Whats killing the music industry ...

[The_Pikeman]

From the bbc...
Stopping the pop-swappers

They used to say "home taping" was killing music, now it's meant to be internet downloaders. But the real pirates these days are crime bosses - and the rewards are plentiful.

This tidal wave of subpoenas is the latest in a series of steps the RIAA has taken to stop "file-sharing" which, it believes, is causing CD sales to fall through the floor.

According to the RIAA, CD sales dropped by 10% in 2001 and a further 6.8% last year, largely because of file sharing.


Crushing the counterfeiters - extreme measures in Thailand
But the figures tell a different story.

In America and the rest of the world the biggest culprit in falling music sales is large-scale CD piracy by organised crime.

In just three years, sales of pirate CDs have more than doubled, according to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI).

Every third CD sold is a pirate copy, says the federation.

The IFPI's Commercial Music Piracy 2003 report, produced in early July, reveals pirate CD sales rose 14% in 2002 and exceeded one billion units for the first time.

According to the RIAA's own figures, over the last two years the US music industry has produced 25% fewer CDs.

The peak of production was in 1999 when 38,900 individual titles were released. But by 2001 this was down to 27,000. Releases grew again in 2002 but were still below the previous high.


Singles are important to fans but few record firms
Musician George Ziemann says if only 3,000 copies of each of the "missing" CDs were sold, the fall in sales would be wiped out.

For Mark Mulligan, an analyst with Jupiter Research, the music is weathering a hangover after the 80s and 90s boom, when everyone was buying CD versions of their old vinyl records.

"Now the CD replacement cycle has drawn to a close," he says.

Also the global decline in CD sales is taking place against the background of a general economic recession that is depressing sales of almost everything.

After piracy and the production of fewer CDs comes the changing dynamics of the music industry.


Competing for kids' cash - mobiles are another new demand
Many of the people using file-sharing systems are looking for singles. By contrast the music industry is focussed on shifting albums.

This is reflected in sales figures. In the US sales of CD singles generate only a few percent of the total market. In the UK, it's 10% of all revenues.

Typically, singles are used to drum up support for an album, being hyped weeks in advance and played heavily on radio and TV long before they go on sale.

With nowhere to get these singles and no desire to buy an expensive CD album just for one song, it is no wonder many fans turn to file-sharing systems.

Finally, music just isn't as important to young people as it used to be. There is more competition than ever for the cash in a teenager's pocket.

"Youths are no longer defining themselves by music in the same way they used to," says Mr Mulligan

The music industry cannot hope to sue everyone using file sharing to find music as that would take hundreds of years and already the US legal system is complaining about the work the RIAA is heaping upon it.

There is no doubt that some piracy is going on via peer-to-peer systems but maybe not to the extent the RIAA fears. Perhaps it is about time they sang a different song.

-how.

[DallasStarsRule]

Whats killing the music industry is overpriced charging of unoriginal and frankly crappy, songs. With your J-LOs and your P-DIDDYs, what else can you expect?

If the music industry wants to know why people arent buying music, its not because of Kazaa, its because of natural consumer quality control. Just because I cant download a song doesnt mean I'm going to hand over $30 for the album.

The music industry has been so cuaght up in looks they forgot about the actual MUSIC.

I have my 500 mp3s, and every time I turn on the radio I'm thankful I have them.

[(SDS)benmcl]

About 8 months I was listening to some comments from an industry insider. I wish I can remember the details of what he said but main point he made was that in fact that if you look at everyting over all and the state of the economy sales of CDs are actually steady at that time. He even argued that to a cetain extent file sharing was helping CD sales.

Damn I wish I could remember the details.

I agree though the general file sharing is not hurting the industry nearly as bad as they say. For one thing the CDs are still priced to high.
CDs are far cheaper to reproduce than tape yet tape has always been cheeper. Yes I understand the agruement you pay for quality but in such a situation as this it was pure greed.

I don't file share for a few reasons. First the downloads I have tried were simply garbage. Poorly extracted and heavily compressed. Not worth my time. Second I don't listen to much of the type of music that is out there. Third I am one of the few that wants the entire album.

I have discovered that if you want to get the good stuff you really need to become part of an exclusive group. These groups are fairly secured and I am told that the quality is usually high. Its just not worth my time.

Also the stuff what is passing for music these days makes me want to cry. I can not remember the last time I listened to the radio. The mere thought that I have to drive somewhere with someone who listens to this stuff gives me a headache.

[spm1138]

I don't pirate music because I like the music I listen to and I think the people that make it deserve the money I pay for it. I can't really be arsed doing New Order or Radiohead out of whatever share of what I pay for one of their CD's they get.

