David Lowery Blasts NPR Intern On File-Sharing

[troutman]

http://stereogum.com/1069672/david-lowery-on-file-sharing/news/

On Monday, June 16, NPR All Songs Considered intern Emily White published an essay (http://www.npr.org/blogs/allsongs/2012/06/16/154863819/i-never-owned-any-music-to-begin-with) in which she admitted that, while she boasted an iTunes library comprising some 11,000 songs, she had only purchased 15 CDs in her lifetime.

The piece struck a nerve with former Cracker/Camper Van Beethoven frontman David Lowery, who responded to White yesterday with a 3,300-word missive (http://thetrichordist.wordpress.com/2012/06/18/letter-to-emily-white-at-npr-all-songs-considered/) that grapples with White’s confessions as well as many issues never explicitly raised by White.

He crunches some numbers, concluding that White owes $2,139.50 to the artists whose music she has obtained sans payment.

For all its weaknesses, his essay is essential reading: passionate, eloquent and urgent. Read it here (http://thetrichordist.wordpress.com/2012/06/18/letter-to-emily-white-at-npr-all-songs-considered/).

Do you agree with Lowery’s argument? Or do you think it falls short of addressing the problem? Do you pay for music, or are you, like White, sitting on a library of songs you obtained via sharing?

[troutman]

http://thetrichordist.wordpress.com/2012/06/18/letter-to-emily-white-at-npr-all-songs-considered/

I’ve been teaching college students about the economics of the music business at the University of Georgia for the last two years. Unfortunately for artists, most of them share your attitude about purchasing music. There is a disconnect between their personal behavior and a greater social injustice that is occurring. You seem to have internalized that ripping 11,000 tracks in your iPod compared to your purchase of 15 CDs in your lifetime feels pretty disproportionate. You also seem to recognize that you are not just ripping off the record labels but you are directly ripping off the artist and songwriters whose music you “don’t buy”. It doesn’t really matter that you didn’t take these tracks from a file-sharing site. That may seem like a neat dodge, but I’d suggest to you that from the artist’s point of view, it’s kind of irrelevant.

The average income of a musician that files taxes is something like 35k a year w/o benefits. The vast majority of artists do not make significant money on the road. Until recently, most touring activity was a money losing operation. The idea was the artists would make up the loss through recorded music sales. This has been reversed by the financial logic of file-sharing and streaming. You now tour to support making albums if you are very, very lucky. Otherwise, you pay for making albums out of your own pocket. Only the very top tier of musicians make ANY money on the road. And only the 1% of the 1% makes significant money on the road. (For now.)

On a personal level, I have witnessed the impoverishment of many critically acclaimed but marginally commercial artists. In particular, two dear friends: Mark Linkous (Sparklehorse) and Vic Chesnutt. Both of these artists, despite growing global popularity, saw their total incomes fall in the last decade. There is no other explanation except for the fact that “fans” made the unethical choice to take their music without compensating these artists.

Shortly before Christmas 2009, Vic took his life. He was my neighbor, and I was there as they put him in the ambulance. On March 6th, 2010, Mark Linkous shot himself in the heart. Anybody who knew either of these musicians will tell you that the pair suffered depression. They will also tell you their situation was worsened by their financial situation.

What the corporate backed Free Culture movement is asking us to do is analogous to changing our morality and principles to allow the equivalent of looting.

Ultimately there are three “inconvenient” things that MUST happen for any legal service:

1.create an account and provide a payment method (once)
2.enter your password.
3. Pay for music.

So what you are really saying is that you won’t do these three things. This is too inconvenient. And I would guess that the most inconvenient part is….step 3.

That’s fine. But then you must live with the moral and ethical choice that you are making to not pay artists. And artists won’t be paid. And it won’t be the fault of some far away evil corporation. You “and your peers” ultimately bear this responsibility.

[troutman]

The Internet could not care less about your mediocre band
http://www.north.com/latest/the-internet-could-care-less-about-your-mediocre-band/

The convenience that Emily is searching for is, as she mentions, provided by Spotify (http://spotify.com) – by doing so she shows us that a musician’s enemy is not the music downloader. The enemy is Spotify, MOG (http://mog.com), Rdio (http://rdio.com) et al who license entire music catalogs from labels at great cost. The labels (in my case Warner Bros) then pay a pittance in royalties to the artists. The winners in this vast charade are the labels and venture capitalists.

Believe me I know. I recently received a royalty statement from Warner Bros in which I found that one of our most popular songs, ‘Natural’s Not In It’ had been streamed or downloaded through paid online services, almost 7000 times. That netted me $17.35. Now that was just one song out of our entire Gang of Four catalog. The statement amount in total, my share, came to $21.08. There was a big, red-inked stamped message on the last page that read, “Under $25 do not pay.”

Lowery points out in his passive/aggressive “Letter to Emily” that people are buying less music these days. I wonder if it has ever occurred to him that maybe that’s because they are being served up an all-you-can-eat cheap buffet of music from the likes of Spotify?

The Internet can not be ethical. Only users of the Internet can be said to be ethical, moral, or philosophical; they may be terrorists, kidnappers, racists, deviants; they could also be atheists, religious zealots or spiritualists; they might be gay, straight, bi, married, divorced; employed, destitute…the list goes on. Whoever they may be they are users. The Internet is its own thing. The Internet doesn’t give a damn about musicians or your mediocre band.

[This discussion is about user behavior not the moral or ethical stance of downloading music. Clearly musicians/artists/creators ought to be compensated for their work if they are selling it. This post isn’t about that.]

