Record stores around the country have been closing; our local Harvard Square HMV closed a few months ago. Universal is cutting CD prices by 30 percent (but not for classical). The really interesting question is how did the industry survive for so long?
The record companies don’t make artists happy (see Courtney Love’s speech from May 16, 2000).
The record companies don’t make government regulators happy, having been prosecuted for price fixing and other antitrust law violations. (see this Federal Trade Commission consent order)
The record companies don’t make convenience seekers happy. A CD is absurdly huge compared to the number of bytes that it holds. Why would you want to devote a whole bookshelf to storing a collection of 500 CDs when the same music would fit onto a pocket-sized MP3 jukebox? Why would you want to lug your music from house to office or house to car when the MP3 files could be easily copied onto a separate device?
The record companies don’t make environmentalists happy. A digital file that could be transferred electronically is instead encased in a plastic anti-theft package, a plastic shrink wrap, a plastic anti-piracy sticker, a plastic jewelbox, and a plastic disk. Why pump all that oil out the ground and make all those environmentally unfriendly wastes when we have multiple magnificent electronic infrastructures that can carry a song?
The record companies don’t make audiophiles or technophiles happy. The encoding system is so badly designed that 80 percent of the bits in the disk’s data stream carry no information, which is one reason that MP3 compression is so successful. They forgot to allocate a few bytes for the name of the album or the titles of the tracks on the disk so you have a medium that stores 700 megabytes but not the critical text information that you’d want to see (if, for example, you loaded your CDs into a jukebox).
CDs are so badly engineered that they actually have more distortion than the LP records that they supplanted, especially for classical music (the CD is at its least accurate for very quiet sounds but works great for Heavy Metal). Most serious audiophiles listen to analog LPs or the new DVD-Audio and Super Audio CD (SACD) formats. The record companies have done their best to alienate their least price-sensitive customers by charging insane $25/disk prices for SACDs and releasing only a handful of titles in the new formats.
How does an industry like this survive for so long? Faced with high monopoly prices, why wouldn’t consumers simply turn on the radio or TV, watch DVDs instead of listening to music CDs, or … (gasp) read books? Actually that may be what is happening. The record industry likes to blame the peer-to-peer file sharing services but these are awfully painful to use. Someone with money to spare could presumably find something more entertaining to do than wait for half-broken files to download. More likely Joe Average looked at a nice collection of 500 CDs being offered for sale at the old prices and said “Thanks, but I’d rather have a brand new car instead.. and it comes 20 channels of free music on the radio.”
Copyright is created by the government in order to encourage artists. Due to a combination of technology stagnation, lack of imagination by the music industry, and price fixing by record companies, the artists haven’t been getting too much encouragement, at least not as a percentage of the $12-15 billion in annual revenue (source).
In the long run it is tough to see how the average consumer would be willing to pay more for music than the $10-12/month that Sirius and XM satellite radio charge for a subscription [I’ve tried both XM and Sirius by the way; XM has a lot of tremendously annoying commercials and “house ads”, even on the ostensibly commercial-free classical station; Sirius is much superior.]. It probably makes a lot more sense to treat the Internet as another form of subscription radio. Individuals pay 25 cents per hour to listen to music, up to a maximum of $10 per month, and the revenue is divided up among the artists according to how much airplay there was. To make it work would probably require “trusted systems” such as the new Microsoft Palladium environment but at least this fits with how consumers actually like to buy stuff. Most people don’t want to make a lot of 25 cent or 99 cent purchase decisions every day. They’d rather pay a fixed known subscription and have the freedom to “flip channels” to their heart’s content.
Actual sales figures seem to bear out this idea. While the CD industry has seen unit sales drop by 10 percent and has resorted to suing 20-year-olds, Sirius had signed up more than 100,000 subscribers by June 2003, less than a year after beginning operations. XM, a slightly older, cheaper, and (in my opinion) crummier service has nearly 1 million subscribers.
People will pay for music but they won’t pay $18 for one song that they really want to hear that otherwise could be nicely stored in less than 1 cent of hard drive space.
The only people the record companies are at all interested in making happy are the executives and shareholders (in that order) of the conglomerates that own the record companies. It’s strictly about greed. And it completely explains the ridiculous behavior of the record industry.
As you noted, the conglomerates desperately desire to retain complete monopoly control over the production, distribution, and pricing of the product they call “music.” Unfortunately, the consumers who are supposed to be eagerly paying full price to the conglomerates for their product recognize that the product is overpriced. The product is also of continually declining quality as the conglomerates seek to maximize profit by putting out a narrow and repetitive range of “hits” formulated by accountants to target a particular demographic.
