn't come out and say that. He said that the prices of CDs have dropped because they are an inferior medium (decidedly by the consumer's purchasing habits). Inferior because they take up space and aren't portable relative to an electronic copy. You could follow that your books are an inferior medium to ebooks, but there are a few kinks with ebooks left to work out, namely how the reading feels with books v ebooks.

Re:Just like cassettes

[Jer]

By the OP's suggestion I should ditch all my books and scan/torrent/rebuy them in PDF.

You make it sound like that's a ridiculous suggestion, when in fact there are a lot of people who want to do exactly that.

Well, maybe not PDF. But something like that.

Re:Just like cassettes

[introspekt.i]

Once you have that then how to you tell your own copy from someone elses?

A CD is a token of ownership.

You answered your own question. Proof of purchase is the CD and or the receipt from where you picked it up.

Re:Just like cassettes

[mister_playboy]

I gave up on binders because they seem to damage CDs once the plastic in them starts to age and harden. It's usually subtle "pin-holes" in the disc when held up to the light, and it doesn't always audibly affect the sound, but it's still extremely disappointing. My collection is too big and represents too much cash outlay over time to risk it.

I still make a lot of use of CDs, but always burned ones. I keep the original in its jewel case on the shelf.

Re:Just like cassettes

[AP31R0N]

You don't own it then either. You're renting a license to listen to it for as long as you own the object. i know what you mean though. If i don't have a "hard copy" of it, it's just fluff on a hard drive.

Verses of a song. Chuck versus the MP3 Player.

Re:Just like cassettes

[Pojut]

My death metal binder hasn't had any new CDs added to it since I graduated from high school back in 2002. The summer after I got out, I spent nearly a whole week ripping every single cd in that binder...now it just sits as a monument to an angrier, adolescent-addled mind :-) I'll pop it open every now and then for nostalgia or to show people that yes, even though I'm all "sitting at a desk programmer wearing a tie" now, I was once an gothish metal head.

I still have the 7/16th inch tunnels in my ear lobes, but I'm proud of those...even though my "crazy" days are behind me, I will still never take a job where they ask me to take out my tunnels.

Re:Just like cassettes

[gmuslera]

Not sure about iTunes, but at least Amazon is a good example that you don't "own" books in Kindles if they could remotely delete them, as they already did. But go to some digital media that you really control and won't matter if is in your (not i)phone, media player, or computer, is you who decides about storing, backing up, playing o even moving to a different media, so could count as "owning" for what it matters.

Re:Just like cassettes

[Nethemas the Great]

When was the last time you tried to carry around 500 hours worth of music around in your back pocket?

Re:Just like cassettes

[newdsfornerds]

You sure it isn't piracy as well?

Re:Just like cassettes

[c6gunner]

How do you prove you really have the rights to that file?

How do you prove you didn't steal the CD?

Here in the civilized world, we have this concept known as "innocent until proven guilty". Have you heard of it?

Re:Just like cassettes

[UnknowingFool]

Based on the history of the RIAA dragnets, it's best if you have the CD. Even if you are incorrectly fingered by your ISP (and it has been known to happen), you have an easy record of ownership. In the event the RIAA gets a copy of your HD (and they will), you have a good defense. Personally I'd love this confrontation.

RIAA Attorney: "So Mr. Smith, I find it interesting that you have over 10,000 songs on your HD. YOU STOLE THAT MUSIC DIDN'T YOU!!"
Me: "Is that on the record?"
Court Reporter: "yes"
Me: *puts boxes and boxes of CDs on table* "You can bite my shiny metal ass"

Re:Just like cassettes

[jandrese]

Well, lets compare. Say you have an iPod that can hold 20,000 songs. Assume an average album is 12 songs. That's 1,667 albums. A CD weighs about 16g. Your collection of music weighs about 26kg. Compared to the 140g iPod that's substantial. It gets worse if you're carrying them with the booklets and inside the jewel case, then the weight goes up to about 60g per album, for a total weight of right about 100kg. When your jogging music is a 4 man lift, I wouldn't call it portable anymore.

Re:Just like cassettes

[hanabal]

why do you need to identify "your" copy. There can be effectively infinite copies so identifying who owns which one is pointless.

About proving you have the rights, I thought we lived in a society where the accuser has to prove their case, not the accused. So "they" should have to prove that you don't have a licence.

Re:Just like cassettes

[Maxo-Texas]

It's also still legal to record songs off of the radio.

Re:Just like cassettes

[commodore64_love]

Nowadays RIAA doesn't sue people for having MP3s.
They sue them for uploading the MP3s, so having ownership doesn't matter if they have a record of you ULing the songs.

Re:Just like cassettes

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't feel like I "own" a song unless I have it on CD (or cassette, vinyl, etc).

I don't mind digital downloads so long as they're high quality and unencumbered by DRM.

Re:Just like cassettes

[commodore64_love]

A long, long time. As long as I have a Bluray player I'll be able to play my CD collection. Maybe sometime after 2020 we'll all have 100 Mbit/s HDTV-capable connections, but not yet.

And if Bluray dies out circa 2030 (replaced by internet streaming), I'll just stock up on BRD units like I did with VCRs, so I can continue using my home movies and/or music.

Re:Just like cassettes

[Inda]

Slightly off topic but I would have bought the $13 CD, copied it the a chrome metal cassette because the quality achieved was better than the $8 inferior version.

You reap what you sow and judging the quality of music my daughter listens too, the harvest is poor.

"Dig up stupid"

Re:Just like cassettes

[Anonymous Coward]

On the other hand:

If your jogging music is 20,000 songs, and figuring that the average song is about 3 minutes long, then you've got 60,000 minutes, or about 41 days of music. If you intend on jogging for 41 days without pause to sleep or perform any other biologically necessary functions, then lifting 100kg and carrying it around with you is probably not a big problem, since you're clearly possessed of superhuman capabilities.

Re:Just like cassettes

[commodore64_love]

Ownership confers upon you the right to listen to that song for your whole life. - Perhaps I'm in the minority on this but I still listen to tapes or records that were purchased 30-50 years ago, and every listen costs me nothing.

Re:Just like cassettes

[clone53421]

The person I replied to said he likes to “own” the song, by which he meant he likes to own something tangible – CD, vinyl, etc. You can never “own” the song; the record company does. You own the media, and have a license to listen to the song it contains.

I still listen to tapes or records that were purchased 30-50 years ago, and every listen costs me nothing.

That’s just your license: unlimited plays, as long as you still own the media it is contained in. If the record companies could have their way, the license wouldn’t be nearly as generous toward you, the customer...

The point I was trying to make was twofold:

Why would I want to own something tangible just to listen to the song, if that wasn’t necessary?

Why do I need a contractual license to play the contents of the CD (physical media that I own)?

Re:Just like cassettes

[jandrese]

But that's the beauty of the MP3. You don't have to choose ahead of time which music you're going to listen to, you just bring it all and choose on the fly. You also don't have to organize your music collection, that's all done for you as well. And creating a mixtape is as easy as dragging and dropping instead of grabbing CDs, ripping one song at a time, and then burning the result to another CD. People think that MP3s are poorer value for the money because it's not "digitally perfect", but they always overlook the wide variety of other benefits that come from having all of your music in one spot and portable.

Re:Just like cassettes

[jafac]

Given that I've "lost" several tracks now to Apple's DRM, (and my own platform mobility - go figure, I use several computers, have upgraded over the years, even *gasp* forgot my iTMS account password! God forbid I should shop at one store a few times, decide I don't like them, and stop shopping there, yet desire to continue using the product I purchased.) - given that, I paid $.99, I don't feel like paying the extra "price" of having to rip a downloaded .MP3 to a blank CD in AIFF format, re-ripping it (losing audio quality in the process) just to make the track transferrable. . .