That said, I do think piracy is an excuse. I think the real reason for sh tty sales is sh tty product.

Pop music at the moment is just cringeworthy. At computer shows they sell these "Top 40 Album Chart" CD-Rs... there's nothing in the Top 40 I actually want at the moment.

They haven't come up with anything vaguely new to shift records with for ages. Our self appointed moral guardians are back to complaining about how pop singers dress.

The biggest thing right at the moment seems to be the new series of Pop Idol and Fame Academy.

How sad is that?

[A_Rimmerlister]

yup more and more evidence that suggests that it's the record-companies themselves that are killing their own market. ( http://www.ukcdr.org has more )

Did they really think once everyone had their copy of the old vinyl records that they could keep the number of cd's sold at the same level ?

Piracy & p2p-services are used by the record-companies like the jews were blamed for Germany's problems by Hitler.

Sure the pirates aren't helping the 'small' bands & artists, but I doubt that the Metallica, Robin Williamses & Britney Spearses of this world would suffer from the 'damage' these services ever could do ...
Or are the record-stores lying to us as to what cd's sell for the top40-lists as well ???

An economics teacher once explained how these lists could be corrupted :
Counting the actual records that were sold wouldn't do the stores any good, because it would mean they couldn't satisfy the customer that came looking for the #1 cd in the list.
Instead they would list those albums that they hadn't sold in the hope that the added advertisment such a top-40 position would bring in extra sales ...
It still makes a lot of sense ... and it could explain why those 'top-40' artists are hurt by piracy as much as they say they are.

[Infguy98]

,

[Nightmare]

Originally Posted by A_Rimmerlister

An economics teacher once explained how these lists could be corrupted :

The method a certain small record shop owner told me about is not just about sold CDs. In the beginning of the nineties the wholesalers instructed him as to how those sales lists should be made in the first place.They told him how many of Big Idol X's records he was allowed to write up each week, and if he sold more he should just pass the numbers on for next week.

Oh yeah, if he didn't follow orders there would be troubles with getting any records for the shop. At that time there were only a couple really big companies to buy from, so it was a serious threat. I don't know what method they use today, but there must be something. Why do you think some of that crap hangs on the lists for so long? Most rabid fans buy their copy the same month it comes out, don't they?

[spm1138]

Originally Posted by Kowalski.44

The good thing about Ninja Tune is that you can listen to max 2 minutes of every song availible. Perfect if you're looking for something new and unheard of.

That's the frustrating thing in all of this. When decent record companies do put stuff up to listen to or to buy on websites it seems to work wonders. Apple's music shop was a raging success considering it was for Mac only and had very little content.

As for Digital Copyrights... if I've just bought an MP3 I am unlikely to just give it away to anyone because I've payed for it.

Blah. If they just put a dollar a tune/monthly sub website up with good MP3s, an awful lot of their piracy problems would go away. Idiots.

Maybe they worry that if people heard their music first they wouldn't buy the album...

[Olethros]

Originally Posted by spm1138

Maybe they worry that if people heard their music first they wouldn't buy the album...

My thoughts exactly. When the record companies spend gazillions of dollars hyping a record with a bright and shiny cover the last thing they want is for people to find out the contents is utter crap. Before they've actually paid for it, of course.

I cannot go a day without thinking "How. The. FUCK does Justin Timberlake sell ONE SINGLE FUCKING ALBUM?" A friend of mine at work actually downloaded "Justified" from iMesh or something purely out of morbid curiosity. (One music critic actually gave it a '6' in a national newspaper.) And now I know beyond the slightest shadow of a doubt that never before in the history of mankind has anything that vile, that wretched and that utterly devoid of any redeeming features both musically or artistically been released upon reasonably innocent people. If I had the choice of wether to track down and kill either the top-40 war criminals of Yoguslavia or the people responsible for that album I'd have a hard time desiding.

Okay, so it's kind of a roundabout way of saying it, but my point is that what hurts the music industry the most is the disgustingly apparent lack of quality in their products. Granted, I might be a grumpy old man as far as their target audience goes, but really deep-down to-the-core crappy music never fails to waft its stink through time, trends and glittery, sparkling marketing hype. If I lived in the sixties I'd be loathing The Monkeys the same way I loathed "poodle rock" hair bands in the eighties and boy bands and teen queens today.

[OpFor]

And rap...lets not forget that...I ****ing hate this rap...

[Cap'n Beeb]

Lower the price, sales increase, and you gain your oh so precious profit back. And maybe, just maybe, the artist will get something out of it.