[troutman]

I just want to note that the youthful accumulation of music is not as rosy peachy as they make it seem. When a human being is capable of hearing vast quantities of music there comes, by mathematical certainty, a point of diminishing returns. When you are listening to random obscurities all your life without forming meaningful attachments to any of it, you are creating a superficial musical judgement that may never encompass the idea of living intensely with a piece of music until you have thought it through and understand it completely.
Tony Patti
June 24th, 2012 @ 7:38 pm

http://www.north.com/latest/the-internet-could-care-less-about-your-mediocre-band/

[psyang]

[This turned out to be a bit of a ramble, sorry]

Those who know me know I have a strong stance against piracy. I am a software developer, so software piracy affects me personally. I'm very careful that any software I use is legally obtained, whether purchased or free. For example, I am the only one in my circle of family/friends/acquaintances that I know of who has a paid-for license for WinZip.

For me, this extends naturally to digital entertainment. Music and movies are not a right. Just because one is able to get high quality free music/movies doesn't mean one should (I just made a similar argument in the absent senator thread). There are little or no repercussions for piracy, but it doesn't make it right. And that, ultimately, is what matters most in this issue - what is right.

A friend of mine tried to argue that the HBO series Game of Thrones was not available for purchase, and so they pirated them. He felt he had some God-given right to watch the show, and it was HBO's fault for not allowing him to watch it when he wanted to. Even worse, I believe that the series (at least the first few seasons) is now available for purchase, but my friend won't buy them since he already watched those series, and the price was too high for him regardless.

So it's no surprise that I agree completely with the article. One point the author alludes to but doesn't explicitly raise is that the cost of reproducing a song or a movie is almost nil, without any sacrifice in quality. This has effectively taken any semblance of control away from the media creator - it's impossible for an artist to ensure only paying customers have access to their high-quality music.

I really liked the author's point that forces beyond sites like Pirate Bay (including computer manufacturers, ISPs, and search engines like Google) directly/indirectly benefit from piracy.

Unfortunately, there's no easy way to enforce measures that will prevent piracy, even without the many forces directly/indirectly profiting from piracy. The only case where things worked out in a fair/just manner (as far as I can tell) is Louis C.K.'s recent live concert that he released. $5, no DRM, and he made over a million dollars (of which a large chunk went to various charities). But there was no legislation - only his plea that people not pirate, and an acceptance by the consumers to honor that plea.

So a world without piracy can exist in a fair/equitable way, but it requires a massive change in how people perceive and, more importantly, respect the industry and the artists.

[Regular_John]

I've said it before on this site and I'll say it again. It's too late to put the genie back in the bottle. Napster reached critical mass 12 years ago. That's a decade of "free" music, a substantial portion of which the music industry spent on dead end tactics and p***ing all over the same people they we're trying to maintain as paying customers.

Much like video rentals & home milk delivery, the business model & product being offered are no longer relievent or valuable.

This isn't to say artist/musicians are not entitled to make a living off their wares, but the reality is that the market/public can not maintain the same number of artist at the same level that it once could. And "making music your life" may require more sacrifice than you're willing to make.

However, I still believe the cream will rise to the top and many performers will make a good living for years to come. Consider this, The Arcade Fire released their debute album, Funeral in 2004... two years after Napster got shut down. Justin Bieber was 10 years old at the time. Both artist are making a comfortable living despite starting after the flood gates had opened.

For the record, I subscribe to Rdio (an "all you can eat" service) and I still purchase recorded music from time to time... direct from the artist website.

It's time to stop focusing on the 99% of users who won't spend a dime on your album and start focusing your effort into adding value to the 1% that will. Give me the limited edition on red vinyl, offer me meet & greets, heck even just sign some autographs onto the 1,000 CD's you will sell and offer them at your shows. But the days of spending $20 for just the music are over... and have been for longer than Bieber's been shaving.

/rant

[Maritime Q-Scout]

[One point the author alludes to but doesn't explicitly raise is that the cost of reproducing a song or a movie is almost nil, without any sacrifice in quality.

The cost of reproduction isn't almost nil, it is nil.

I was taught in economics class that Price is set where Marginal Cost = Marginal Revenue (yes yes there are exceptions I know) but if the Marginal Cost of a unit is 0, then it doesn't really matter where the revenue falls on the graph, price is going to be zero.

What exactly does this mean?

It means that industries will need to change from charging for the product and focus on the service.

For example, with music, rather than charge for the song, artists will be charging for concerts. Essentially the song becomes advertisement for their tours (which funny enough is how it used to be).

With movies you're paying for the experience in the theater, rather than watching the movie itself.

With software you're not paying for the program, but servicing, updates and content.


Look at TV. Do you pay for a specific TV show when you watch it? No, you pay for the service to be provided to you, you watch the channel you want at no extra cost (you may have to pay extra to have the series of channels available to you) and the show you want. Advertisers are the ones paying to produce the show and put it on the air, not the end user. The internet is essentially you paying the ISP (cable company) for access to the internet (TV channels) and you consume the media (tv channels) you desire, when you desire.


The really funny thing is, if your product is good enough people will pay.

I buy CDs, but rarely do I from Walmart, HMV or a box store, I'll spend twice as much for them at one of the artist's shows as I know they are getting the money and not a few cents of the purchase price.

I do buy DVDs but only if the movie is good enough for me to be proud of my collection. Have I downloaded Dark Knight? Yes. Have I purchased it on DVD and Blu-Ray, yes and yes.

