Pirate Bay Promotion Attracts Over 5000 Artists

redletterdave writes "While the movie and music industries would have you think that torrents are a threat to their business, thousands of independent artists heartily disagree. That's why more than 5,000 musicians, actors, writers, filmmakers and artists have signed up to be promoted by The Pirate Bay, the world's largest torrent site. Earlier this year, following the seizures of many popular file-sharing domains like MegaUpload, The Pirate Bay introduced a new promotion platform for artists called 'The Promo Bay,' which let independent artists reach tens of millions of people by offering favorable advertising spots on the The Pirate Bay's homepage. The response to The Pirate Bay's promotion platform has been overwhelming: the company announced on Thursday that it has already received more than 5,000 applications, and has managed to be a quality platform for driving significant interest to independent artists."

Comments

Evolve or die

[dubbreak]

The artists have spoken, the consumers have spoken the music industry is evolving. Either the RIAA and big music evolve with the rest of the industry or face inevitable extinction.

Re:Evolve or die

[lorenlal]

I am not a musician - But my understanding is that musicians and bands make most of their money by touring. If that is indeed the case, then advertising with TPB, getting exposure, and (hopefully) a large fan base actually ends up being a great investment. I'd expect that this is even more so for indies, since they really don't get the benefit of the distribution channels of big label artists.

Plus, concert goers are pretty likely to buy the album. If they're actually good, chances are there are plenty of people who will go and support them by buying music on the various digital outlets too. The Pirate Bay could be doing a lot of good for these artists.

Re:Evolve or die

[Terrasque]

"We've decided to stop paying artists entirely, that is up to them."

As far as I understand things, they're largely there already..

  * Courtney Love does the math
  * The Problem With Music by Steve Albini

Re:Evolve or die

[dubbreak]

Did you even read the summary? I know RTFA is frowned upon, but 5000 artists selected this as a way to get their music out.

Since pretty any person can now record their own music with quite high quality with minimal investment (which used to be limited to studios with many thousands of $$ invested in equipment) we are finding more and more free music. And it makes sense. Music is about creativity and sharing. If you want to get your music out there how do you? You might luck out with getting local radio play, but the internet is now the definitive way to get yourself noticed. You aren't going to get noticed charging for people to listen to you.

All the new music I discover is either:
1. found online
2. through friends (which discovered it one of these two ways.. yay recursion)

Once I hear about a band what do I do? I download some music via p2p, bittorrent, off their site.. some free medium. IF I like it and want to listen to it long term I buy (vinyl which usually comes with high quality mp3 rips as well) and add it to my collection. If they are in town I'd buy a ticket to a show. I'll probably subscribe to their youtube channel to watch new videos and hear new releases (which generates some add revenue) and if singles come out I like and need now I'll buy via iTunes or similar. The key is I need a free avenue for me to move into any payment type scenario or I'm not interested.

Look at how well the 'pay what you want' model has worked for music and games. It's impressive. People want to reward others for their creativity but also want low risk. Yes there will be leaches in the system, but it all works out in the end. I don't endlessly complain about people on welfare because of my tax bracket.

Kickstarter is a great example of how people want to support creativity but want low risk. I just discovered it a few months ago and have already supported 2 projects. The best part is you aren't limited to some kind of MSRP (kickstarter and pay-what-you-want). If you really like what someone is doing you can support them as much as you want.

I honestly believe people want to reward others for their creativity, but it seems quite honestly a heavy fisted middle man (such as the US record industry) isn't required to do that. The music industry used to offer exposure. That's what a record label bought you (with the huge cut they take in sales). Instead of taking a cut of future sales the Pirate bay is offering exposure for free. I think it's a huge win for artists.

Re:Evolve or die

[PopeRatzo]

That said, this has to feel a bit uncomfortable for artists.

Oh yeah. It makes them so uncomfortable that 5000 of them rushed to sign up with a web site that has been declared Public Enemy No 1 by the entertainment conglomerates, the RIAA, the MPAA and a whole bunch of sovereign nations.

Yeah. Real uncomfortable, they must be.

Re:Evolve or die

[dubbreak]

The music industry used to offer exposure. That's what a record label bought you (with the huge cut they take in sales). Instead of taking a cut of future sales the Pirate bay is offering exposure for free. I think it's a huge win for artists.

I'd like to correct myself. The music industry offered a few things to artists (not just exposure) in exchange for a hefty cut of all sales:

• Exposure (as mentioned before)
• Recording facilities/expenses
• Distribution

With the internet and modern tech these are all irrelevant. Bands can get exposure online through various avenues online. Recording can be done in a basement. Distribution is trivial if online and there are services for physical distribution that don't take anywhere near the cut the labels do.

Re:Evolve or die

[Anonymous Coward]

In fairness they make most of their money off of touring because the record companies with their various accounting practices and lop-sided contracts get all the profit from music sales. It doesn't have to be that way but yes independents giving away music build an audience is smart.

Re:Evolve or die

[PopeRatzo]

Exposure is everything in entertainment industry. A sold out concert tour can rake in money in the 100-200 million dollar range. So if album sales were effectively zero popular artist could still be millionaires.

You don't have to be a "popular artist" to make good money, if you are capable of creative thought and care about your work and your audience.

I've made a portion of my income as a professional musician for just over 25 years, and the past 5 have been by far the most lucrative. It's never been my main source of income, but I could live comfortably on it (though I probably wouldn't be able to bankroll my daughter's grad school).