The conjoined twin of greed is arrogance, which in this case prevents the media conglomerate executives from recognizing that their overpriced formula-driven pap isn’t attracting consumers. So they resolutely insist that something is wrong with consumers rather than with their industry. They declare war on consumers and bring on the legal equivalent of nuclear warheads to vanquish the “piracy” that they insist is the cause of their declining revenues. The only other industry I know of with so much arrogance that it treats paying customers as an “enemy” is the airlines– and we all know what sort of shape they’re in.
The arrogance and greed of media conglomerate executives also prevents them from recognizing that their desperate tactics to save their monopoly only antagonize their customers, drive them away, and create further justification for choosing alternatives to paying $20 that contains one worthwhile song.
As you also note, the “answer” to this problem is to embrace and exploit the needs and desires of customers rather than waging pointless wars to preserve a dying marketing model (the dinosaur eating its tail). If anything, the capitulation by Universal in lowering its prices is an excellent sign that the executives of at least one conglomerate are beginning to see beyond their own greed and arrogance. Perhaps they will begin to realize that the only way they can survive and prosper is to offer a desirable product at a price (and distribution method) that customers will accept. This realization will require a major paradigm shift, forgoing the “need” for immediate spectacular profit in favor of a more reasonable profit over the long term. If the shift does occur, it may even portend a shift beyond the media conglomerates. But I’m not holding my breath.
The only people the record companies are at all interested in making happy are the executives and shareholders (in that order) of the conglomerates that own the record companies. It’s strictly about greed. And it completely explains the ridiculous behavior of the record industry.
As you noted, the conglomerates desperately desire to retain complete monopoly control over the production, distribution, and pricing of the product they call “music.” Unfortunately, the consumers who are supposed to be eagerly paying full price to the conglomerates for their product recognize that the product is overpriced. The product is also of continually declining quality as the conglomerates seek to maximize profit by putting out a narrow and repetitive range of “hits” formulated by accountants to target a particular demographic.
The conjoined twin of greed is arrogance, which in this case prevents the media conglomerate executives from recognizing that their overpriced formula-driven pap isn’t attracting consumers. So they resolutely insist that something is wrong with consumers rather than with their industry. In desperation, they declare war on consumers and bring on the legal equivalent of nuclear weaponry to vanquish the “piracy” that they insist is the sole cause of their declining revenues. The only other industry I know of with so much arrogance that it treats paying customers as an “enemy” is the airlines– and we all know what sort of shape they’re in.
The arrogance and greed of media conglomerate executives also prevents them from recognizing that their desperate tactics to save their monopoly only antagonize their customers, drive them away, and create further justification for choosing alternatives to paying $20 that contains one worthwhile song.
As you also note, the “answer” to this problem is to embrace and exploit the needs and desires of customers rather than waging pointless wars to preserve a dying marketing model (the dinosaur eating its tail). If anything, the capitulation by Universal in lowering its prices is an excellent sign that the executives of at least one conglomerate are beginning to see beyond their own greed and arrogance. Perhaps they will begin to realize that the only way they can survive and prosper is to offer a desirable product at a price (and distribution method) that customers will accept. This realization will require a major paradigm shift, forgoing the “need” for immediate spectacular profit in favor of a more reasonable profit over the long term. If the shift does occur, it may even portend a shift beyond the media conglomerates. But I’m not holding my breath.
The only people the record companies are at all interested in making happy are the executives and shareholders (in that order) of the conglomerates that own the record companies. It’s strictly about greed. And it completely explains the ridiculous behavior of the record industry.
As you noted, the conglomerates desperately desire to retain complete monopoly control over the production, distribution, and pricing of the product they call “music.” Unfortunately, the consumers who are supposed to be eagerly paying full price to the conglomerates for their product recognize that the product is overpriced. The product is also of continually declining quality as the conglomerates seek to maximize profit by putting out a narrow and repetitive range of “hits” formulated by accountants to target a particular demographic.
The conjoined twin of greed is arrogance, which in this case prevents the media conglomerate executives from recognizing that their overpriced formula-driven pap isn’t attracting consumers. So they resolutely insist that something is wrong with consumers rather than with their industry. In desperation, they declare war on consumers and bring on the legal equivalent of nuclear weaponry to vanquish the “piracy” that they insist is the sole cause of their declining revenues. The only other industry I know of with so much arrogance that it treats paying customers as an “enemy” is the airlines– and we all know what sort of shape they’re in.
The arrogance and greed of media conglomerate executives also prevents them from recognizing that their desperate tactics to save their monopoly only antagonize their customers, drive them away, and create further justification for choosing alternatives to paying $20 that contains one worthwhile song.
As you also note, the “answer” to this problem is to embrace and exploit the needs and desires of customers rather than waging pointless wars to preserve a dying marketing model (the dinosaur eating its tail). If anything, the capitulation by Universal in lowering its prices is an excellent sign that the executives of at least one conglomerate are beginning to see beyond their own greed and arrogance. Perhaps they will begin to realize that the only way they can survive and prosper is to offer a desirable product at a price (and distribution method) that customers will accept. This realization will require a major paradigm shift, forgoing the “need” for immediate spectacular profit in favor of a more reasonable profit over the long term. If the shift does occur, it may even portend a shift beyond the media conglomerates. But I’m not holding my breath.