I find the Louis CK approach to media interesting, $5 for a special DRM free, he's selling his own tour tickets without using a ticketing agency, all to keep costs down. All the while he's making a bloody fortune. I think people want to see the end producer (be it musician, actor, or software developer) get rich off their work, not some corporate executive they've never heard of.


Not to pick on psyang, but if I saw your software for sale at Staples I wouldn't think twice about buying it. However, knowing you're a poster on CP, if I knew what software you developed, I'd make a conscious effort to look for it when I'm out, if I could use it I'd buy it. I'd do it more so because I have a connection with the developer than the product itself.

We as a society are saying, we want a connection with those developing the media for us, without that we aren't paying for it. With it, we will praise and defend you until the end of the earth, or until you no longer produce what we want (ie: Apple Fanboys).

This also turned into a bit of a rant, I hope it's coherent I don't feel like proof-reading it... if only there were a program I could download off Pirate Bay that would do that for me

[SebC]

Kickstarter. Problem solved.

[cDnStealth]

I fall into an interesting area on the whole piracy debate. Off the bat I will admit to torrenting music, movies and TV shows. I also own hundreds of DVDs, Blurays and CDs (Often purchased at full price).


A friend of mine tried to argue that the HBO series Game of Thrones was not available for purchase, and so they pirated them. He felt he had some God-given right to watch the show, and it was HBO's fault for not allowing him to watch it when he wanted to. Even worse, I believe that the series (at least the first few seasons) is now available for purchase, but my friend won't buy them since he already watched those series, and the price was too high for him regardless.


Like your friend I downloaded the first season of Game of Thrones. At the time I didn't have access to HBO but I was interested in checking out the show. Sometimes I'll even download a series because I am unable to watch it at the time it airs. Unlike your friend however, I bought the first season on Bluray the day it was released. With movies it's a little different for me. I tend not to download very many because I generally see a lot of films in theaters. If I like it, I'll buy it on release or when it goes on sale. If it's something foriegn or with limited screening I may download it, watch it and if it's enjoyable I will purchase a copy.


Music is a totally different story for me. I use torrents as a way to sample albums/artists I am interested in. I like to throw torrented music on my iPod and give it a couple listen throughs before I decide if it's enjoyable. Listening to a 30 second sample on iTunes isn't the same, nor is sitting on Youtube. But if I am sitting there enjoying an album that I've downloaded then I will make the effort to buy the CD. If I don't like it then it gets removed from my iPod and my computer. Simply put, I would never buy a CD from a band I've haven't listened to and just because I downloaded something doesn't mean the artist is missing out on money. If I had to choose between not listening to a new artist or paying $15-$20 I'd choose the former. The way it exists now, I get exposure to way more bands/films/shows via the internet and that gets me spending more money on the entertainment industry. I am interested as to how you feel about this approach.


So a world without piracy can exist in a fair/equitable way, but it requires a massive change in how people perceive and, more importantly, respect the industry and the artists.


This is impossible and the sooner people come to realize this fact the better off the industry will be. You will never get rid of piracy. Let me repeat that, you will NEVER get rid of piracy. It's simply not possible. People will always find a way to illegally obtain music/movies/games no matter what measures are put in place to stop it. Instead of trying to stop piracy these companys should be trying to make their products more accessible not less. The music industry could learn a great lesson from the video game company Valve. Their digital distribution service is a fantastic model that doesn't combat piracy so much as it encourages people to buy games. Deep discount sales on Steam (often 50%-75%) ensure larger market exposure and people are more willing to take a chance on a $5-$20 game then paying $60. I buy games I would never have even tried because of these discounts and Steam makes it more convenient to buy rather than pirate. In comparison, iTunes is a joke. You pay almost the same amount as a physical CD but you don't get the benifit of owning the CD and the songs come with huge restrictions (you can only download it so many times and can only transfer them to 3 or 4 devices).

[troutman]

Music is a totally different story for me. I use torrents as a way to sample albums/artists I am interested in. I like to throw torrented music on my iPod and give it a couple listen throughs before I decide if it's enjoyable. Listening to a 30 second sample on iTunes isn't the same, nor is sitting on Youtube. But if I am sitting there enjoying an album that I've downloaded then I will make the effort to buy the CD. If I don't like it then it gets removed from my iPod and my computer. Simply put, I would never buy a CD from a band I've haven't listened to and just because I downloaded something doesn't mean the artist is missing out on money. If I had to choose between not listening to a new artist or paying $15-$20 I'd choose the former. The way it exists now, I get exposure to way more bands/films/shows via the internet and that gets me spending more money on the entertainment industry. I am interested as to how you feel about this approach.



It should be possible to preview most songs/albums on youtube. Internet radio too - ex. CBC3 has hundreds of artist pages with song samples.

[cDnStealth]

It should be possible to preview most songs/albums on youtube. Internet radio too - ex. CBC3 has hundreds of artist pages with song samples.

While this is true, the majority of my listening is done on public transit where I don't have access to the internet. I am not saying it's right and while the ends don't justify the means (so to speak) I make sure to buy the CDs to albums/artists I enjoy. Anything else wouldn't get my money/listening anyway.

[psyang]

Like your friend I downloaded the first season of Game of Thrones. At the time I didn't have access to HBO but I was interested in checking out the show. Sometimes I'll even download a series because I am unable to watch it at the time it airs. Unlike your friend however, I bought the first season on Bluray the day it was released. With movies it's a little different for me. I tend not to download very many because I generally see a lot of films in theaters. If I like it, I'll buy it on release or when it goes on sale. If it's something foriegn or with limited screening I may download it, watch it and if it's enjoyable I will purchase a copy.