I have quite a few friends who have very successful music careers. They're not mega-platinum, rolling in dough guys, but they've got health insurance and some have 401k accounts. Some make money from traditional channels, CD releases, etc, but most have found alternative income streams from their music, and all make a good chunk from public performance. About 8 years ago, I started writing and producing music on commission, the way some artists and sculptors work. It was a goofy idea when I started, but it's turned out well. When I sell a piece in this manner, I sell the rights as well. The commissioner can do whatever they want with the recorded piece, sell it, duplicate it, destroy it. In some cases, I don't keep even a copy for myself in final form (though with digitally produced and recorded music, keeping the parts is the same thing as keeping the whole, since all the information I need to create an exact duplicate of the final product is saved). The only thing I retain is attribution, so the only thing the commissioner cannot do is say he made it. I'm experimenting with various digital watermarking, to insure I maintain the attribution for music that is distributed beyond just a few people, but I haven't found exactly what I'm looking for in that regard, yet. I'm sure I will eventually.

The point is, artists are supposed to be innovators. The world for artists is changing today as it has changed several times in modern history. If they innovate, have integrity, and care about their audience, they'll do OK.

Re:Evolve or die

[fooslacker]

Since they made them available at an affordable price and without DRM I've bought more in the last year than in the last 10 before that combined. Evolve doesn't mean the model you espouse above with the live show being the product is the only viable one. Where you are correct however is that the old model of the record company taking the majority of risks and relying on 3 mega stars to prop up 3000 busts and trying to recreate the same success over and over again by mimicry of past successful artists is no longer viable since today's artists don't need major labels to front the costs of getting in the studio and getting a record/tape/cd pressed. The real key to finally putting a nail in big music's coffin is open new radio like distribution channels where music can be experienced for the first time for free and that is happening slowly through things like pandora and spotify. Hopefully, it will continue.

Re:Evolve or die

[skine]

Bands, both established and new, are realizing that it's possible to exist without a record label. And in many cases, it's in their best interest to get away from their label.

One of my favorite bands is Streetlight Manifesto.

From their website:

We’re writing today to ask you to please boycott all Streetlight related items by not purchasing any of our records or merchandise from Victory’s website, any traditional CD stores, online third party retailers or any digital distribution service (iTunes, Amazon etc). Victory has a long-time reputation of pocketing all of the proceeds from a band’s music and merch, with shady accounting and generally bully-ish behavior. If you want to support Streetlight, our music and our ability to tour and continue to release music, please make all SM related purchases from our own webstore, The RISC Store (www.riscstore.com), or come out to a show and buy a shirt or cd from us directly. In regards to getting the music we make, you can buy directly from us, or, alternately, we’re sure you can find a way to get the tunes onto your computer that may not be, ahem, traditional Speaking a Bit metaphorically, there is a Torrent of methods to accomplish this, and Google is your always loyal friend

Re:Evolve or die

[BenJCarter]

I am not a musician - But my understanding is that musicians and bands make most of their money by touring.

I met a Rock Star, once. He hit it big in the late 80's, and is still Rockin'. Being the network geek that I am, the subject of online distribution and piracy came up. In his words, "He used to tour to promote albums, now he uses singles and albums promote tours."

Perhaps Pirate Bay's business model may have a shot. I can certainly think of at least one industry just begging for more creative destruction...

Indie music has opened up my library.

[Beardo the Bearded]

I'm listening right now to a PB song: Unite by Djjage

I teach spin classes and use almost all indie rock and electro rock. Every time, people ask me for the artists and comment on how good the music is.

Fuck the labels, all of them. They're useless and intolerant and dangerous. Actually, let's not fuck them. I like my dick to not fall off.

I submitted

[jordan314]

I'm one of the 5000 artists that submitted to this campaign. All of the music on my page can be downloaded for free. For artists like me who have only dozens of listeners, the exposure is worth any potential loss of income. http://soundcloud.com/jordanbla

blocked by court order

[blackest_k]

I would quite like to look at this site however, my isp says access is blocked by court order
so i can't access these independent artists legally...

On the 24 July 2009, an Order was made by the High Court requiring eircom to block or otherwise disable access by its subscribers to the website thePirateBay.org, its related domain names, IP addresses and URLs. The Court was satisfied that on the basis of the evidence presented by the record companies that the PirateBay website is a website that facilitates the exchange of copyrighted sound recordings without the consent of the copyright owners.

eircom recognises the legitimate rights of the owners of copyrighted material and believes that individuals who share or download copyrighted material without the authorisation or the permission of the copyright owner are acting illegally.

The Order further provides that should the PirateBay website content be legitimatised in the future, then eircom has liberty to apply to the Court to have the Order vacated and access to the PirateBay website enabled.

eircom in compliance with the Order has agreed that access to the website the PirateBay.org, its related domain names, IP addresses and URLs from the eircom network will be blocked indefinitely from the 1st September 2009.

is the content hosted at http://thepiratebay.se/promo enough to change anything?

With TPB posted a compendium of published promos

[gellenburg]

I understand Promo Bay requests submitters list the top 3 countries, presumably for geo-targeting, but I wish the TPB folks would at least put up a web page that lists ALL of the published promos from every country.

I love discovering new music, and love listening to music from all over the World. I'd hate to not discover some awesome music from say Gabon or Tanzania or India because the submitter didn't put USA as one of the Countries.

Re:Confused

[Gription]

This kind of points out why the RIAA and the MPAA (who are incestuous siblings) will now have to seriously up the ante in their attacks on the Pirate Bay.
There isn't any way that they can allow competition in a market that their cartel controls. Dammit!!! They paid good money for their monopoly so their senators better get cracking to wipe them out.