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I got four paragraphs in before I said to myself "This reads like a hit piece, who is this guy?" A quick search of the author reveals a slant and bias so stron
by 6stringmerc 10y ago
I got four paragraphs in before I said to myself "This reads like a hit piece, who is this guy?"
A quick search of the author reveals a slant and bias so strong you'd think he was a lobbyist writing legislation instead of an Op-Ed.
Whatever points he's trying to make about the "value gap" he runs right to the absolute same party-line Azoff, the RIAA, and multi-national conglomerate rights-holder firms want: Fiddle with safe harbors, and get the US government to jack up the rates streaming services pay for music by way of tweaking the rules for terrestrial radio. It's all very clear for anybody who is keeping track of this debate.
So, if you want a consolidated, heavily biased stump speech designed to raise sympathy ("Think of the poor musicians! Think of Prince!") and deflect from the more customary benefactors of such changes, multi-billion dollar companies, here you go. It is what it is.
And, while I'm a fan of Prince and his successes, I think the guy isn't an icon to be emulated when it came to rights management and his approach to "the music business" in some ways. As a musician he had just as many flops - if not more - than actual hits. He also wanted to completely ban cover songs, which is a really shitty and selfish attitude in my opinion. Guys like Prince and the author would, by logical extension, want to kill off "remix culture" and some of the changes that are pushing toward real, useful Copyright Reform in time.
I don't think SV and VC doesn't love music, and I don't think the whole intention is to rip off music artists. The industry already rips off music artists to an insane degree. The music industry doesn't have a lot of high ground to get preachy until it cleans up its own accounting (Eminem's successful lawsuit regarding digital royalties for licenses vs. sales) and contract issues (Kesha and Kemosabe) that reflect poorly on the motivations, actions, and long-term vision of the industry.
- jdquey 10y agoWhat if the music industry saw the sales of their music more as a marketing awareness play than an income generator? Songs played on Youtube, Spotify, Pandora, etc. and their covers drives little direct revenue to the artist. I doubt that will change anytime soon. However, that drives serious brand awareness to the artist, who could then sell other add-ons (music tickets, t-shirts, limited edition releases, etc) Maybe I'm naive to the industry. But most business owners I know would kill for marketing that paid them and returned an ROI.
- whatok 10y ago> However, that drives serious brand awareness to the artist, who could then sell other add-ons (music tickets, t-shirts, limited edition releases, etc) Not all genres lend to live performance. Not all audiences buy t-shirts. Not all audiences purchase music at all.
- jdquey 10y agoWhat genres have artists that do not sell anything outside of their music?
- 6stringmerc 10y agoNo, you're absolutely correct in the traditional way of doing business - just think back to AM/FM radio in the US. The songs were advertisements to go buy the record, which made the record companies a lot of money and the musician usually pennies. Once people didn't have to pay huge mark-up to get music they rationalized that musicians weren't getting much anyway - so, let's spend our money on live shows, merchandise, fan club stuff - and there's a lot of music lovers that I believe have spent their money from recorded music on other music related things. Not sure there's data to support it, but I've always thought of recordings as kind of the throw-away element to being in the music industry: Nobody makes money on them unless you get them in a TV commercial or a movie soundtrack.
- scarface74 10y agoNo matter if you think it's a "hit piece" or not, why should Google and radio stations get to profit off of others work without giving money back to the creators?