Music is a totally different story for me. I use torrents as a way to sample albums/artists I am interested in. I like to throw torrented music on my iPod and give it a couple listen throughs before I decide if it's enjoyable. Listening to a 30 second sample on iTunes isn't the same, nor is sitting on Youtube. But if I am sitting there enjoying an album that I've downloaded then I will make the effort to buy the CD. If I don't like it then it gets removed from my iPod and my computer. Simply put, I would never buy a CD from a band I've haven't listened to and just because I downloaded something doesn't mean the artist is missing out on money. If I had to choose between not listening to a new artist or paying $15-$20 I'd choose the former. The way it exists now, I get exposure to way more bands/films/shows via the internet and that gets me spending more money on the entertainment industry. I am interested as to how you feel about this approach.

Honestly, I have no problem with your approach. If you download a song, don't like it, and remove it from your system, then not paying for it makes sense to me - especially since the cost to the artist of you downloading the song is virtually 0. This is just my opinion, and I understand things get murky when, say, you've listened to a song 5 times before deciding to remove it. What is right or wrong suddenly becomes quite subjective, and the model becomes based on the honor system. But it's still better than outright piracy.

I also don't know what to make of HBO. My understanding is that their revenue stream comes mainly from their licensing deals with cable providers. As such, you could say that all of their content is already paid for - it's up to the cable providers to ensure they get enough subscribers to justify having HBO in their lineup. As such, there's no incentive for HBO to curb piracy of their shows - that responsibility has been delegated to the cable providers.


This is impossible and the sooner people come to realize this fact the better off the industry will be. You will never get rid of piracy. Let me repeat that, you will NEVER get rid of piracy. It's simply not possible. People will always find a way to illegally obtain music/movies/games no matter what measures are put in place to stop it. Instead of trying to stop piracy these companys should be trying to make their products more accessible not less. The music industry could learn a great lesson from the video game company Valve. Their digital distribution service is a fantastic model that doesn't combat piracy so much as it encourages people to buy games. Deep discount sales on Steam (often 50%-75%) ensure larger market exposure and people are more willing to take a chance on a $5-$20 game then paying $60. I buy games I would never have even tried because of these discounts and Steam makes it more convenient to buy rather than pirate. In comparison, iTunes is a joke. You pay almost the same amount as a physical CD but you don't get the benifit of owning the CD and the songs come with huge restrictions (you can only download it so many times and can only transfer them to 3 or 4 devices).

I agree - I don't think piracy can be stopped unless an absolutely full-proof copy protection scheme magically appeared. I think the idea of focusing on services instead of content makes a lot of sense - but unless a content provider actually offers their content for free, I don't feel I have a right to download it.

[Burninator]

www.rdio.com

$5 a month and I have unlimited access to all the music I want.* I haven't illegally downloaded any music since I signed up several months ago. Can't speak highly enough of it. I'm sure the other streaming music services out there are the same.

However I don't really see how much money gets back to the artists. A typically album costs $10, I pay half that and listen to dozens of albums a month. I suppose it's better than nothing.


*Well almost. They don't have everything. But their selection is massive.

[troutman]

www.rdio.com (http://www.rdio.com)

$5 a month and I have unlimited access to all the music I want.* I haven't illegally downloaded any music since I signed up several months ago. Can't speak highly enough of it. I'm sure the other streaming music services out there are the same.

However I don't really see how much money gets back to the artists. A typically album costs $10, I pay half that and listen to dozens of albums a month. I suppose it's better than nothing.


*Well almost. They don't have everything. But their selection is massive.

From post #3

The enemy is Spotify, MOG (http://mog.com), Rdio (http://rdio.com) et al who license entire music catalogs from labels at great cost. The labels (in my case Warner Bros) then pay a pittance in royalties to the artists. The winners in this vast charade are the labels and venture capitalists.

Believe me I know. I recently received a royalty statement from Warner Bros in which I found that one of our most popular songs, ‘Natural’s Not In It’ had been streamed or downloaded through paid online services, almost 7000 times. That netted me $17.35. Now that was just one song out of our entire Gang of Four catalog. The statement amount in total, my share, came to $21.08. There was a big, red-inked stamped message on the last page that read, “Under $25 do not pay.”

[cDnStealth]

Honestly, I have no problem with your approach. If you download a song, don't like it, and remove it from your system, then not paying for it makes sense to me - especially since the cost to the artist of you downloading the song is virtually 0. This is just my opinion, and I understand things get murky when, say, you've listened to a song 5 times before deciding to remove it. What is right or wrong suddenly becomes quite subjective, and the model becomes based on the honor system. But it's still better than outright piracy.

I also don't know what to make of HBO. My understanding is that their revenue stream comes mainly from their licensing deals with cable providers. As such, you could say that all of their content is already paid for - it's up to the cable providers to ensure they get enough subscribers to justify having HBO in their lineup. As such, there's no incentive for HBO to curb piracy of their shows - that responsibility has been delegated to the cable providers.




I agree - I don't think piracy can be stopped unless an absolutely full-proof copy protection scheme magically appeared. I think the idea of focusing on services instead of content makes a lot of sense - but unless a content provider actually offers their content for free, I don't feel I have a right to download it.