Also, given that I now have TWO acquaintances who I've had to console over lost music libraries; failed hard drives with no backup. . .

- I think I'll keep my library of "quaint" Audio CD disks.

Downloading is no cheaper, it is only more convenient at the Point of Purchase, and is less convenient thereafter, and product quality is lower. Which has pretty much been my argument since 1996.

I figured they'd win me over when downloads were $.05. They almost had me with iPods though.

Re:Just like cassettes

[Anonymous Coward]

Being a nerd, I don't jog (shamefully), but I do spend a lot of time at school doing math and science homework for at least 4 hours. I rarely ever bring any portable music players, but occasionally I might borrow an MP3 player or CD player. Even with impending crushing boredom, I wind up listening to less than 70 minutes of music. I just makes my head hurt and I have the volume low. And I listen to a lot of music at home (with speakers).

There is the advantage of the MP3 player not skipping while jogging, though.

Re:Just like cassettes

[UnknowingFool]

From my memory of the lawsuits, it doesn't matter to the RIAA. They've sued people who didn't have computers or people who were dead. In the case of Tanya Anderson, they didn't even have any evidence she shared songs on her computer but they put her through an expensive lawsuit for over two years before they finally dropped it. She won attorneys fees in a countersuit.

Re:Just like cassettes

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, but try ripping that DM at your typical itunes/amazon bitrates - Arch Enemy in particular seems to suffer for it. Metal's (imo, at least) one of the few genres where the CD still trumps the download - the sound just doesn't compress well. Besides, once you've got the CD you can rip it to lossless and drop the CD into storage until you need it again. :)

Re:Just like cassettes

[Anonymous Coward]

If you don't have a hard copy, you can't put it on display, show it off, identify yourself with it. Let the world know that you find that music cool, and feel cool that the world knows!

Oh, to be 13 again.

Re:Just like cassettes

[clone53421]

put it on display, show it off, identify yourself with it. Let the world know that you find that music cool, and feel cool that the world knows!

Oh, to be 13 again.

You’re talking about T-shirts, right?

Re:Just like cassettes

[Carnildo]

The RIAA hasn't.

Re:Just like cassettes

[Anonymous Coward]

*crunch*

Re:Just like cassettes

[Hurricane78]

O RLY? Obligatory XKCD: http://xkcd.com/691/

Re:Just like cassettes

[clone53421]

Or you might want to have them playing on shuffle. Good luck doing that with CDs. Not only would you have to carry all of them for every 15-minute jog (not knowing which tunes you’d happen to select this time) but you’d be shuffling discs mid-stride.

Re:Just like cassettes

[clone53421]

He didn’t buy the cassette because it was a cassette, he bought it because it was cheaper. If he had been willing to spend the extra money for the CD, he’d have just listened to the CD.

Re:Just like cassettes

[Anonymous Coward]

CD *tried* to go from 5" redbook to SACD (failed) and mini-cd singles (failed).

"Mini CD" singles weren't really intended as a successor to CDs, they were just an additional variant that happened to be smaller (and lower in capacity) but were otherwise identical.

They were about in the late-80s, which was around the time that CDs *started* enjoying mass market success- they weren't about to replace it!

I think they disappeared because there was no point. From what I heard the idea was that people would buy special portable players for them, but CD players were expensive then, and who wants one that only supports silly little 20 minute discs? Plus I don't think all standard players had the extra tray-well to hold 3" CDs at that time. So most CD singles by the mid-90s were the usual size...

Re:Just like cassettes

[Anonymous Coward]

When you consider moving your entire collection around they aren't very portable. If your really serious about music you might have 1000 CD's in jewl cases. Sure a handful of CD's are portable but considering that you can fit an mp3 player in your pocket that holds your entire collection, CD's really aren't that portable.

Re:Just like cassettes

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's assume 4 minutes per song. Your "jogging" music will last you nearly 8 weeks of continuous play. That's a long jog...

Re:Just like cassettes

[tomhudson]

You can still buy mini-cd blank media - but what's the point, when you can get a usb key fob with more capacity for the same price in the bargain bin ...

It only took a decade or so...

[TACD]

You'd think the music companies would have at least one economist on staff who could explain to them, slowly and gently, that under certain circumstances it is actually possible to make more money when each individual unit is priced lower. It really takes some stubborn failure of logic to prioritise your sale price above your actual monetary returns.

Of course, it's also possible that the music quality will just decline to compensate for the drop in price.

Re:It only took a decade or so...

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course, it's also possible that the music quality will just decline to compensate for the drop in price.

No, no that's not possible.

Re:It only took a decade or so...

[Anonymous Coward]

...under certain circumstances it is actually possible to make more money when each individual unit is priced lower.

Case in point, look at what happened when Valve temporarily slashed the price on Left 4 Dead a while back - from full retail price down to $15-20, IIRC. Sales that weekend skyrocketed. The price point hit that impulse-buy sweet spot, where even if it turned out to suck, or you play it just a couple times and forget about it, no big loss. The same sure as hell applies to music. Few things burn like paying $15 for a single decent track, but a sub-$10 burn I can live with.

Re:It only took a decade or so...

[HeckRuler]

Not so much in the long run when you've got a monopoply of a few oligarchs who all collude to keep prices high. Now that one of the prisoners has come face to face with his dilema, he's breaking ranks and diving for some quick cheap cash.

Of course, it's also possible that the music quality will just decline to compensate for the drop in price.

HAHAHAHAHA, oh that's a good one. A decline in music quality? You think that corporate profits influence musicians in ANY way? And I don't think that the quality of pop music has to drop very far before it becomes noise.

Re:It only took a decade or so...

[EvanED]

Case in point, look at what happened when Valve temporarily slashed the price on Left 4 Dead a while back - from full retail price down to $15-20, IIRC. Sales that weekend skyrocketed.

I was going to reply with this exact example. According to Jeff Atwood quoted an article saying that the sale didn't just dramatically increase sales and didn't even "just" cause more copies to be sold than launch, but brought in more raw revenue than launch day did.

Re:It only took a decade or so...

[DerekLyons]

You'd think the music companies would have at least one economist on staff who could explain to them, slowly and gently, that under certain circumstances it is actually possible to make more money when each individual unit is priced lower.

You'd think, if you are spouting about economics, that you'd have found an economist to gently and slowly explain to you the meaning of 'elastic' and 'inelastic' markets.
 
Or, IOW, not lowering their prices isn't a sign they don't have such an economist as it isn't at all clear that lowering their prices will lead to significantly increased sales. People don't buy CD's like toothpaste (because that brand is on sale this week), they buy them because they like the artist.

Re:It only took a decade or so...

[Kjella]

The same economist would probably also tell them that this is usually only true if the market is so that lowering them price would open up the market to a much larger part of the population or that people would consume vastly more. Neither is really true, almost everyone everywhere listens to some music already and most people won't be dedicating much more time to listen to it nor can they listen to more than one song at once. And there's always free radio 24/7 if everything else is not enough, or Spotify if you're lucky enough to have that. There's tons of budget bin music, but nobody's buying it.

The simple truth is that most people are cheap. Even with free Spotify everybody's talking about how annoying the ads are, yet extremely few want to pay to make them go away. It's like going on and on about your toothache and yet you never go see a dentist. It costs 17$/month (99 NOK) to cure in a country with a nominal GDP of 76,692$. Compared to US incomes that's 10$/month for practically near limitless access to music, offline access and so on and it annoys them and still they don't pay. For comparison, you'd get about four rides with the city bus/tram/subway here for the same. At the local fastfood I'd get two kebabs or somewhat less than a pizza. But that's not what people want, they want it for free and continue to be annoyed.

Re:It only took a decade or so...