When I was a member of the prime music buying demographic, I bought hundreds of CD’s, often on little more than a whim. Many of those CD’s were played once or twice before taking up residence in a cardboard box in a closet.
Price wasn’t really a factor. In addition, many of those CD’s were purchased while I lived in the UK, where prices of 15-20 quid were common.
But, somewhere along the line, that compulsive need for a music fix subsided. Today, I might buy 2 or 3 CD’s in a year, if that. (And those are likely to be reissues of music recorded decades ago.)
I don’t download music because there’s nothing on offer that I want to hear, whether it is free or 99 cents a track.
In other words, I don’t spend money buying music for the same reasons I don’t buy comic books — I’m well beyond adolescence. If others have experienced the same thing as they grow older (and our population is aging) then decreased music sales — via any medium — are here for the long term.
The only people the record companies are at all interested in making happy are the executives and shareholders (in that order) of the conglomerates that own the record companies. It’s strictly about greed. And it completely explains the ridiculous behavior of the record industry.
As you noted, the conglomerates desperately desire to retain complete monopoly control over the production, distribution, and pricing of the product they call “music.” Unfortunately, the consumers who are supposed to be eagerly paying full price to the conglomerates for their product recognize that the product is overpriced. The product is also of continually declining quality as the conglomerates seek to maximize profit by putting out a narrow and repetitive range of “hits” formulated by accountants to target a particular demographic.
The conjoined twin of greed is arrogance, which in this case prevents the media conglomerate executives from recognizing that their overpriced formula-driven pap isn’t attracting consumers. So they resolutely insist that something is wrong with consumers rather than with their industry. In desperation, they declare war on consumers and bring on the legal equivalent of nuclear weaponry to vanquish the “piracy” that they insist is the sole cause of their declining revenues. The only other industry I know of with so much arrogance that it treats paying customers as an “enemy” is the airlines– and we all know what sort of shape they’re in.
The arrogance and greed of media conglomerate executives also prevents them from recognizing that their desperate tactics to save their monopoly only antagonize their customers, drive them away, and create further justification for choosing alternatives to paying $20 that contains one worthwhile song.
As you also note, the “answer” to this problem is to embrace and exploit the needs and desires of customers rather than waging pointless wars to preserve a dying marketing model (the dinosaur eating its tail). If anything, the capitulation by Universal in lowering its prices is an excellent sign that the executives of at least one conglomerate are beginning to see beyond their own greed and arrogance. Perhaps they will begin to realize that the only way they can survive and prosper is to offer a desirable product at a price (and distribution method) that customers will accept. This realization will require a major paradigm shift, forgoing the “need” for immediate spectacular profit in favor of a more reasonable profit over the long term. If the shift does occur, it may even portend a shift beyond the media conglomerates. But I’m not holding my breath.
the record industry is losing money because:
* horrible economy
* high unemployment (choose between the Johnny Cash album or Ramen noodles for lunch)
* convenience of MP3s & custom cd creation
* PIRACY (online AND offline)
By piracy offline, i am not talkin about the mp3 kind kind of piracy, but the real world kind. The guy on the corner who is making cds and tapes of albums and then selling them to people on the street. This is huge in NYC. I dont see Hillary Rosen or her replacement issuing those clowns subpoenas.
If I could go to a record/cd store and put any 20 songs on a cd I would glaldy pay $10-12 for this. It would have to be *any* songs I choose, not just 200 or so. I would even wait a couple of days for this order to happen. The record industry could have been doing this for years.
How right you are, but this is just the beginning:
– advertising in whatever medium is no longer trusted. If I want good product information I’ll go to a news group, a web site that posts reviews or a blog.
– imagine the waste of paper products that would be stopped by eliminating magazines and newspapers? I can just as easily read the New Jerk Times digitally.
– have the gov’t subsidize fresh and unprocessed foods encouraging people to buy their groceries without all the excessive packaging.
– develop handhelds or palmtops with decent screens and browser with wi-fi and bluetooth, so that you can use wireless keyboards and do all your word processing and computer stuff without using all the electricity to run a desktop PC with a monitor, printer and all that other crap that gets plugged into your power strip.
– think of all the fresh water and energy saved by eliminating photo film/paper manufacturing and processing?
Shitcan all this archaic dross.
Talking about the CD’s, they use the cheapest plastic for the cases so if you drop it once, that’s it, the hinge cracks. Then they call them “jewel cases.” Plus, CD’s don’t give you archival quality. Magnetic tape is better.