I know that what I do isn't exactly right. I am still downloading someone elses hard work for free. I get that. I am also probably in the minority of people who would actually go out and buy a CD or DVD. But that doesn't make it right. I don't know what the solution is but most people aren't going to spend money if they know they can get something for free. They have to provide something that is easy, safe and more convenient than going to a torrent site without all the DRM attached. Shaming people isn't really going to solve the problem and DRM only impacts those who are legally buying the product in the first place. They have to get people to look at illegally downloading as more of a hassle. I could pirate a video game but it's way easier for me to pick it up on sale where I don't have to worry about viruses or spyware infecting my PC. I think Valve has done a pretty good job at, not so much combating piracy, but encouraging people to pay for games.

[Bobblehead]

I think this argument is asinine:
On a personal level, I have witnessed the impoverishment of many critically acclaimed but marginally commercial artists. In particular, two dear friends: Mark Linkous (Sparklehorse) and Vic Chesnutt. Both of these artists, despite growing global popularity, saw their total incomes fall in the last decade. There is no other explanation except for the fact that “fans” made the unethical choice to take their music without compensating these artists.

There is no other explanation? Really? The writer lost me at that point. Even reading the article, he mentioned both those artists suffered from depression before killing themselves. Perhaps their illness contributed to their falling income? But no, it had to be downloaders.

And there are statistics in that article that really seem cherry picked to prove a point. Commercial radio in the US has undergone a massive shift to being controlled by a few companies (ClearChannel et al) which seem to push a smaller group of artists. Comparing to 1999 when many people would purchase a full album since singles were relatively rare at the time. I personally have a number of CDs I haven't listened to in a long time because I purchased it on the strength of one song and the rest were sorely lacking. Also, the conversion to the MP3 format can be done by simply ripping your own music while I know back in 1999 I was still in the process of replacing some of my cassettes. Also in the interim there are a lot more things wanting my entertainment dollar - there are more cable channels, MUCH higher speed internet, more video game consoles, just more competition for the leisure dollar.

And I also have a hard time reconciling the argument when you hear about how easy it is to self produce now days. How some recent albums (http://www.billboard.com/column/chartbeat/david-guetta-has-longest-charting-dance-1007348352.story#/column/chartbeat/david-guetta-has-longest-charting-dance-1007348352.story) are closing in on historic sales records.

I don't want to imply that it is fine for people to take music and the creator never get a cent. If they make the music they should be paid. But the hyperbole in many of the arguments makes it difficult to take them seriously.

There is no other explanation except for the fact that “fans” made the unethical choice to take their music without compensating these artists.

I'm sorry, they need to be way more realistic than that.

[troutman]

If you would all just follow my music recommendations, your CDs would be all killer, no filler.;)

[Bobblehead]

If you would all just follow my music recommendations, your CDs would be all killer, no filler.;)

Alas, my major CD purchasing foray was long before I ever met you.

Besides, while I'm sure there would be some overlap, I think some of your tastes are a bit avant-garde for me.

[mykalberta]

The music company started its own death by trying to push one song to sell an entire album and when that song wares out you find you have spent $16 for one song as the rest of the songs are shat. The reason they are losing money is because normally 90% of all songs on an album arent any good, and any that do are sold as individual songs on iTunes. If they want to make their money they need to increase the price of their "hit" singles or learn to make their money via touring and value added sales. I still cant see why they cant come up with a individual song based DRM rather than album DRM.With 80Gb Ipods I think songs can afford to be 7mb in size vs 5mb etc.

For movies, I personally thing the Internet has lead to more sales, I would have never bought all the seasons of the Wire, or the Shield, etc etc etc had I not watched them in their entirety after torrenting them. The funny thing is I still watch the torrented version and keep the DVDs on the shelf because watching it on DVD is just not that convenient as pressing play and going through 3-4 episodes at once. There are also a metric shat tonne of movies I have bought after torrenting them and just loving them too much to deal with a shat quality. Cream will always rise to the top.

For games as previously posted, Steam at least for some games has had to make them some money, I have bought more games in the last 5 years that I ever did before and easily spend 3-4X as much. I will purchase games on their sales just because of the price and never get around to playing it and then one day I see it on my account and wonder when the he77 did I ever buy that.

As for software, I dont pirate it because I dont really use it at home. I know people who use photoshop at work and if I need anything shopped I ask them and I dont pirate windows because I dont think retail price is that expensive for copy and I dont need office at home because I have it at work etc.

[SebC]

I still cant see why they cant come up with a individual song based DRM rather than album DRM.With 80Gb Ipods I think songs can afford to be 7mb in size vs 5mb etc.Apple will sell you DRMed songs that work on Apple devices, but I want DRM-free so it works on all devices.

[DownInFlames]

iTunes music is DRM-free, and has been for awhile.

[Mass_nerder]

Without wanting to venture too deep into this debate:

I have to say that maybe 50% of my collection I did not pay for, but the difference between music I acquire vs. music I pay for is shrinking.
I used to argue that I didn't want to pay for an entire album, if I only wanted one song; Itunes, and other similar services have rendered that moot.
Then I downloaded because I wanted to hear the album sounded before I purchased it; Podcasts, Bandcamp pages etc...have rendered that moot as well.

I find that a lot of the bands I listen to offer their music digitally for free now anyway, then provide vinyl/cds through smaller labels/distros which I'll gladly support.
I spend more buying the vinyl because I love collecting it. I like the idea of passing on music to my kids, like my dad did for me. I find more value in having something in my hand.
Tough to do that with a bunch of pirated digital music, I suppose.

[cral12]

From post #3

The enemy is Spotify, MOG (http://mog.com), Rdio (http://rdio.com) et al who license entire music catalogs from labels at great cost. The labels (in my case Warner Bros) then pay a pittance in royalties to the artists. The winners in this vast charade are the labels and venture capitalists.