[Nethemas the Great]

But if they didn't price themselves out of everyone's wallet then how would we be motivated to find alternatives? Practically free transmission of digital content from person to person has a nice ring to it...

Re:It only took a decade or so...

[newdsfornerds]

You forget the board members went to business school. That makes it harder for them to apprehend what's happening the real world.

Re:It only took a decade or so...

[pangu]

Of course, it's also possible that the music quality will just decline to compensate for the drop in price.

No, it will not, because it can't decline.

Re:It only took a decade or so...

[Aradiel]

No, no that's not possible.

Search your feelings, you know it to be true!

Re:It only took a decade or so...

[Gnavpot]

The same economist would probably also tell them that this is usually only true if the market is so that lowering them price would open up the market to a much larger part of the population or that people would consume vastly more. Neither is really true, almost everyone everywhere listens to some music already and most people won't be dedicating much more time to listen to it nor can they listen to more than one song at once.

Huh? You don't need to dedicate more time to listening if you buy more CDs. And you certainly don't need to listen to more songs simultaneously.

You simply need to listen to each CD less frequently.

I can only speak for my self, but since I "discovered" the £4-8 CDs on amazon.co.uk, I have bought a handful of CDs every month. Before that, I didn't even buy one each year.

Re:It only took a decade or so...

[DaveGod]

You'd think, if you are spouting about economics, that you'd have found an economist to gently and slowly explain to you the meaning of 'elastic' and 'inelastic' markets. IOW, not lowering their prices isn't a sign they don't have such an economist as it isn't at all clear that lowering their prices will lead to significantly increased sales. People don't buy CD's like toothpaste (because that brand is on sale this week), they buy them because they like the artist.

To elaborate, well there's a Wiki on elasticity of demand, which basically considers the proportionate change in quantity demanded to the proportionate change in price. But, that's just one influence over what we're really interested in: monopoly profit. That Wiki page has a textbook chart though perhaps it is not clearly explained:

The monopoly position is PmQm whereas under perfect competition the position is PcQc. The former makes the most profit, whilst the latter has the most quantity being demanded without the supplier making a loss*, and hence is the best-possible position consumers can reasonably expect, all else being equal.

However. See those bits in italics? Theories should rightly try to keep other variables and other considerations constant and therein lies the rub.

Firstly, the "loss" is not completely accurate. At PcQc, the supplier is not breaking-even, it is actually making the absolute minimum profit it will accept to continue producing the goods. Consider, would you invest in a company for a 3% return when you can make 2% in a savings account? Probably not: the company would have to make you the 2% (the risk-free opportunity cost) PLUS sufficiently more from the company to account for the increased risk. Economics often treats this minimum return as effectively a finance cost - and, in this context, what really is the difference between dividends that "must" be paid vs. loan interest?

Secondly, music is (aside from personal grumbling about the crap produced these days) wholly about not all being the same - we specifically do not want all else to be equal, it is a creative industry not a commodity. So that means investing in new artists; new artists means new risks. It might help to consider that chart refers to one product and now we are thinking about many. See how this feeds into the minimum profit/finance costs?

Differentiating between monopoly profits and "finance cost" gets very muddled when examining, say, one album or wondering why a CD costs so much. The labels do have a very valid argument when they talk about needing to make lots of money from some in order to suffer the losses on the others. The ONLY way to determine if a music label is making monopoly profits is to examine their overall profits relative to investments and risk, over the long term. Only then can you see if what society is losing through individual albums being "overpriced" is what society is getting back though new creative music (yes this does still make the fatal assumption that the music industry has competent management and is efficient).

What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[thered2001]

If given a music CD, what would be the first thing you'd do with it? Play it or burn it? (Or give it back with an apology of "this is not a format I support any more"?)

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[Anonymous Coward]

rip it

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[Mr. DOS]

Try “rip it”.

Who burns CD's any more?

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[quantumplacet]

I dont know, most cd's that come out these days I'd rather burn than rip...

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[julesh]

I dont know, most cd's that come out these days I'd rather burn than rip...

Having tried this with a box full of AOL cds, I can tell you you have to have a *very* hot fire to get them to burn.

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[keeboo]

Who burns CD's any more?

Interesting comment from someone with a nickname like yours.

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[omnichad]

I burn my CD's. Otherwise, they're just empty.

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[Anonymous Coward]

I normally just torrent the album any way. Saves having to install a program to rip the CD and messing about getting the encoding right. In fact I have normally already downloaded the album and decided that it is worth buying.

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[MachDelta]

I put an AOL CD on the BBQ once. It actually surprised me how quickly it softened and then began to sag into grill. I had to be pretty quick with a fork to scoop it off before it fell onto the burners. And then I had to twirl the fork to keep the melted CD from dripping onto the ground. I actually ended up with a pretty cool looking plastic blob wrapped around the fork, but unfortunately I couldn't get the fork out without smashing my "artwork". :(

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[Anonymous Coward]

(Or give it back with an apology of "this is not a format I support any more"?)

I think I'll choose the not-douchebag answer that doesn't make me confrontational towards public conventions just for the sake of being a confrontational douchebag, thank you very much.

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[Anonymous Coward]

I probably wouldn't even burn it. To do so would mean having to dig through my pile of spares and try to rig up an old optical drive via IDE-USB adaptor (because folding the IDE ribbon to connect it directly would leave the drive upside down).
 
Seriously, the first thing I would do on being given a music CD would be to torrent its contents.

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[Nethemas the Great]

I think I'd go find a milk jug lid and a microwave and watch the pretty light show as the disc goes round and round...

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[Anonymous Coward]

Play it. Seriously, since I only have 500 MB left on my hard drive (I have a 250 GB HD). I tried moving a bunch shit from my HD (movies, old useful programs, 3ds max documents, SolidWorks documents, uninstalled some games, etc), yet I still manage to have 1 GB. And I need more memory for the page file and I know that I am 100% free of malware.

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[iamnobody2]

whats the milk jug for?

Re:What's the first thing you would do with a CD?

[Nethemas the Great]

The milk jug "lid" is to lift the CD off of the floor of the microwave in order to enhance the light show (lasts about 10 seconds). Other similar non-metal items will work as well...

How much for the artists ?

[Yvanhoe]

Sell them $99 or $0.01, I am not willing to pay for middlemen more than the final artist will get. I think I'll wait for flattr.

Re:How much for the artists ?

[trickyD1ck]

Right, because artists are so good at/interested in production, marketing, logistics, customer support, etc. Middlemen exist for a reason.

Re:How much for the artists ?

[Yvanhoe]

Marketing ? Logistics ? Consumer support ? Don't need those in the internet era. The only reason middlemen still exist for is production. People I know that still buy CDs do so "to give to the artist" but they listen to all their music on downloaded MP3s. Just make the CD case an empty plastic box with a guarantee that 80% of the price goes to the artist and I am sure you continue to sell those very well. Face it : a CD doesn't fit in nowadays portable players.

Re:How much for the artists ?

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

Sell them $99 or $0.01, I am not willing to pay for middlemen more than the final artist will get. I think I'll wait for flattr.

So even though the artist agrees to have the middleman manage this and even receive the lion's share of the money, it doesn't matter? It's not the artist's right to do that?

Re:How much for the artists ?

[GKevlin]

How could you not need those even on the internet. How did you hear of the artist? How did you download their music? What mechanism allowed you to pay for it (securely)? The business model is changing, not the fact that it is a business and requires coordination beyond the scope of an indiviual who can sing.

Re:How much for the artists ?

[Yvanhoe]

I heard it on last.fm, or an open equivalent. Some friend put an extract on their facebook, on a fora, it was used in a video clip... etc... Of 90% of the artists I have discovered lately, it was through these means. Radio, TV ? They don't spread a lot, they are very repetitive.