Why I buy less CDs these days:
I have discovered that I buy less CDs now in part because I have ripped most of my 400+ CD collection onto my PC, and uploaded all of the liabrary of songs to my 20 gig iPod.
NOW I find I am listening a lot more to the music I already own and finding that I desire new muisic less and less. Guess I have good taste 🙂
O
Why I buy less CDs these days:
I have discovered that I buy less CDs now in part because I have ripped most of my 400+ CD collection onto my PC, and uploaded all of the liabrary of songs to my 20 gig iPod.
NOW I find I am listening a lot more to the music I already own and finding that I desire new muisic less and less. Guess I have good taste 🙂
The only people the record companies are at all interested in making happy are the executives and shareholders (in that order) of the conglomerates that own the record companies. It’s strictly about greed. And it completely explains the ridiculous behavior of the record industry.
As you noted, the conglomerates desperately desire to retain complete monopoly control over the production, distribution, and pricing of the product they call “music.” Unfortunately, the consumers who are supposed to be eagerly paying full price to the conglomerates for their product recognize that the product is overpriced. The product is also of continually declining quality as the conglomerates seek to maximize profit by putting out a narrow and repetitive range of “hits” formulated by accountants to target a particular demographic.
The conjoined twin of greed is arrogance, which in this case prevents the media conglomerate executives from recognizing that their overpriced formula-driven pap isn’t attracting consumers. So they resolutely insist that something is wrong with consumers rather than with their industry. In desperation, they declare war on consumers and bring on the legal equivalent of nuclear weaponry to vanquish the “piracy” that they insist is the sole cause of their declining revenues. The only other industry I know of with so much arrogance that it treats paying customers as an “enemy” is the airlines– and we all know what sort of shape they’re in.
The arrogance and greed of media conglomerate executives also prevents them from recognizing that their desperate tactics to save their monopoly only antagonize their customers, drive them away, and create further justification for choosing alternatives to paying $20 that contains one worthwhile song.
As you also note, the “answer” to this problem is to embrace and exploit the needs and desires of customers rather than waging pointless wars to preserve a dying marketing model (the dinosaur eating its tail). If anything, the capitulation by Universal in lowering its prices is an excellent sign that the executives of at least one conglomerate are beginning to see beyond their own greed and arrogance. Perhaps they will begin to realize that the only way they can survive and prosper is to offer a desirable product at a price (and distribution method) that customers will accept. This realization will require a major paradigm shift, forgoing the “need” for immediate spectacular profit in favor of a more reasonable profit over the long term. If the shift does occur, it may even portend a shift beyond the media conglomerates. But I’m not holding my breath.
I sometimes use a Russian service (web site) which allows me to download selected CD tracks (mp3s, actually) for between 2 and 5 cents apiece. I am gladly paying this, and so will many others. Micropayments are definitely better than macropayments.
Maybe this is the reason she was for piracy against the record companies.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/09/27/entertainment/main523538.shtml
Bet we don’t hear any more such talk out of her now.
Merchandising, Philip, Merchandising! Several years ago I threw away all my CD cases and sleeves opting for the more convenient carry all. These days, when thinking about inviting prospective dates and girlfriends I kick myself and wish that I could take up all my shelf space with my ultra cool CD collection, allowing them to freely browse, seeing firsthand what good taste I have. (Here, have some salt.) Now I keep my CD cases so that I can buy a cool CD holder too. I even save my books – I used to give them away after reading them.
Also worthy of note is the logevity of CD’s – they don’t last very long! Vinyl records are the best for that, but they REALLY take up alot of space, and worse yet, the most efficient way to store them makes them incredibly hard to browse and organize. Whats worse is that the edges of the sleeves do not last long making them even harder to show off.
This is very true. I remember seeing a story about this in the Times recently. I’m glad to see CDs going away but wonder if the replacement will be that great. I have an MP3 player which is very cool and great for travel. It would be great to have a hard drive in your car stereo and in your home stereo so you didn’t have to bring the actual mp3 player from place to place or buy more than one. As it is now, you have to get an adaptor of some sort for your car, which is inherently clumsy. I also wonder what the standard format will be: iTunes uses some weird format they claim is superior and BuyMusic.com uses only Windows Media. According to both Apple and Microsoft, mp3 is not even that great-other formats use even less space and sound as good or better (don’t know if this is true). I have a semi-tech question for anyone to answer: Was it hard to develope mp3? I mean, was it always there, or was it a break-through?
The only people the record companies are at all interested in making happy are the executives and shareholders (in that order) of the conglomerates that own the record companies. It’s strictly about greed. And it completely explains the ridiculous behavior of the record industry.
As you noted, the conglomerates desperately desire to retain complete monopoly control over the production, distribution, and pricing of the product they call “music.” Unfortunately, the consumers who are supposed to be eagerly paying full price to the conglomerates for their product recognize that the product is overpriced. The product is also of continually declining quality as the conglomerates seek to maximize profit by putting out a narrow and repetitive range of “hits” formulated by accountants to target a particular demographic.