Believe me I know. I recently received a royalty statement from Warner Bros in which I found that one of our most popular songs, ‘Natural’s Not In It’ had been streamed or downloaded through paid online services, almost 7000 times. That netted me $17.35. Now that was just one song out of our entire Gang of Four catalog. The statement amount in total, my share, came to $21.08. There was a big, red-inked stamped message on the last page that read, “Under $25 do not pay.”

Isn't "Gang of Four" from the UK?

[Mass_nerder]

Isn't "Gang of Four" from the UK?

Yes

[Flash Walken]

On the one hand I am empathetic towards the artists.

At the end of the day, though, I can't separate that from the fact that this is not at all about the artists, it's about an outdated dinosaur of an industry attempting to guilt me into propping up the industry rather than the artist.

NEW YORK, N.Y. - Louis C.K.'s gambit to sell tickets to his comedy shows himself is paying off.

The comedian said Wednesday that after just 45 hours, his tour has sold 100,000 tickets and taken in $4.5 million in sales. He's bypassing ticketing services like Ticketmaster to sell tickets only on his website.

On Monday, he began selling tickets for $45 without fees. His 39-city stand-up tour kicks off in October.

After announcing the results, he tweeted: "I guess it was a good idea."
Louis C.K. previously sold downloads to his special "Live at the Beacon" for $5, a move that was widely hailed and has since been imitated by other comics. It made more than $1 million in 12 days.
http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/arts-and-life/entertainment/arts/in-2-days-louis-ck-sells-45-million-in-tickets-in-gambit-to-avoid-ticketmaster-160601365.html

While I am empathetic that artists are not more appreciated in society and better compensated for their efforts, paying 14.99 for a ####ty cd that the band/artist sees less than 10 percent from isn't going to change the public perception of art in our culture.

Frankly, I think my local art scene has benefited from music piracy.

[troutman]

Pandora Users Played David Lowery's Song a Million Times and All He Got Was $16.89


http://www.spin.com/articles/pandora-david-lowery-cracker-low-royalties-debate-streaming/?utm_source=spintwitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=spintwitter

[Bobblehead]

When a terrestrial radio station plays a song, how much does an artist get in royalties?

If a single radio station with an average of 100K listeners played a song 10 times, how much would an artist receive?

If Pandora hadn't played it a million times, how would his income from that song change? Would he have sold it more? Would terrestrial radio stations have played it more? How has his income stream from this song been affected by Pandora?

He thinks what he received is too low. Most people believe their work is undervalued. But in reality, what should a 20 year old song be worth?

[troutman]

Lowery said Pandora paid him $16.89 for more than one million plays of "Low" during the last three months of 2012. (He only owns 40 percent of the song, but the implied $42.23 that Pandora would've paid all songwriters still seems fairly paltry; Lowery also gets a performance royalty, which he says is "higher but also quite lame.") By comparison, Lowery indicates that nearly 19,000 plays of "Low" on U.S. terrestrial radio netted him close to $1,400, while a mere 179 plays on Sirius XM satellite radio yielded about $182.

[MarchHare]

If Lowery doesn't like the royalties he's receiving from Pandora, then why did he agree to their licensing terms? And don't say, "He didn't negotiate the deal, the record company did," because then I'll ask just why he signed a contract that allowed his label to license his streaming rights for such a pittance.

Also, is it possible to determine how many of those Pandora streams resulted in a new fan who would have otherwise been unaware of his music? How many of those new fans went to one of his shows and/or bought some of his merch?

Believe it or not, but there was a time when record labels would bribe radio stations (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payola) to give airtime to their artists' songs. The American congress investigated this activity and eventually made it illegal. If broadcasting songs to the public for free is considered an essential part of promoting an artist, shouldn't everyone in the music industry be embracing Pandora, Rdio, and the like?

And maybe I'm out of the loop, but is music piracy even a wide-spread problem anymore? I don't know anyone who illegally downloads music these days. The reason record industry profits are shrinking is because iTunes has made it so customers are no longer forced to spend $15 for a full album when they only want one song.

[opendoor]

If Lowery doesn't like the royalties he's receiving from Pandora, then why did he agree to their licensing terms? And don't say, "He didn't negotiate the deal, the record company did," because then I'll ask just why he signed a contract that allowed his label to license his streaming rights for such a pittance.


Unless I'm mistaken, Pandora doesn't license music. Under US Law they're allowed to stream basically anything they want as long as they pay the royalty rate set by the government.

[opendoor]

When a terrestrial radio station plays a song, how much does an artist get in royalties?

If a single radio station with an average of 100K listeners played a song 10 times, how much would an artist receive?

If Pandora hadn't played it a million times, how would his income from that song change? Would he have sold it more? Would terrestrial radio stations have played it more? How has his income stream from this song been affected by Pandora?

He thinks what he received is too low. Most people believe their work is undervalued. But in reality, what should a 20 year old song be worth?

Performers don't get paid anything from normal radio. The songwriter and/or rights holder makes the money off of that. The amount varies depending on a bunch of factors, but I think it's usually a few cents per play per station.

With things like Pandora (whose royalty rates are based on newer legislation, primarily the DMCA) the performer and the owner of the recording (usually the label) get the bulk of the money while the songwriter gets basically nothing. That's what Lowery is complaining about, as he even mentions that he gets a different and larger cheque for his performance on the song. So much of the law is pretty archaic and based more on when people would buy sheet music or have their songs played by an orchestra than any reality of the last 70 years. It also doesn't help that you have artists expecting the good times from the '90s to continue forever, where they'd be able to release a crappy album with 1 or 2 good songs and pull in millions because of the lack of options for consumers.