To pay for it securely ? You have paypal, you will soon have flattr (it is a shame that this doesn't come from majors, it is their job !) When I go see someone live, it is almost a direct donation. In fact I have seen some artists doing the cashier.

How did I download the music ? There are several platforms that provide centralized hosting for free (youtube, dailymotion, myspace) that many artists use today, but you know, if the legalausaurus allowed it, a platform like napster, or eDonkey could work VERY well with a cost of zero. They did, before they were forbidden.

I love the juxaposition

[edremy]

""Why does Universal feel the need to get below $10?" a senior distribution executive at a competing major asked. "

Quickly followed by

"[Sales of CDs] which [are] down 15.4% so far this year. Album sales were down 18.2% last year, and 19.7% in 2008, "

I swear, Thick as a Brick should be a Jethro Tull song, not a description of record company executives....

Re:I love the juxaposition

[notaspy]

"I swear, Thick as a Brick should be a Jethro Tull song, not a description of record company executives...."

An album which makes the case for the superiority of vinyl (packaging).

The business model isn't completely dead with this

[Coopjust]

I'll be honest. I'm usually more of a singles person than an album person.

However, when the album and digital copy are near the same price, the physical copy provides a long lasting backup (pressed CDs last longer than burnt), and I have a lossless copy that I can legally use, rip to lossless on my PC, and not have to go on a tracker and seed until my eyeballs fall out of my head for the ratio...it makes sense for a number of albums.

Weird Al Yankovic stated that he was happy for either avenue his customers used to buy music, but his take per track on iTunes was about two cents a track and his take on CDs was about 26 cents- which is pretty major if you want to support the artist.

Anyhow, it's a good move by UMG, albeit overdue. I think it's like the MPAA- the "boston strangler" of VHS turned out to be a major blessing and boon to their business. Hopefully other companies follow suit.

Too late

[Junior J. Junior III]

This would have been a great strategy for the late 1990's, when the CD was still a relevant media (and, for that matter, when consumers were demanding that prices be lowered, both through their words and through their actions -- which the industry by and large ignored completely).

I'm not sure I'd call CDs relevant still. We've moved on to solid state media, writeable storage decoupled from the content. You could discount 8-track tapes and they wouldn't sell today. CD's don't have the same analog appeal that vinyl records to, either. I expect that eventually they'll just stop making CDs, and all music will be distributed via the network.

This price reduction merely indicates that we're a little bit closer to that day. I doubt it'll do much to boost sales at this point.

Re:Too late

[Boomerang Fish]

I'm not sure I'd call CDs relevant still. We've moved on to solid state media, writeable storage decoupled from the content. You could discount 8-track tapes and they wouldn't sell today. CD's don't have the same analog appeal that vinyl records to, either. I expect that eventually they'll just stop making CDs, and all music will be distributed via the network.

This price reduction merely indicates that we're a little bit closer to that day. I doubt it'll do much to boost sales at this point.

Maybe... where can I get an 8 track player these days? While CD players abound... in computers, in cars, in game stations... and DVD (and Blueray? Don't know, don't have one yet...) players can play CD's...

I admit it's late, but it may allow a last gasp, since the players surround us.

--
I drank what?

Re:Too late

[wirehead_rick]

This would have been a great strategy for the late 1990's, when the CD was still a relevant media (and, for that matter, when consumers were demanding that prices be lowered, both through their words and through their actions -- which the industry by and large ignored completely).

I'm not sure I'd call CDs relevant still. We've moved on to solid state media, writeable storage decoupled from the content. You could discount 8-track tapes and they wouldn't sell today. CD's don't have the same analog appeal that vinyl records to, either. I expect that eventually they'll just stop making CDs, and all music will be distributed via the network.

This price reduction merely indicates that we're a little bit closer to that day. I doubt it'll do much to boost sales at this point.

Mod parent up.

This is _the_ post of the day.

Re:Too late

[Anonymous Coward]

I expect that eventually they'll just stop making CDs, and all music will be distributed via the network.

At which point they'll no longer get my money. I'm not buying something without a physical copy, and lucky for me, there are still plenty of people on my side. Enough that they don't want to lose our business.

Re:Too late

[GasparGMSwordsman]

I'm not sure I'd call CDs relevant still.

I do love reading comments like this. CD sale make up more than 55% of all music sales. This includes Vinyl, MP3 (or any other digital format), Cassette tapes and any other format. (Actually if you look at the numbers, they refer to "songs sold online" vrs "CD albums sold". If you take a reasonable and low estimate that there are 8 songs on a CD, the math clearly shows that songs are being sold at a rate of 2-1 in CD's favor)

I questions anyone's sanity that say, "Is the majority of the market still relevant?" Let me use another example. About half of all people are Women, would you claim that Women are not relevant?

Even if CD sales declined at this speed for 5 more years. At the end of that, it would still be a fifth of all music sales.

So here is what I suggest, since 1/5 is obviously not relevant. Next time you get a pay check, send the not relevant portion to me! (pre or post tax, either way, I am not picky.)

Re:Too late

[Junior J. Junior III]

That's why I don't think CDs are relevant to me. I didn't go out and do a market analysis study before I posted to /., so that's why I qualified my statement with "I'm not sure that..." I think that's reasonable. If you want to disagree, that's fine, but you could have been just as effective by citing the 55% figure and skipped on the douchebaggery.

I haven't bought a CD in over 10 years, apart from indy releases burned at home by local bands.

I would have preferred to buy lossless encoded downloads from them, but that wasn't something that they offered, so I bought CDs, ripped them, and put them on my music player.

I ripped my 800+ CD collection and put it on my NAS at home, and play that through my network to my stereo system. I fully intend never to buy another music CD unless that's absolutely the only way to get a lossless copy of the music.

Re:Too late

[GasparGMSwordsman]

That's why I don't think CDs are relevant to me. I didn't go out and do a market analysis study before I posted to /., so that's why I qualified my statement with "I'm not sure that..." ...

But you didn't state it is not relevant *TO YOU* you stated it was not relevant *AT ALL*.

This would have been a great strategy for the late 1990's, when the CD was still a relevant media (and, for that matter, when consumers were demanding that prices be lowered, both through their words and through their actions -- which the industry by and large ignored completely).

If you want to make large generalized statements, then expect to people to point out you are wrong. In this case all you had to do was do a google search of the issue and read any of the articles. Your first sentience is a broad generalized statement, that also happens to be untrue.

You next follow up with a second statement saying I'm not sure I'd call CDs relevant still." (I assume that this is where your claim that this is your opinion comes from). Followed by another inaccurate statement about solid state media (solid state does not even have a single percentage point in the market yet).

I'm not sure I'd call CDs relevant still. We've moved on to solid state media, writeable storage decoupled from the content. You could discount 8-track tapes and they wouldn't sell today.

I should also mention that they DO still sell 8 tracks:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-10287864-1.html

Lastly I would disagree with the premise that the CD is dieing. It will be here for the next 10-20 years. Why? Because there is no replacement to the physical format. When we DO have a replacement format that is as easy to use as the CD then it will be replaced, but not before.

I don't mean to say you should not share your feelings or opinions. However when you enter into a public debate using incorrect information that is your own fault. The statement that *you think* that the format is dieing and no longer relevant to you (and to many others I assume you point would be) is entirely valid. The change from the *for you* to *for everyone* however is one of those dangerous statements that speakers such as Joseph McCarthy and former Governor Palin use when they didn't bother to inform themselves. It is a tool to win a debate without having accuracy or truth on your side.

I also want to be clear that I am not trying to associate you with either of those extreme examples. I just find the use of such "opinion-as-fact" tactics morally repugnant. (Even when used by accident, which is what I assume happened here.)

I do apologize about the being-a-dick part, that was probably uncalled for.