[(SDS)benmcl]

That may be a tad complicated for them. Don't forget these guys have big time education so how bright can they be?

[GenoOfTheCrayon]

Kowalski, the swear filter can't do anything about puting size=2 in the middle of the words. Like this!

f[ size = 2 ]uck[ / size ]

Without the spaces.

fuck

[DallasStarsRule]

exactly

if the music wasnt so shallow and pointless, then people would pay for it

I'm not paying $30 for an album from an artist who basically is all looks, and no talent.

1) CDs are overpriced. $30-$40 for a CD is far too much, when I can buy a movie that took millions of dollars to make for something like $20.

2) 90% of new music is pretty much the same crap ass template. You have your boy band guy or your britney spears girl, they sing about love or some other crap they have no understanding or personal feelings about, and the RIAA wonders why pepole dont pay for it. Because its CRAP that is not worth the effort or money! Not because of Kazaa!

The RIAA seems to think that 100% of the songs downloaded would be otherwise bought. They dont consider that kazaa is the only way most people would even bother with the crap theyr'e putting out.


And this whole american idol BS sickens me. I usually am a very nice person, but I hope that guy with the fro and that ugly girl both get hit by trains.

[Crowze]

What annoys me the most is that record companies support so many awful unoriginal bands, when there are many other bands making good and original material and they get next to no recognition for it. The companies think "ooh this is another Britney, Britney sold well so lets go for this person as well". They are too scared to back something different, because they have no others to compare it ('s sales) to. If they'd just wake up and look at the market, they'd see that many of us want something different. The talent is out there, they just need to support it.

[Freon]

Originally Posted by Nightmare

The method a certain small record shop owner told me about is not just about sold CDs

hehe that's true. i once work for a video game stores chain. and each week the marketing guys told us what to put on the best selling charts

i've heard that producing CDs is cheaper than those old vinyls, yet they cost more on shelves. and they say we are the hackers

[DEFkon]

I've never really bought into the whole "this music sucks, that's why nobody's buying it" as a serious explanation of the current trends. I mean if i were to play devil's advocate, i'd just respond with something like "then why are people collecting them?" A few months back for kicks i did a search for "britany spears" on kazza (actually i was trying to see if i was connected or not) anyhow, there must've been a zillion files/users... so obviously it's not that people don't want these songs, either that or those of us that don't like her are in the minority.

-- The point is that the music industry is fighting an uphill battle trying to regain the ground they lost about 5-6 years ago. If they had the insight, they would've invested heavily in offering music for download online for some miniscule fee, and offer easily found web servers and the like. Back then, if you wanted an Mp3 you actually had to work for it, buy searching through FTP servers, most of which had ratio's, and were on dial up. So getting one song could take about 30 mins.

If the music industry had jumped on board the .com boom of the 90's and competed with the rudamentary, time consuming, and fustraiting file trading aperatus they would've dominated, and been positioned properly to maintain that dominace of online distrubiton. BUT!! they didn't and abandoned that approach.

Now fastforward 5 years and they want to rectify that mistake, problem is that they can't compete with anyone selling stuff for free. So, they need to get rid of that compition. That's the goal right now. Kill file-swaping, then step in and sell it online in some format.

I'm actually surprised that the RIAA hasn't just had the balls yet to produce their own endorsed version of kazza. You'd pay X amount per month, and you could register to be a trader. It'd be the Ebay of the online distrubiton. No (or very little) overhead because your not using alot of bandwith, instead your just selling the license to trade, and the ability to find other licensed traders.

Of course.. that wouldn't really compete with applications like kazza or edonkey, that also let you download movies, apps, ect.

Oh well, looks like we're just gonna have to loose our rights, and accept being spied on and attacked by strangers in the night.

[(SDS)benmcl]

Actually sucky music is playing apart. People have want the music the way they want it. They want a certain song, not the entire album because they feel most of its fluff. They want the 2-3 songs mixed with other favorites.

There has been some suggestions, and some of those have been pointed out here, that the situation is not nearly as bad as they say it is.

The fact is the music industry not only wants to tell you what music to buy, ie if you want this song you have to buy the rest of them, and how you shold listen to it. Until they realize that not only people want to be in control they can make money from that they will continue to do stupid things.

I also believe that they will make a mistake very soon if they have not already. They will take on the wrong person and will get smacked down pretty heavily.

[-Snakebite-]

Best thing to do is just carry on buying what you like, don't download all the **** music just because you can. If the stuff they are producing now didnt sell better than the other stuff, they wouldnt make it. Its just a business, they give the public what they want.

[Ranger 223]

whats killing the music industry?








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