One of the bigger problems for smaller scale artists isn't even the amount of royalties they're entitled too, but rather getting them at all. Some of the larger organizations (record companies primarily) simply don't pay or severely underpay royalties and there's not a lot the artists can do about it. If a moderately successful artist thinks they're owed $50K in royalties, it's basically up to them to prove it, which can be a daunting and expensive task when you're going up against a label or radio conglomerate with scores of lawyers and accountants on staff.

[troutman]

And maybe I'm out of the loop, but is music piracy even a wide-spread problem anymore? I don't know anyone who illegally downloads music these days. The reason record industry profits are shrinking is because iTunes has made it so customers are no longer forced to spend $15 for a full album when they only want one song.

I doubt most people under 30 are paying for very much of their music libraries.

[Flash Walken]

I doubt most people under 30 are paying for very much of their music libraries.

I doubt many people under 30 still have 'libraries'.

Streaming, baby. "the cloud"

[Bobblehead]

Lowery said Pandora paid him $16.89 for more than one million plays of "Low" during the last three months of 2012. (He only owns 40 percent of the song, but the implied $42.23 that Pandora would've paid all songwriters still seems fairly paltry; Lowery also gets a performance royalty, which he says is "higher but also quite lame.") By comparison, Lowery indicates that nearly 19,000 plays of "Low" on U.S. terrestrial radio netted him close to $1,400, while a mere 179 plays on Sirius XM satellite radio yielded about $182.

OK, but 1 play on Pandora probably averages 1 person hearing it.

1,000,000/19,000 = 52.6

So unless they're only an average of 53 people listening to the radio when that song was being played, a heck of a lot more people heard the song via terrestrial radio. So using the "number of plays" is a terrible metric.

Cutting the numbers another way:
Pandora paid $0.00001689 per set of ears listening ($16.89/1,000,000).
Terrestrial radio paid $1400. If they are paying a similar price per set of ears listening, that would mean $1400/.00001689 = 82,889,284 listeners.
Divide that by the number of times played 82,889,284/19,000 = 4363 listeners per play.

Is it reasonable to expect that a terrestrial radio station has an average of at least that many listeners at any given point in time? Going by this ratings period (http://cdnmediaratings.blogspot.ca/2012/12/calgary-radio-ratings-august-27.html), the radio station with the lowest ratings in Calgary appears to have much higher ratings than that. *

So if you go by the number of people who probably actually listened to the song, Pandora is overpaying!

Actually, from following this over the years, traditional radio stations have had a pretty darn good deal when it comes to royalties (at least in the US - I'm not sure how Canadian rates differ).

The truth is somewhere in between, but I still contend that this article lives up to the website/magazine that published it - Spin.

Lies, damn lies, and statistics.




* although I may be reading those rating wrong. It is easy to see who is higher, but knowing exactly how many are listening at any given moment may not be totally clear.

[kermitology]

From post #3

The enemy is Spotify, MOG (http://mog.com), Rdio (http://rdio.com) et al who license entire music catalogs from labels at great cost. The labels (in my case Warner Bros) then pay a pittance in royalties to the artists. The winners in this vast charade are the labels and venture capitalists.

Believe me I know. I recently received a royalty statement from Warner Bros in which I found that one of our most popular songs, ‘Natural’s Not In It’ had been streamed or downloaded through paid online services, almost 7000 times. That netted me $17.35. Now that was just one song out of our entire Gang of Four catalog. The statement amount in total, my share, came to $21.08. There was a big, red-inked stamped message on the last page that read, “Under $25 do not pay.”

Spotify, Rdio, etc, are not the enemy. The labels are. He even proved that point. These streaming services have paid a great price to get access to the music catalog of record labels (who control everything in this case) and THEY are the ones who pay the artists a pittance.

If you want to own your music, then don't deal with a label. But a label is (so far) the best way to get your music to the masses.

The best example of the tyranny of labels is Victory Records and Toh Kay/Streetlight Manifesto.

Q: I wanted to hear the Toh Kay record. The music video – before Victory took it down – was beautiful and so was the song. My gosh. What happened?
A: Victory had given Streetlight a choice: either completely kill the Toh Kay record (their absurd reasoning was that its sale would “cannibalize” Streetlight sales, ha!) or hand it over to them so they can release it and exclusively profit from it. Streetlight has experienced and documented years of Victory not paying royalties while continuously profiting from their music, so it was a no-brainer. We had to cancel the record, no matter how much we all loved it and how hard the guys worked on it. That music video, by the way, is also “illegal”. So if you saw it – your eyes are criminals. Source: http://streetlightmanifesto.com/pre-orders-faq/

The music industry as it stands is dying. Your best option is to get yourself a following and then strike out on your own. Labels will kill you in the end. You have to market directly to the consumer, or directly with the distribution service.

[Flash Walken]

One thing I found interesting is the latest Jay-Z album. Now, without having control of antiquated distribution methods, private entities can bankroll albums for use in their own promotions. Samsung by the sounds of it are 100% behind Jay-Z's latest release, and it's almost entirely for the marketability of it.

There is tremendous potential now I think for ease of access to the arts, which is going to be beneficial for the market leaders in the corporate sector who can begin to harness it early.

21st Century patronage.

