4 ms·

> I know that the money doesn't all go to the artists - what would you have me (or the GP) do instead, not pay for any of it? Mail them a check. Mail them cash

by chill1 13y ago

> I know that the money doesn't all go to the artists - what would you have me (or the GP) do instead, not pay for any of it? Mail them a check. Mail them cash. Hand them cash in person. Send them bitcoins; if they're tech-savvy enough.

metachor 13y ago
That's disingenuous. How well would it scale for a musician to personally handle depositing checks from millions of fans? There is a very good reason that many musicians become involved with labels, promoters, distributors, etc., which is to free up the time of the artist to focus on what they are actually interested in doing: writing and playing music.
- dragonwriter 13y ago
  > How well would it scale for a musician to personally handle depositing checks from millions of fans? Like many scaling problems, that's a good problem to have: at that point, you can afford to have people working for you depositing checks, which is pretty much the inverse of the power relationship artists have with labels.
  - yardie 13y ago
    > the inverse of the power relationship artists have with labels. You don't know what the relationship with the label is. Some artists come in with their own label and only need distributor to reach a bigger audience (artists $$$/labels$$). Some come in completely unknown and the label has to front all the money (artists $ / label $$$$), and some are quite happy to be on a smaller label and let the label handle the business side of things. > at that point, you can afford to have people working for you depositing checks ...and paying royalties for samples, collaborators, songwriters. Well now we have to hire a guy to handle all of this and you can either pay him/her a salary or a cut of the sales. Now we've slipped back into the label distributor problem.
- fnordfnordfnord 13y ago
  >How well would it scale for a musician to personally handle depositing checks from millions of fans? Many of them do a good job handling fan mail. It sounds like a nice problem to have. >There is a very good reason that many musicians become involved with labels, promoters, distributors, etc. There are some good reasons for artists to outsource administrative errands, management. There's also the crappy reason that is the monopolization of the major distribution channels.
aidos 13y ago
And then steal the music? Then I wouldn't get to enjoy artwork like this: http://www.popsike.com/Lemon-Jelly-Lost-Horizons-LP-NM/290607365285.html http://www.popsike.com/Lemon-Jelly-Lost-Horizons-LP-NM/29060... :)
- voltagex_ 13y ago
  The issue I have is that the very first link in this search: https://www.google.com.au/search?q=lemon+jelly+flac https://www.google.com.au/search?q=lemon+jelly+flac should be a link to somewhere I can buy albums for $10-15USD each. I have been steadily moving to buying only digitally released music, but some artists and labels make this very difficult. Doing it right are: * Boomkat.com (reasonable FLAC surcharge) * digital-tunes.com (same price for FLAC/MP3) * bleep.com * hdtracks.com (sort of, the markup is massive) Failing are: * Amazon, iTunes et al - ~256kbit-ish music, often mastered terribly. (Yes, I'm aware that AAC is a bit higher quality at the same bitrate) * Beatport.com (you want me to pay how much extra for WAV?!) * Almost every major label - I can't order lossless tracks from most of them

by chill1 13y ago

metachor 13y ago

That's disingenuous. How well would it scale for a musician to personally handle depositing checks from millions of fans? There is a very good reason that many musicians become involved with labels, promoters, distributors, etc., which is to free up the time of the artist to focus on what they are actually interested in doing: writing and playing music.

dragonwriter 13y ago
> How well would it scale for a musician to personally handle depositing checks from millions of fans? Like many scaling problems, that's a good problem to have: at that point, you can afford to have people working for you depositing checks, which is pretty much the inverse of the power relationship artists have with labels.
- yardie 13y ago
  > the inverse of the power relationship artists have with labels. You don't know what the relationship with the label is. Some artists come in with their own label and only need distributor to reach a bigger audience (artists $$$/labels$$). Some come in completely unknown and the label has to front all the money (artists $ / label $$$$), and some are quite happy to be on a smaller label and let the label handle the business side of things. > at that point, you can afford to have people working for you depositing checks ...and paying royalties for samples, collaborators, songwriters. Well now we have to hire a guy to handle all of this and you can either pay him/her a salary or a cut of the sales. Now we've slipped back into the label distributor problem.
fnordfnordfnord 13y ago
>How well would it scale for a musician to personally handle depositing checks from millions of fans? Many of them do a good job handling fan mail. It sounds like a nice problem to have. >There is a very good reason that many musicians become involved with labels, promoters, distributors, etc. There are some good reasons for artists to outsource administrative errands, management. There's also the crappy reason that is the monopolization of the major distribution channels.

aidos 13y ago

And then steal the music? Then I wouldn't get to enjoy artwork like this: http://www.popsike.com/Lemon-Jelly-Lost-Horizons-LP-NM/290607365285.html http://www.popsike.com/Lemon-Jelly-Lost-Horizons-LP-NM/29060... :)

voltagex_ 13y ago
The issue I have is that the very first link in this search: https://www.google.com.au/search?q=lemon+jelly+flac https://www.google.com.au/search?q=lemon+jelly+flac should be a link to somewhere I can buy albums for $10-15USD each. I have been steadily moving to buying only digitally released music, but some artists and labels make this very difficult. Doing it right are: * Boomkat.com (reasonable FLAC surcharge) * digital-tunes.com (same price for FLAC/MP3) * bleep.com * hdtracks.com (sort of, the markup is massive) Failing are: * Amazon, iTunes et al - ~256kbit-ish music, often mastered terribly. (Yes, I'm aware that AAC is a bit higher quality at the same bitrate) * Beatport.com (you want me to pay how much extra for WAV?!) * Almost every major label - I can't order lossless tracks from most of them