The conjoined twin of greed is arrogance, which in this case prevents the media conglomerate executives from recognizing that their overpriced formula-driven pap isn’t attracting consumers. So they resolutely insist that something is wrong with consumers rather than with their industry. In desperation, they declare war on consumers and bring on the legal equivalent of nuclear weaponry to vanquish the “piracy” that they insist is the sole cause of their declining revenues. The only other industry I know of with so much arrogance that it treats paying customers as an “enemy” is the airlines– and we all know what sort of shape they’re in.
The arrogance and greed of media conglomerate executives also prevents them from recognizing that their desperate tactics to save their monopoly only antagonize their customers, drive them away, and create further justification for choosing alternatives to paying $20 that contains one worthwhile song.
As you also note, the “answer” to this problem is to embrace and exploit the needs and desires of customers rather than waging pointless wars to preserve a dying marketing model (the dinosaur eating its tail). If anything, the capitulation by Universal in lowering its prices is an excellent sign that the executives of at least one conglomerate are beginning to see beyond their own greed and arrogance. Perhaps they will begin to realize that the only way they can survive and prosper is to offer a desirable product at a price (and distribution method) that customers will accept. This realization will require a major paradigm shift, forgoing the “need” for immediate spectacular profit in favor of a more reasonable profit over the long term. If the shift does occur, it may even portend a shift beyond the media conglomerates. But I’m not holding my breath.
Pay-back-to-the-artist systems may work very well for four-guy rock bands, but what about big orchestras? It takes a hell of a lot of resources to do a really good studio recording of an orchestra. How would those be payed out?
Pay-back-to-the-artist systems may work very well for four-guy rock bands, but what about big orchestras? It takes a hell of a lot of resources to do a really good studio recording of an orchestra. How would those be payed out?
Pay-a-reasonable-amount-to-the-artist may get to work very well for four-guy rock bands, but what about studio recordings of big orchestras? Those take a lot of resources.
By the way, the points in Courtney Love’s speech were made better in an earlier essay by musician and producer Steve Albini called “The Problem With Music.”
http://www.negativland.com/albini.html
See also Steve Albini’s essay, “The Problem WIth Music,” which predates Courtney Love’s speech by a few years. http://www.negativland.com/albini.html
The only people the record companies are at all interested in making happy are the executives and shareholders (in that order) of the conglomerates that own the record companies. It’s strictly about greed. And it completely explains the ridiculous behavior of the record industry.
As you noted, the conglomerates desperately desire to retain complete monopoly control over the production, distribution, and pricing of the product they call “music.” Unfortunately, the consumers who are supposed to be eagerly paying full price to the conglomerates for their product recognize that the product is overpriced. The product is also of continually declining quality as the conglomerates seek to maximize profit by putting out a narrow and repetitive range of “hits” formulated by accountants to target a particular demographic.
The conjoined twin of greed is arrogance, which in this case prevents the media conglomerate executives from recognizing that their overpriced formula-driven pap isn’t attracting consumers. So they resolutely insist that something is wrong with consumers rather than with their industry. In desperation, they declare war on consumers and bring on the legal equivalent of nuclear weaponry to vanquish the “piracy” that they insist is the sole cause of their declining revenues. The only other industry I know of with so much arrogance that it treats paying customers as an “enemy” is the airlines– and we all know what sort of shape they’re in.
The arrogance and greed of media conglomerate executives also prevents them from recognizing that their desperate tactics to save their monopoly only antagonize their customers, drive them away, and create further justification for choosing alternatives to paying $20 that contains one worthwhile song.
As you also note, the “answer” to this problem is to embrace and exploit the needs and desires of customers rather than waging pointless wars to preserve a dying marketing model (the dinosaur eating its tail). If anything, the capitulation by Universal in lowering its prices is an excellent sign that the executives of at least one conglomerate are beginning to see beyond their own greed and arrogance. Perhaps they will begin to realize that the only way they can survive and prosper is to offer a desirable product at a price (and distribution method) that customers will accept. This realization will require a major paradigm shift, forgoing the “need” for immediate spectacular profit in favor of a more reasonable profit over the long term. If the shift does occur, it may even portend a shift beyond the media conglomerates. But I’m not holding my breath.
Philip, I agree that the record companies screw everyone with their policies, but I want to make it clear that some of the CD shortcomings you describe are due to bad practices, and are not inherent to the CD format itself.
More detail at http://www.cross-spectrum.com/2003/09/06/
Philip, I agree that the record companies screw everyone with their policies, but I want to make it clear that some of the CD shortcomings you describe are due to bad practices, and are not inherent to the CD format itself.