[kermitology]

Jay-Z is interesting because he is one artist who entirely controls his own destiny. You're gonna get paid when you created the label that your music is licensed to.

[Bobblehead]

And someone actually went ahead and did a breakdown of how much songwriters and performers get paid broken out over differing distribution models.

Lowery doesn’t disclose the Pandora performance royalty but he declares it “unsustainable."5 This is a fascinating perspective: apparently in Lowery’s view a performance royalty of $1,275 is unsustainable but the AM/FM world of $0 is totally fine?

http://theunderstatement.com/post/53867665082/pandora-pays-far-more-than-16-dollars

[rogermexico]

When a terrestrial radio station plays a song, how much does an artist get in royalties?

If a single radio station with an average of 100K listeners played a song 10 times, how much would an artist receive?

If Pandora hadn't played it a million times, how would his income from that song change? Would he have sold it more? Would terrestrial radio stations have played it more? How has his income stream from this song been affected by Pandora?

He thinks what he received is too low. Most people believe their work is undervalued. But in reality, what should a 20 year old song be worth?

I will dig out a SOCAN statement for some exact figures, but if a single radio station with an average of 100K listeners plays a song 10 times an artist might receive up to two or three bucks. Maybe, depending on if all of those plays get tracked and logged.

It depends on the station. You get one amount for campus/community radio, a little bit more for CBC, a little bit more for commercial stations. But it's only a few cents - I think a CJSW play gets you roughly a quarter - provided it comes during a SOCAN sampling period.

You get a fair bit more for TV. I think it's 3 - 5 bucks but again I'd have to check a statement. And you get more if its international. So for example, my old band had songs used twice as theme music for TV shows - once in Canada and once in Germany. I think we got a bit of a bump for the international one.

Once I remember my log in credentials for the SOCAN website I'll come back with the actual rates.

To put it all in perspective - I've forgotten the password for the site that tracks my song writing royalties. That's how little money we're talking about here.

[Itse]

Piracy has no effect on sales. This has been studied multiple times, and the results are pretty much the same. It actually propably mildly increases sales.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21856720 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21856720)

Besides, while profits are down, music sales are actually up. So really what we have is not a situation where people are buying less music, we have a situation where music has less value as a commodity.

So why are profits down?

To start with, there is much more competition for the entertainment dollar these days (especially the games industry, which has grown into an entertainment giant).

Also; before most people had even heard of the internet, analysists were saying that the CD era was one of inflated sales numbers, as people were replacing their old LP's with CD's from the same artists. The music industry tried it's best to turn reselling the same products to the same customers in new formats a continuous cycle (remember the minidisc, Super Audio CD, DVD-Audio...?).

However, that project failed and now digitalization has essentially killed that business almost completely.

Even further, music business has been inflated ever since the album era began. It was well studied that most people never listened to the albums they bought all the way through more than once or twice. In the vinyl era many never even flipped a single over. With albums becoming longer from 30 minutes to 45 minutes and now typically an 1h+, people were paying for more and more music that they didn't actually want.

This was good business, but it also ended.

None if this is news to the entertainment industry, so they are not really lobbying for tougher piracy laws because they think piracy is hurting sales.

Piracy is a crime is because making it a crime has proven to be nice new business model, and corporations are competing in coming up with convoluted logical leaps to create new streams of income through legal means.

For example a recent EU court decision means that propably in the future the IP industry will get a piece of the sale of every printer and printing product. Because you know, they COULD be used to print copyrighted material.

It's insanity, it's scam, and it has absolutely nothing to do with poor suffering artists.

[troutman]

A New Way for Musicians to Make Money on YouTube


http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-07-11/a-new-way-for-musicians-to-make-money-on-youtube#r=hpt-ls

In 2001, composer Scott Schreer wrote a roughly two-minute saxophone-heavy acid jazz instrumental called Love Doctor, and the song lives in an online catalogue of music that he licenses to film and TV producers. It also exists in some 1,500 YouTube (GOOG (http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/snapshot/snapshot.asp?ticker=GOOG)) videos that used the song without paying for the rights. Hunting those stray recordings and trying to collect licensing fees has never been worth most musicians’ trouble. In May, however, Schreer started getting paid by the former freeloaders.

Love Doctor and Schreer’s library of about 1,700 other tunes now bring his company about $30,000 per month from their use in YouTube videos. He’s the test case for a New York startup called Audiam (http://www.audiam.com/) that says it can help artists profit when others use their music. Jeff Price, Audiam’s founder and a friend of Schreer’s, pitches musicians like this: “Let’s go find you money that already exists.”

Big record companies and music publishers already have deals with YouTube to collect money when their songs show up in videos. Small artists and composers don’t. Price wants Audiam to be the middleman for them. When YouTube ads appear on videos while their music is playing, Audiam will claim a share of the revenue and send it along to the artist—minus a 25 percent cut. “It’s magic money,” Price says. “It’s buried treasure.”

[troutman]

Thom Yorke and Nigel Godrich Pull Music From Spotify, Speak Out Against Their Business Model

Godrich: "The reason is that new artists get paid #### all with this model. It's an equation that just doesn't work."

http://pitchfork.com/news/51515-thom-yorke-and-nigel-godrich-pull-music-from-spotify-speak-out-against-their-business-model/

[Bobblehead]

Spotify's Financial Viability and Pernicious Fallacies (Op-Ed)

When one examines the facts, streaming is a viable financial model that pays rights holders fairly and can and will grow the overall business. Simples.

http://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/5070561/spotifys-financial-viability-and-pernicious-fallacies-op-ed