Re:Too late

[Junior J. Junior III]

That's why I don't think CDs are relevant to me. I didn't go out and do a market analysis study before I posted to /., so that's why I qualified my statement with "I'm not sure that..." ...

But you didn't state it is not relevant *TO YOU* you stated it was not relevant *AT ALL*.

Not to be pedantic about it, but I stated that I wasn't sure that CDs are still a relevant media today. not that they aren't relevant.

You next follow up with a second statement saying I'm not sure I'd call CDs relevant still." (I assume that this is where your claim that this is your opinion comes from). Followed by another inaccurate statement about solid state media (solid state does not even have a single percentage point in the market yet).

Fair enough; I really am guilty of lumping "solid state" media in with hard drives. I didn't mean to, but I kindof forgot that most iPods aren't flash-based. I probably should have said "user-writeable" media.

I have no idea on figures, but I have to assume if you added up all the storage on iPods and flash-based mp3 players that it would be more than 1% of the market, though. Granted, a lot of iPods have tiny hard drives in them, not solid state storage. I also meant to include hard drives in home media servers and NAS solutions, as well, just to give a better idea of where I was coming from.

I'm not sure I'd call CDs relevant still. We've moved on to solid state media, writeable storage decoupled from the content. You could discount 8-track tapes and they wouldn't sell today.

I should also mention that they DO still sell 8 tracks:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-10287864-1.html

I dunno, I think that article does more to support my case than it does the case that 8-tracks still would sell if they were discounted. The Cheap Trick album is $30 on 8-track format, which is by far the most expensive way to purchase the album. I'd really love to see the total sales figures for that album, broken down by format.

Also, that cnet article mentions that "major labels" stopped producing the format in 1988, but that "entrepreneurial souls" have kept making them. Basically, it's indeed a dead format, and a tiny number of 8-track fetishists are keeping it alive in niches. Just like there are people who own and maintain Model T's.

Even the cnet editors admit they didn't know the 8-track format was still offered. Which, it isn't really -- try ordering a major label release on 8-track from a mainstream retailer. Except for one Cheap Trick album and whatever the aforementioned "entrepreneurial souls" are putting out, you won't find any for sale anywhere.

When you describe someone as a "soul" it kindof connotes "dead" to me, though;)

Lastly I would disagree with the premise that the CD is dieing. It will be here for the next 10-20 years.

I don't actually disagree with that -- CDs will be around as long as there are players. As long as DVD and Blu Ray players exist, they'll likely continue to support reading/writing CDs. And if the next format after Blu Ray is the same size spinning laser-read disc, I bet CDs will be playable and writeable on it, too.

So at the very least all the zillions of CDs that exist will be playable, and the format will certainly not die in that sense.

Not dying is not the same as remaining relevant, though. What counts as relevant is probably a matter of debate, and if the 55% figure is accurate perhaps I'm a bit ahead of my time in saying it yet, but to me it's pretty clear that the future is network distribution, not physical distribution.

I should point out, I have zero plans to buy a Blu Ray player for watching movies. I may or may not get one in my next computer, but if I do it'll likely be due to it being

One more thought

[Coopjust]

If I was a used CD retailer, I'd be scared right now. You're probably selling the CD for less anyways, but with the price difference being much less, you might lose a lot of your customers since the price of a new CD that supports the artist and is in immaculate physical condition is only a few bucks more.

Competition is always good though, and I'm sure used stores will be fine.

Speaking of businesses being threatened, I don't see the "as a record store owner, my business faces ruin" troll yet.

Re:One more thought

[Jer]

Speaking of businesses being threatened, I don't see the "as a record store owner, my business faces ruin" troll yet.

There are still record stores?

Outside of college towns I thought that business model had been pretty much destroyed by a combination of big box chains and the Internet.

Re:One more thought

[Boomerang Fish]

Used CD dealers used to be used tape dealers who used to be user record dealers...

Anyone in this market should know that the market exists because formats change and peoples needs change...

You're right they'll take a hit... but they have before and they'll come up with something new, as they always have.

Granted, I don't know what form it will take... maybe used MP3 players or used flash storage? Who knows...

But I somehow feel that this industry is used to change, even if a given dealer may not be.

--
I drank what?

Re:One more thought

[NotOverHere]

I would believe that retailers would be happier. They would get higher turnover. Better chance for sale to customers that thought $15 was too high; multiple sales from the customer who didn't mind $20 per disc.

My younger brother does CD wholesale resell. Thanks to the godsend that is the Doctrine of First sale, publishers and artists have already received their percentage on the copyrighted material. Most big name music stores, having limited floorspace for "new" music, rarely sell every copy, and sell the leftovers for pennies on the dollar for ticketed price to 2nd tier wholesalers. My brother as a third tier wholesaler then picks out the gemstones, and lists them on Ebay or Amazon. 80% of what he has will likely end up as landfill....

Wouldn't you think first tier retailers would like to change the price point and move more items at a higher overall profit?

Normal price here. And still way overpriced.

[wvmarle]

In Hong Kong a typical release CD of some local artist costs around USD 10 already. That's been since I moved here 7, 8 years ago. Older releases cost less. Import from US is typically USD 8-12 for a CD.

Now there are a few differences: the entertainment world lives on a smaller budget and the top artists are at a level that wouldn't even make it into American Idol. That says more about the cantopop than about American Idol.

Movies on DVD cost about USD 20 (new releases), older movies are sold at far cheaper prices. On VCD one can buy a movie for a few dollars.

The above prices are for the official media, not for the pirated ones. Those are far cheaper.

Still I think US$10 for a CD is overpriced. Pirated CD's are selling for well under USD 1 each. So that is a $9.something mark-up for what? Recording and artist's share?

Both pirated CD's and official CD's have to be manufactured and distributed. That incurs costs that are independent of the content. The only difference is the actual recording and the marketing. Even the shops selling pirated disks are in the same expensive locations as the official outlets, so even there is no difference: they both have to make the same profit to survive. Both shop's suppliers have to run their trucks and pay their drivers and workers and run their CD/DVD machines.

Official releases have better quality CD (technical: play guaranteed, last longer than a few years) and come in jewel case instead of paper sleeve. That may add $0.20-0.30 to manufacturing. Even when selling at USD 2.50 each the label should be able to make a USD 1.00 gross profit on each. And at that price level it becomes vending machine material, and volume may skyrocket due to all those impulse buys. Sell a million disks, make a million in gross profit. If a million dollars is not enough to cover recording, marketing, and a fat profit, then you're doing something terribly wrong.

Re:Normal price here. And still way overpriced.

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow.. I want what you're smoking. Maybe you should start a band and make a million dollars with your burnt/sleeved CDs.

Re:Normal price here. And still way overpriced.

[EvanED]

Still I think US$10 for a CD is overpriced. Pirated CD's are selling for well under USD 1 each. So that is a $9.something mark-up for what? Recording and artist's share?

Let me rephrase: "so that is a $9.something mark-up for what? Almost all of what went into producing the album?"

(Though of course both arguments are dumb because the artist gets so little, but it really isn't that pressing the CDs and distributions are supposed to be a substantial part of the cost.)

Re:Normal price here. And still way overpriced.

[wvmarle]

I have met plenty of artists that recorded their own 4-6 track album and sold it for something like EUR 5 at their concerts. That was their cost - and they had produced only maybe a couple thousand disks.

Recording a CD by some big label may cost 10 times as much, but when moving hundreds of times the number of disks that is still cheaper on a per-CD basis, and manufacturing cost is down due to bigger volumes.

In the volumes those big record companies are doing I don't believe they need double the price of an indie CD just for marketing and recording.

Or you could of course, you know, try to give some supporting figures for your reply. Something to make it believable that those huge margins are needed, and reasonable even.