More detail at http://www.cross-spectrum.com/2003/09/06/
Philip, I agree that the record companies screw everyone with their policies, but I want to make it clear that some of the CD shortcomings you describe are due to bad practices, and are not inherent to the CD format itself.
More detail at http://www.cross-spectrum.com/2003/09/06/
Philip, I agree that the record companies screw everyone with their policies, but I want to make it clear that some of the CD shortcomings you describe are due to bad practices, and are not inherent to the CD format itself.
More detail at http://www.cross-spectrum.com/2003/09/06/
(I’m having problems posting this comment, I *really* hope it doesn’t show up 4 times!)
Philip, I agree that the record companies screw everyone with their policies, but I want to make it clear that some of the CD shortcomings you describe are due to bad practices, and are not inherent to the CD format itself.
More detail at http://www.cross-spectrum.com/2003/09/06/
(I’m having a problem posting this comment, I *really* hope it doesn’t show up 5 times!)
recommended reading: The Problem with Music
http://www.negativland.com/albini.html
Philip, I agree that the record companies screw everyone with their policies, but I want to make it clear that some of the CD shortcomings you describe are due to bad practices, and are not inherent to the CD format itself.
More detail at http://www.cross-spectrum.com/2003/09/06/
The trick is to price music at a cost where piracy would be no longer worthwhile for most people.
Imagine you could get a song for 50 cents. And you could transfer this song to any device you wanted without any DRM hassles and with a song buying interface that is straightforward. Would you not want to just buy the song outright instead of tracking down a friend, copying it to a transferable medium, then copying it to your hard disk, etc?
Real/listen.com Rhapsody is a similar model; pay $9.95 for all-you-can-stream. For anyone doing most of their listening at/near 128kb or bandwidth, it’s a tremendous deal.
You know, I can see people spending hours or even days on an Amazon-like music system, reading peoples’ reviews, listening away, and 1-click buying songs for less than a dollar. In fact, music can go a few steps further than books, since people can create mixes for others to download, for parties or just as a way to flirt (like with mix tapes). Kazaa doesn’t fulfill one percent of what it could achieve, especially since music is a drug of sorts.
Well, I’m sure the hardware companies are banking on Palladium and music-as-killer-app to push another upgrade cycle.
The only people the record companies are at all interested in making happy are the executives and shareholders (in that order) of the conglomerates that own the record companies. It’s strictly about greed. And it completely explains the ridiculous behavior of the record industry.
As you noted, the conglomerates desperately desire to retain complete monopoly control over the production, distribution, and pricing of the product they call “music.” Unfortunately, the consumers who are supposed to be eagerly paying full price to the conglomerates for their product recognize that the product is overpriced. The product is also of continually declining quality as the conglomerates seek to maximize profit by putting out a narrow and repetitive range of “hits” formulated by accountants to target a particular demographic.
The conjoined twin of greed is arrogance, which in this case prevents the media conglomerate executives from recognizing that their overpriced formula-driven pap isn’t attracting consumers. So they resolutely insist that something is wrong with consumers rather than with their industry. In desperation, they declare war on consumers and bring on the legal equivalent of nuclear weaponry to vanquish the “piracy” that they insist is the sole cause of their declining revenues. The only other industry I know of with so much arrogance that it treats paying customers as an “enemy” is the airlines– and we all know what sort of shape they’re in.
The arrogance and greed of media conglomerate executives also prevents them from recognizing that their desperate tactics to save their monopoly only antagonize their customers, drive them away, and create further justification for choosing alternatives to paying $20 that contains one worthwhile song.
As you also note, the “answer” to this problem is to embrace and exploit the needs and desires of customers rather than waging pointless wars to preserve a dying marketing model (the dinosaur eating its tail). If anything, the capitulation by Universal in lowering its prices is an excellent sign that the executives of at least one conglomerate are beginning to see beyond their own greed and arrogance. Perhaps they will begin to realize that the only way they can survive and prosper is to offer a desirable product at a price (and distribution method) that customers will accept. This realization will require a major paradigm shift, forgoing the “need” for immediate spectacular profit in favor of a more reasonable profit over the long term. If the shift does occur, it may even portend a shift beyond the media conglomerates. But I’m not holding my breath.
To decode an 128 mp3 in real time you would need a 150-200 Mhz CPU. This was not econimically possible when CD were introduced.
Courtney’s speech borrowed heavily from Steve Albidini.
http://www.arancidamoeba.com/mrr/problemwithmusic.html
The free music via Mp3.com provides both
variety (you didn’t mention that), and
fresh tracks of comparable quality to
that ‘produced’ by the majors. My Cabel TV
also provides ‘free’ chanels that rival
the the majors. I don’t have to steal to
get good music.
Occam’s Razor: one reason CD sales might be down is because of the downturn in the economy.
Not only that, but even 20 years ago there was cheap magnetic recordable media. Think how much more useful your CDs would have been if that inner piece of plastic held a magnetic credit card like stripe on it to encode where you left off or your track ordering. One fixed magnetic read/write head would have done the trick, and even 20 years ago, a cheap tape recorder cost about $40.00, so I’m stipulating this would have been feasible and interesting.
Sure back then only the highend players would have supported writing to the CDs, but back then CD players were also going for $1,000 a piece.
CDs have the failings of production and size that you mentioned, but not the technical ones. The “LP is superior to CD” is definatly a myth. SACD and DVD-A are superior, but it is debatable whether the human ear is actually able to hear the difference. No person can detect sound much more than 20 kHz: cds go up to 22, which is perfectly adequate. 5.1 surround is the only real advantage. Besides the high price of DVD-A and SACD, the music biz is also forcing strong copy protection, which makes them _less_ desirable than cds for a mp3 enthusiast.
The recording industry has seen a signifigant drop in sales which the of course blame on piracy. The more signifigant stat is that in the same period they have had an almost idendical percentage drop in new releases. Less new records = less sales.
http://www.hydrogenaudio.com is a great forum to get answers about the technical side of digital music. The first lesson is that no opinion about music quality is good without double-blind testing. Our ears are easy to fool, and the placebo effect is the only thing that makes a $1000 cable different from a $10 one.
CDs have the failings of production and size that you mentioned, but not the technical ones. The “LP is superior to CD” is definatly a myth. SACD and DVD-A are superior, but it is debatable whether the human ear is actually able to hear the difference. No person can detect sound much more than 20 kHz: cds go up to 22, which is perfectly adequate. 5.1 surround is the only real advantage. Besides the high price of DVD-A and SACD, the music biz is also forcing strong copy protection, which makes them _less_ desirable than cds for a mp3 enthusiast.
The recording industry has seen a signifigant drop in sales which the of course blame on piracy. The more signifigant stat is that in the same period they have had an almost idendical percentage drop in new releases. Less new records = less sales.
http://www.hydrogenaudio.com is a great forum to get answers about the technical side of digital music. The first lesson is that no opinion about music quality is good without double-blind testing. Our ears are easy to fool, and the placebo effect is the only thing that makes a $1000 cable different from a $10 one.
CDs have the failings of production and size that you mentioned, but not the technical ones. The “LP is superior to CD” is definatly a myth. SACD and DVD-A are superior, but it is debatable whether the human ear is actually able to hear the difference. No person can detect sound much more than 20 kHz: cds go up to 22, which is perfectly adequate. 5.1 surround is the only real advantage. Besides the high price of DVD-A and SACD, the music biz is also forcing strong copy protection, which makes them _less_ desirable than cds for a mp3 enthusiast.
The recording industry has seen a signifigant drop in sales which the of course blame on piracy. The more signifigant stat is that in the same period they have had an almost idendical percentage drop in new releases. Less new records = less sales.
http://www.hydrogenaudio.com is a great forum to get answers about the technical side of digital music. The first lesson is that no opinion about music quality is good without double-blind testing. Our ears are easy to fool, and the placebo effect is the only thing that makes a $1000 cable different from a $10 one.
what about the people that don’t have the money to pay for any of this stuff?
cd prices have jumped upwards of 18 bucks for a $2 manufacturing cost. the rest is split here and there, but buyers don’t care where it goes. buyers care if the cost was worth the purchase. sales are declining — it isn’t worth the purchase.
looking at mp3’s, they are cheap and easy but you either need a $400 ipod or a $500+ computer to play them. if the person buying the computer has low tech skills, they’ll probably buy a store packaged pc with tons of hardware to run the latest operating system, which they have to learn the skills to use. of course prices drop, but they get replaced with newer and better.
…this is not easier than copying your friend’s cassette copy of a copy of iron maiden’s greatest hits to play on your $5 tape deck.
it’s not about which technology is better — a lot of people just want to listen music at some point, and they shouldn’t be required to be sitting on a nest egg or college degree to do that.
Let’s see – artists release CDs and ask the music industry to sell them. But the music industry controls the media, so most popular radio stations play only a narrow hit-list of music (exception, CKUA, http://www.ckua.com, in Alberta). Thus the average listener has no way of expanding her musical horizons — except by downloading, which the RIAA is trying to stop.
I’ve purchased CDs from artists I had never heard before simply because I’ve been able to sample their music via downloading. Had I not had this technology available to me, the music industry would have lost those sales.
Internet ‘radio stations’ filling specialty niches also have provided a rich source of new music to listen to, thus educating me further.
All that file-sharing has done in my case is change the type of music I buy. Now, as a better-informed consumer, I can actually buy the music I want to hear, rather than what top-40 stations, and media advertising, tells me to buy.
While I usually like and agreewith your ideas, there are some serious flaws in this argument. While I agree with your assertion that the record companies don’t make anyone (other than themselves) happy, I think your appraisal of music consumers is off base.