When CDs and LPs were sold in parallel, the CD (with it's cheaper manufacturing) tended to cost more than the LP. I don't believe that marketing a CD costs more than marketing the LP that is sold at the same time.

Re:Normal price here. And still way overpriced.

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

So in other words, the people who created music, produced it, marketed it, etc - they shouldn't get anything? It should simply be a matter of reproduction costs? I'm just having a hard time figuring out the premise for your argument.

"privately, some appeared annoyed."

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't this just imply collusion, when we have executives at other companies "annoyed" when UMG lowers prices? What right do they have to tell UMG what prices to set?

price fixing?

[eagl]

If the other music groups complain or retaliate in any way, doesn't that constitute illegal price fixing?

Re:price fixing?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is America. Here in our free market society, we call that "competition". Come to think of it... *eyes eagl suspiciously and with a sneer* ...where's your American flag pin, comrade?

Re:price fixing?

[eagl]

My flag pin is tucked away in my wallet 'cause it's all about me, and our own president refused to wear a flag pin during his campaign because he thinks only hypocrites wave the flag in public. Or maybe it was only religious gun toting rednecks that put their hands over their heart during the national anthem? I forget which one it was. Or was it both? In any case...

I thought a bunch of companies getting together to all raise prices together and punish any companies that didn't comply with the higher prices was sort of "bad" from a competitive, capitalist perspective. It is something you'd expect to see with a controlled economy, and except for very specific cases (like food prices), is illegal in the US. Methinks your comment might be really directed at your own tortured inner collective tendencies, a shaded mirror reflection of your soul.

Re:price fixing?

[Hurricane78]

You are realizing that you are talking about a group of people who can’t do a business deal without hookers and drugs, are you? ^^ (I know that this is de-facto true because of my old job.)

Some price fixing will be their smallest problem if they get caught. ;)

Re:price fixing?

[eagl]

They're the same group of jerks that installed a rootkit on my computer a few years ago (thanks sony asshats) so I'll believe pretty much anything said about them.

Good job guys

[Taibhsear]

Welcome to the 21st century. *cough*

"Single CD's" will have the suggested list prices

[VShael]

Am I the only one that read that and said "Oh, so the album CDs will still be 25 bucks?"

Songwriter's share of the royalties

[tepples]

Even when selling at USD 2.50 each the label should be able to make a USD 1.00 gross profit on each.

The songwriter (who is often not the recording artist) would disagree with that. The US copyright royalty board has set a statutory rate of about 9 cents per track split between the songwriter and his music publisher, tied to the Consumer Price Index.

Re:Songwriter's share of the royalties

[wvmarle]

Then where does the rest of the money go?

USD 10 retail price

20% for the shop: USD 2, shop pays distributor $8 each.

$0.50 each for distribution (let's be generous), USD 7.50 to the CD manufacturer.

$1.50 for manufacturing of the disk, case, booklet (I'm in a generous mood tonight), $6.00 left.

$0.09 for royalties: $5.91 gross profit for label? For recording costs? Marketing costs? Even liberally applying other costs on the CD process there is stil a lot of money unaccounted for.

Besides I wonder wtf some "copyright royalty board" has to do with setting rates. Isn't such a rate decided as a matter of negotiation between artist and publisher?

Re:Songwriter's share of the royalties

[NeoSkandranon]

Marketing. Promotion. Paying off radio stations to play the song seven or eight times a day.

'Single' CD's? What are those(Must be getting old)

[Anonymous Coward]

Do they mean like a regular album? Did they ever release singles that are the equivalent of 45rpm records? Don't look at me like that.

Did they ever release a single song CD to promote the song as a single? Maybe that partly explains why they missed the boat. They were saying buy the whole thing, can't have just a taste for under $5. Hello, anybody home. This is the 80s calling, we want our business model back.

The Music Industry 'Gets it'

[tpstigers]

Every time the price of music comes up, I read dozens of comments that say, in a nutshell, that the music industry 'doesn't get it'. And yet, they're still up to their necks in money. While the music industry (and the film industry) seem to be doing everything in their power to resist the onslaught of the internet, their continued profits would argue that their resistance is not exactly futile.

Huh?

[Fnord666]

What's a CD? Some sort of offline backup of the originally seeded songs?

Re:The business model isn't completely dead with t

[MarkvW]

If artists make 13 times more money on CDs than they do on itunes, what does that tell you about efficiencies in the music marketplace?

Re:The business model isn't completely dead with t

[clone53421]

Nothing.

To judge efficiencies, I’d have to also know how many CDs were sold vs. how many digital downloads were sold.

Bad marketing decision

[Anonymous Coward]

CD's priced at $9.99, $8.99, $7.99, $6.99, and $5.99 would sell a lot better.

Re:Bad marketing decision

[Yvan256]

Wow, that's not even 10$, 9$, 8$, 8$, 7$ and 6$, respectively! /dumbass_consumer

MP3! How *quaint*

[mister_playboy]

I remember MP3s. They made a nice way to conveniently transport your music until they were first replaced by better lossy formats, and then made obsolete by lossless formats that take advantage of the abundance of cheap storage.

Price according to quality.

[FlyingBishop]

There are quite a few artists whose new albums I want to pay $20 for. The majority however is cheap cookie-cutter crap.

so,

[syrinx]

what is the price of buggy whips nowadays?

Re:The business model isn't completely dead with t

[ZOmegaZ]

Weird Al Yankovic stated that he was happy for either avenue his customers used to buy music, but his take per track on iTunes was about two cents a track and his take on CDs was about 26 cents- which is pretty major if you want to support the artist.

Of course, if you're buying tracks off the CDs they don't make any more, it's the difference between some profit and none.

Maybe it will push down used CDs too.

[stomv]

I buy about 100-150 CDs each year, and the only ones which come shrink wrapped are local bands who self-publish. The rest of my CDs all come used -- local shops, eBay, amazon, GoodWill, friends, whatever. I've got a long list of music I'd like to own, and I'm in no hurry to buy any particular album, so I rarely pay more than $3 for a CD (including shipping). Since I listen to music from mp3 files 100% of the time, a slightly damaged jewel case or booklet doesn't matter to me.

It costs me less to own more, I'm not giving any money to the MPAA, and I'm not involved in creating more plastic waste -- we Americans own enough crap already. If this helps depress the price of used CDs too, that's ab-fab!

Archive to FLAC

[Anonymous Coward]

Archive to FLAC and put it away for storage, like I do with all my cd's. With a proper lossless archive like FLAC, you forever have the option to convert to any lossy format you chose, for a perfect "first generation" copy. On your main computer, of course, you can just load the entire FLAC archive into your music player and play off that.

Why mess around with buying mp3's when you can get the real thing? I keep a running list of albums I might want to buy, and every few months I order a batch of about 10 used cd's from a used cd store like this. It's not hard to choose between $5 for the real deal and $10 for mp3's (which, no matter how good the sound quality, can never be bit-for-bit identical to the original WAV files on the original disc).

Re:Archive to FLAC

[NeoSkandranon]

+5 informative for the link to secondspin, thanks.

Premium vs Discount Format

[BlueBoxSW.com]

I see this as a really important shift.

Previously, the CD was the premium format, with all it's uncompressed audio glory. And it is fairly portable, playable in most consumer electronic devices found in the living room or car.

The MP3/AAC format was the discount format. Compressed with some audio loss, and playable in less devices. Also encumbered in some cases with DRM.

The premium format carried a 50% markup, with most MP3 albums costing around $10, and CD's costing around $15.

With CD's potentially costing LESS than MP3/AAC formats, this signifies the market is placing premium on the MP3/AAC format over the CD. This could be because the format is now supported in more devices, or consumers find it friendlier to deal with, perhaps because there's no need to fight the packaging then burn it on your own.

Re:Premium vs Discount Format

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, I love the idea of Amazon.com's DRMless music files (even with the watermarks); but I can't stomach paying 8 bucks for an album, or 99 cents for a song that might be included on a future album purchase. Their 5 dollar deals are much more palatable, but that's still 50 cents/song on average. I've seen their featured daily sale album priced as high as 3.99, but usually they are 2.99 and occasionally you luck out with a good one for 1.99. I feel okay with that last price and can deal with the 2.99 one for an album on which I adore at least 5 songs. I'm getting a digital, lossy copy Amazon.com! Charge me 20 cents a track max, and really 10 cents is the point where I'll pony up on a regular basis. I'd buy a Kesha song for 10 cents, merely to annoy folks with! At that price point I'd probably spend more than 10 dollars a month on music, since it becomes an impulse buy. Right now, I will only spend what I used to spend on my Sirius sub, which is 12 bucks. I suspect the high prices are really keeping a lot of folks from buying a lot of stuff, especially back catalogue stuff. My dad, the luddite, would be snapping up old Marty Robbins tunes like a madman were they priced so low (despite the fact that crap should be public domain by now). He's never going to do that for 50 cents or more a song. Likewise, I'm never going to buy One Fierce Beer Coaster digitally no matter how much I love that album, they are charging way too much.

All prices in USD.

Re:Premium vs Discount Format

[fermion]

The CD has not been the premium product for years. Recall that one reason the CD became so popular was that was smaller and would last longer than an LP. Some people say the CD sounded better, but there were certainly arguments when dealing with new quality recording played on good equipment. Many would say the LP was better. There were other losses like the shrinkage of cover art, but we dealt with the perceived losses and increased prices because the CD was simply so convenient. It was even more convenient than tapes. And the price was somewhat justified with increased content.

The MP3 meets all the measures we used to make the CD the premium product. The format is smaller and lasts indefinitely. The CD may sound better on quality equipment, but few people have full stereo systems anymore. I see no kids spending the thousand or so I did on a CD player, amp, and speakers. The standard is an iPod.

The issue was not that the MP3 was not the premium product, I think it has been for at least five years, but that no one could figure out how to charge a premium price for it. So CDs have and will likely stay around in the way vinyl did not if for no reason that labels can make money off it and it is a two step process to copy. As long as computer have drives that can read the CD, the format will stay. When they go I do not see a revival as we have seen with LP, as the CD really has no acoustic advantages, and the recording on most CDs were not tailored the way there were on the LP.

Re:"Single CD's" will have the suggested list pric

[keeboo]

That's not the worst.
What about things like 40 y.o. Beatles albums? Wasn't everyone paid properly already?

Perhaps not... I mean, it seems that Paul McCartney is still unable to afford buying meat, after all those years!

Physical media is obsolete

[Trip6]

Except for the DRM, which Mr. Jobs has mostly figured out, physical media has no reason to exist. It's a shame that the most popular formats are so compressed, but that will improve with more bandwidth and Moore's law. Ultimately, the quality of your DAC and transducers (i.e. speakers) determines the quality of your playback level. Vinyl has a certain appealing sound characteristic when enough money is spent on the playback but will never become mainstream again, relegated to hobby status.

Re:Physical media is obsolete

[Sloppy]

physical media has no reason to exist

Buying something insubstantial while drunk at a bar, is awkward. I don't even "pack" storage in circumstances like that, and even if I did, it's not like anyone wants to take the time to transmit it, at least with today's sadly inadequate tech. Handing a physical CD to someone is an act of transferring hundreds of megabytes in less than a second. It's just ridiculously fast and reliable, and no competing technology has risen to challenge it.

You know the old joke.. never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of magtapes.

Re:The business model isn't completely dead with t

[Yvan256]

It tells nothing about the efficiencies in the music marketplace. It tells a lot about music labels contracts, though.

A CD has more than one song on it

[tepples]

$0.09 for royalties

A CD usually has more than one song on it. For a 12-song album, this would be $1.08. So we're left with $4.80, and as NeoSkandranon alluded, some of this is spent on producing promotional short films and buying 4-minute ad slots on radio stations in major markets.

Re:The business model isn't completely dead with t

[nomadic]

I'm usually more of a singles person than an album person.

Noooooooooooooooo...don't say that here, you'll just summon a horde of incredibly annoying self-annointed music geeks who will annoy us all by explaining how for the bands THEY like the whole album is good. If you're unlucky you'll get a few links to a bunch of truly awful whiny hipster bands with ironic band names who all sound pretty much the same, like they first picked up their instruments yesterday.

From what I've been seeing...

[Misch]

From what I've been seeing, I've noted that a number of musicians that I listen to have gone to a "pay what you want" price for their CDs. They used to sell them for $15 a pop, but have switched to "There's a pile of CDs in the back of the room. Pay what you can, I suggest $15" model.

Of course, these are small-time artists in the independent world, so they have the flexibility to set their own prices.

One of the performers doing this has said that he is making more of a profit every night because more people are giving something. (Granted, the profit margin is smaller, but he's making it up in volume.)

Re:'Single' CD's? What are those(Must be getting o

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not really clear by the sumamry if they mean single CDs as in a "single" (1-3 songs promoting the "big" song on the album) or single as in one disk in the case, as opposd to a 2 disk set

Surprise

[LtGordon]

UMG to price new CDs Under $10

Single CDs will have the suggested list prices of $10, $9, $8, ...

Which of these prices do you think will be most common? Kind of like how iTunes just had tons of those $0.69 songs.

A decade too late?

[rudy_wayne]

Or too little too late. Even if the record companies had reduced CD prices to more reasonable levels 10 years ago, I don't think things would be much different today. I haven't listened to a CD in a long time. Why would I want to be constantly shuffling CDs in an out of a CD player when I can rip everything to my hard drive or MP3 player and have hundreds of hours of music easily availble. Things have changed. Just as nobody uses 8-Track tapes anymore, the use of physical media is declining.

CDs are the new buggy whips.

Re:"Single CD's" will have the suggested list pric

[HikingStick]

I read that to mean an album that is on a single CD. Albums that span more than one disk, or are bundled with extra content, will still be a premium product.

Better late than never?

[HikingStick]

Though it may be too late to save the industry, I'll buy some at the lower price points just to get the point across that price has been a major factor. When CDs first came out, they were around $15, and I remember all the talking heads noting how much cheaper they would be to produce once volumes were high enough. Well, volume went up, but so did prices. I'm going to vote with my pocketbook, and will hopefully send a message.

Changes to How We Listen to Music

[AP31R0N]

For my brother who is about 10 years younger than me, gaining new music was a trivial matter. Click > Click > Wait > Enjoy. All it costs him is the time it takes to start the download and space on a hard drive.

Back in my day all we had for fun was a cliff and we had to buy or steal CDs. Do chores > Get allowance > take 45m train ride > find CD > come home > enjoy. Buying A meant not getting B (yet). If i didn't like A, i was still out the money. For me it was a big deal, a decision rather than a mere choice.

i wonder how this colored the significance of music for us. i don't know what it means or if it means anything at all. From my perspective it seems considerable. When you essentially have all the music ever made on your hard drive or a download away... it seems more disposable. It's a bundle of file and folder names. i look at my 300+ CDs and can almost feel what they cost me, i know when and where i bought them, i know what it feels like to move that damn shelf, the feeling of the case being cracked and the annoyance of the music skipping because the slot feeder has damaged it.