First of all, the idea that people will simply turn on the radio, watch movies or (gasp) read books is obtuse at best. It’s not like people are Sims who need “entertainment time,” regardless of what form that entertainment takes. If someone wants to listen to a CD, they want to listen to a CD–usually a CD by a specific artist, or at very least, a specific sub-genre. This is why regular radio won’t cut it for most.
This same reason is why the average consumer is quite willing to pay more than $10-12/month for for music. Satellite radio is fine for background noise while you’re at work, but if you’re in your car and want to listen to Sleater-Kinney, no one is going to flip to the “Rock” channel and wait until one Sleater-Kinney track *might* show up. They want a disc full of the girls. (And God help you if you’re in the mood to hear Meredith Monk–don’t hold your breath.)
The conventional CD is dying, yes, but I don’t think your replacement path is parallel with the real future. This is more like it.
I am a serious audiophile. Not rich though. But I can hear the difference in sound when I change cables in my system. What I can say is that 99% of this article is simply ridiculous. MP3 as an alternative to CD??? Mr Greenspun, please have your ears checked, your hearing is most likely seriously impaired. LPs an alternative to CDs??? Of course, and bicycles as alternatives to cars. Now, regarding SACDs, a serious audiophile that I know claims that it is not a problem of format but of know-how of recording studios. A well recorded CD is such a rich source of sound (yes those 700 MB of information) that you simply must buy an expensive audiophile CD player to hear the full quality of sound recorded on it. He claims that in fact on the best hi-end CD systems the quality between CD and SACD is negligible. And on cheap SACD players, SACD record DO sound worse than CD records on expensive CD players. And a well recorded CD will sound better than a poorly recorded SACD. Audiophiles know it so they do not rush to buy SACDs and spend their cash on futile updates of their listening equipment. And the rest of the crowd just doesnt care about the extra quality of SACD anyway. That is why SACD market is so slow. It is simply because CD delivers 99,9% of what people need. That the CD shops on the corner of the street close down is most likely caused by the overwhelming competition of online shops and the fact, oh yeas, that a lot of people prefer to pirate music instead of paying for it (which does not have much to do with CD format, does it?). And they do not care for the fact that MP3 is only for the deaf. It should be noted here that the Windows Media Player compression is infinitely better than MP3 but hey, it is Microsoft, Microsoft is boo, as are recording companies, do not buy their products even if they are superior. Be a good socialist, beat those who are richer than you and steal the music. After all artists create music for fun, right? Why pay them for their hobby? Ditto recording companies, ditto Microsoft, ditto …
Wired magazine had a good artice on the state of music copyrights.
I find it impossible to purchase lossless music formats. I’m worried that the quality of what is available from iTunes for example, is worst than the original CD so I still order CDs rip them with EAC and then toss them in a box. Have you heard of anyone selling music in a lossless format like apple lossless or FLAC?
Incidently, I read an article on-line about the superior sound quality of HDDs versus optical discs. Just a note.
Nice article, but why even talk about collective licensing? It’s not just CDs that are dead. Labels are becoming obsolete. Here is why:
1. Home recording is becoming more accessible and easier to do, and in most cases, a home recording done right can sound just as good as a professionally produced album.
2. The Internet makes it possible for independent musicians to gain world wide popularity. This trend will continue, and in a few years it will be just as easy to become famous on the web than it would be to get signed to a major label.
3. You can make more money on your own as an independent musician than you can working for a label. Sure, on a label you can sell millions of cds, but the money goes through so many hands before it reaches the artists – a lot of signed musicians get hardly any money. Yet, I’ve seen some bands on the Internet make a living wage just by accepting donations for free downloads.
These three conditions make labels obsolete. The real future of music will not involve online mp3 sales, or charging a flat rate for unlimited downloads. For that to occur, you would need big labels to coordinate. Rather, I believe in the future, labels will die out, and musicians will release their music for free on the internet, because they want to. Some musicians will inevitably become popular enough to support themselves on touring, merchandise, and donations. Others will continue to share their music online for the fun of it.
I love my CD’s and even though I have been working in the online business since 1995, I still love my CD’s, but the discussion is really at an end, the result here here. Most of the record stores has closed and we are now back to where the record stores came from, small back street stores, run by a guy who is running a music store, because that is all that is making sense to him.
Living in Denmark and having an Internet connection through TDC, now gives you free access (legally) to over one million songs, this seems to be the final blow to some of the music stores here in little Denmark.
I don’t know if CD’s will ever get the retro boom that we have seen lately for Vinyl, but I believe that there will always be fools like me out there that will have a special love for the CD medium, and will cherish them for the rest of their lives.
Music might be more free for me to download, but I still really enjoy to buy CD’s and I buy more than ever now, there are certain CD I want in my collection before they become impossible to find.