Anyone else thinking about this sort of thing. /ties another onion to his belt

Re:Changes to How We Listen to Music

[swordgeek]

I agree. I've spent decades slowly building my music collection, planning carefully, reading reviews (or not!), and mostly buying albums one-at-a-time. My wife and I have got about 200 records and 700 CDs now, and I know almost every track on 80+% of them. However, I know of a kid who, at the age of 13, had roughly three YEARS of downloaded music! (And for the record, my collection comes in at a month-and-a-half of music.)

It makes me wonder how music can be anything more than background noise. I'm finding the same thing myself, as I download things or listen to streaming music. I have to actually force myself to critically listen to new music, or it just slips into the subconscious stream.

Live music may be the key, though. Nothing replaces a live show with sweaty musicians onstage.

Re:Changes to How We Listen to Music

[AP31R0N]

It would take pen, paper and about an hour to list all the concerts i've attended. Live performances are something special to me, even if i've seen the act several times. Trying to get autographs after the show is also good fun. Can't download that experience (yet).

Track count? Playing time?

[dpbsmith]

I wonder whether it will turn out that these CDs have subpar track counts and playing time.

In the very early days of CDs it was common for a CD to have the same tracks and playing time as its LP counterpart--about forty minutes, tops. The days of the 72-minute de facto standard didn't come until much later.

Thanks to all my pirate friends!

[newdsfornerds]

Piracy works for the good of most! Thanks, Bram Cohen! Not that I condone or would ever steal anyone's IP.

Better late than never

[Anonymous Coward]

I've been asking for this for a LONG time. I'm one of those audio snobs that wants the highest possible quality for his music. I don't like 128k or 192k mp3s. I want a CD and a hifi sound system in my car and at home. I love buying CDs, but given you can't return it if you don't like it and you can't really listen to it in the store before you check out, I think $6.99 is my sweet spot for the impulse buy.

Better late than never UMG.

Re:The business model isn't completely dead with t

[Nethemas the Great]

What does the fact that a $15-20 charge on a piece of plastic that costs $0.30 to make and provides $0.26 to the artist tell you?

Re:MP3! How *quaint*

[Anonymous Coward]

Yea, everyone's on the lossless format bandwagon now. It's so nice to be rid of mp3s.

woody allen

[Anonymous Coward]

to mutate and pervert a woody allen quote:

"you're a music company. if you want to sell more records, make better music."

Only in the US....

[Niedi]

Here in Germany they still expect me to pay 13-16 euro for most new cds. Mind you according to Google, that's 17,65$ to 21,65$...

And they seem honestly surprised why I'm not willing to pay that much...

These are actually the normal prices

[Sloppy]

Go see a band at a nightclub. It's not unusual for locals at the "CD release party" to give the CD away for free (well, subsidized by their potion of the door charge). Selling CDs for $5 or $10 is most typical. I've seen as high as $12 by touring bands, but they have fuel expenses and that's the top end of the spectrum.

Sounds like UMG is just adjusting to what's normal and expected. The market already told 'em, years ago, that an average of under $10 is the right price.

Compact Disks, or "Compact Disks"

[AliasMarlowe]

One interesting question is whether the $10 disks would be proper CDs, capable of having the trademarked Compact Disc Digital Audio logo, or whether they'd be bastardized pseudo CDs with weirdo copy protection (and ergo NOT authorized to have the Compact Disc Digital Audio logo), which don't play in lots of devices. The invisible cost of nonstandard disks would make them quite unattractive to many.

Re:Compact Disks, or "Compact Disks"

[brianosaurus]

I would hope we're past that already. It has been tried and failed many times. Trying it again as "customer abuse with a better price point" would fail just as badly. I expect its the same product as now, just priced to sell, instead of priced to sit on shelves and boost pageviews for The Pirate Bay.

There's a union...why don't they use it?

[Anonymous Coward]

The real issue that musicians and the companies fail to realize is that it's dirt cheap to set up a decent recording studio these days and even cheaper to pay for the bandwidth to distribute the product. For that matter the band can burn you a disc and mail it for less than $10.

Hopefully they will change the cost too

[Anonymous Coward]

Sony did this already but the problem is that while they lowered the list price substantially, they only lowered the actual wholesale cost a tiny bit so a CD that has a list price of 9.99 actually costs the retailer 8.69. The upshot is that nobody can stay in business by selling these CDs at or below the list price. The record store I manage has to sell the 9.99 list price Sony CDs at 12.99 to make enough money to justify carrying them. Other record companies, when they set the list price at 10 bucks, set the wholesale cost at somewhere between 6 and 7 bucks, which is fair and reasonable. Sony basically just changed their list prices without changing the wholesale prices so they could claim that they responded to customers complaints about pricing, while forcing retailers to either price things above list price and look like they are the ones screwing the customer, or not carry them at all. Hopefully UMG isn't going to be following this pattern of behavior, and will let retailers actually carry and sell their releases for a fair price.

This should work

[nebular]

I find that I'm buying mre DVDs butusually it's the DVDs that are in the bin that are between $5-12, they're old but they're good. It would be the same for cds but I find I don't really even download anymore. I have a nice collection of music I like and haven't found anything that's come out in the last few years that really interests me beyond the occational listen on the radio.

It will work, but the music industry as a whole just needs to step up the quality of music being made.

never buying a cd ...

[tabooli]

... until they let me mail in my gas and parking receipt and get reimbursed for the trip to the b&m.

burn burn burn

[anonymousNR]

The multiple references to "burning" an already "burned" CD clearly shouts that people really forgot how CDs work.
Time to move on with Mp3 and probably in future get a better format, not travel back to CD and Vinyl.

Re:burn burn burn

[Culture20]

The multiple references to "burning" an already "burned" CD clearly shouts that people really forgot how CDs work. Time to move on with Mp3 and probably in future get a better format, not travel back to CD and Vinyl.

Even worse: those "already burned" CDs are pressed, not burned. Although they might have meant "ripped", I'm sure these people meant "ripped and burned" as a way to store more music per CD (lots of CD players play mp3s off CDs).

Yes!

[malp]

Not even the youngest generation. Napster took off about 11 years ago. Many kids just graduating college and entering the workforce probably never bought a CD during their teenage years.

Remember when CDs first came out?

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone else remember when CDs first came out they were 12.99. People wanted to know why something that cost less to produce than a cassette tape cost more to purchase, and the industry was promising that prices would drop to 10 or below after they paid for the new manufacturing setups?

Yeah. F-You recording industry. Making enemies of your customers is what brought you to where you are today. I will dance happily on your grave.

What is a CD?

[Hurricane78]

Were they these silvery disks from the last millennium?

I don’t have a player or even a drive for those anymore. Seriously. Does anyone still buy those?

burn?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why on earth do you guys call "burn" to the process of "un-burning" media from a CD??

Well....

[AmonTheMetalhead]

Depending on what crap they put on the CD's i might buy it, but seeing what crap there's out there, i'm not holding my breath. (just google brokencyde if you want a lobotomy)

Awesome

[thetoadwarrior]

I'll make sure to support UMG more than the other twats. I do like to still buy CDs because I can convert them to MP3, OGG or whatever and have a back-up straight away. When I don't buy CDs, I go for Amazon which has the best digital system so far.

Cd sales are on the way out no matter the cost

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you tried to by a CD player lately. My last look for one turned up about 3 in the shop, compared to about 30 MP3 docks. If you can't buy the hardware to play the things why would you buy them?

9 out of 10 CD retailers said...

[rnturn]

... "We don't expect to make any more money on CDs than we did before they became affordable because we've slashed the floor space devoted to CDs to the bone and nobody goes into that part of the store anymore. At least those that're even able to find where we've hidden it. Besides, we already make a lot more on crappy over-priced, replacement earpods that break in a couple of months than we expect to make on CDs. So we'll be devoting a lot more space to those products than we will for CDs."

Re:The business model isn't completely dead with t

[Coopjust]

26 cents per track. Perhaps I didn't make it clear.