Record Industry crashes, dies

[Ah_Pook]

[FinFangFoom]

good for them. they still wouldn't be shit if pitchfork hadn't given them a good wanking,

Pitchfork is a multi-billion dollar corporation now? Fuck.

[elpollodiablo]

Everyone's made some good points up ins. I'm just glad we're reaching the point where people are recognizing the shift for the inevitability it always was--for a long time, folks seemed to want to deny what was happening, especially those folks in the industry. This craziness recently, with the RIAA sending subpoenas to all of these kids at my school, trying to scare them into settlements rather than go to court... That's a death rattle, right there. They realize that they can't control shit on the wider internet, so they're targeting smaller, organizational networks like those at universities.

[mackro]

I'm going to miss having my liner notes right next to the thing that stores the music.

(Internet access to bio pages doesn't always follow you around everywhere.)

[elpollodiablo]

Why not? We're talking about overall music downloads--the article says there are over 1billion illegal downloads per month. The iTunes store can't begin to compare. In my experience, people will turn to iTunes when the content they want isn't available on P2P, or the quality is bad, or whatever. I know very few people--actually, I don't think I know any people--who use iTunes as their primary source for music. It's P2P first, then iTunes if you can't find what you're looking for. Like I said, when people can find what you're selling in the street, why even bother walking into your store?

Also iTunes launched in 2003, I believe.

You might be right about 2003 - I was trying to remember off the top of my head.

You'd have to compare all illegal music downloads either to all music sales or at least to all legal downloads. iTunes alone makes for a skewed stat. Not to say illegal downloads wouldn't still be greater, but it would be more in perspective.

Obviously someone is using iTunes, even it's not the people you know.

And once again, though I don't have the numbers at hand, I'm fucking certain that if you were to compare P2P and torrent downloads, at a track-by-track or album-by-album basis, against all combined music sales, physical or electronic, the illegal downloads would be four or five times the legal purchases. Looking at all legal music downloads and not just those made through iTunes is a moot point--the vast majority of all legal music downloads are made through iTunes. The rest account for a few percentage points, I'm sure, but not enough that looking at iTunes exclusively makes for a "skewed hat." Yes, there are some people using iTunes. Undoubtedly. My only point is that there are many, MANY more people not paying than paying.

Also reese I think it's a little shortsighted to attribute iTunes' underwhelming (but still substantial) sales on the audio quality of their tracks. Most people do not give a flying fuck about audio quality. I know you do; and I know there are a lot of audiophiles out there for whom it's incredibly important. But they're a tiny minority, man; most people do not distinguish between lossy/lossless compression, and would probably be hard-pressed to pick out the superior sound system. But regardless: the iTunes store doesn't do better because people can get the same goddamn content for free with a free program. The quality of the files people are getting from P2P doesn't matter (and I wouldn't say on a case-by-case basis it's necessarily better). If you get burned on a shitty soundfile, you just toss it and go hunting again, right?

[Andrew_TSKS]

i think joseph scott is right on, and i want to bring up another point that i think maybe people aren't considering.

see, i download everything i can possibly get my hands on. i'm downloading albums right now. i do it every time i'm on the internet. i'd be willing to bet that the majority of the people who post on here do the same thing (regardless of whether we normally downplay it so as not to offend the sensibilities of our editor). anyone else want to admit to it? even if not, that's ok--i can serve as a good enough example, because what's true of me is true of all my other music-loving friends: I STILL SPEND EVERY DIME I CAN AFFORD ON RECORDS. even if i have already had the record downloaded and burned to a cd for months, i will still buy it if i like it enough. and i go record-shopping at least once every other week, which usually leads to me spending $20-100 a month on records. that's all i can afford to spend on records (and sometimes it's MORE than i can afford), and i spend it every chance i get. so, therefore, the amount of music i download has absolutely no reflection on the amount of records i buy. it may have a reflection on the choices i make when i buy records--after all, i never bought "to the 5 boroughs" by the beastie boys, because i downloaded it and thought it was boring. i would have bought it had this been 1997, and i would have turned around and sold it back. but i DID buy underoath's "they're only chasing safety" that same week--a band i never would have heard had i not downloaded their previous album, "the changing of times", based on a song a friend of mine put on a mix cd for me.

and let's not kid ourselves--those of us who love music, but have limited budgets (i.e. EVERYONE ON THIS BOARD) have always had to pick and choose which albums we bought. and back before downloading existed, we still did anything we could to acquire the most music possible. i mean, come on, do any of you mean to tell me that you never used to trade tapes with friends? (note: years ago, in a filesharing-related argument, john told me he used to refuse tapes of albums from friends, saying he'd rather either own them or go without ever hearing them. but he's the only person i've ever heard say this.) i remember that my friends and i would plan our music purchases around what each other already had and could tape for us. i remember being at a record store and being torn between two records, and having friends say "well, i have that one, so i can tape it for you, and you buy the other one and tape it for me." that was standard. i still have tons and tons of dubbed cassettes with albums and eps on them that friends taped for me. and back then, in those times, i still spent every dime i could afford on music.

see, it's not about acquiring music for free. acquiring music for free is GRAVY. i like it, but it's not the same as actually owning an album. i'm listening to a burned cd right now. but i don't HAVE THE ALBUM. i won't HAVE THE ALBUM until i GO TO THE STORE AND BUY IT. and, by the way, the idea that itunes downloads will ever replace that for people who think the way i do (and i'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of music lovers do think that way) is ludicrous. it basically looks to me like they're selling me a dubbed copy for the price of the album. that's not worth it. if i'm gonna buy the album, i want to actually have it. and a lot of other people will agree with me.

my point, amid all these digressions: there's no money being lost on downloaded albums. you can't tell yourself that everyone who downloads the new metallica album would have gone to the store and bought it if they couldn't download it. it's flat out NOT TRUE. and you know what? of the people who do download it, a lot of them who like it enough will still go and buy the album. maybe. or maybe not, but they'll buy something else.

it's not music that's dying. people who go into playing music with the simple hope that they'll one day be able to make a living off doing something they love will still get into playing music, and some of them will still be able to achieve their goals. the mariah carey-level pop stars will fade out, and the huge corporate conglomerates who sell music in the same way they'd sell dish detergent will get out of the business because it will become less profitable (relatively speaking: that rolling stone article laments a loss of profit between 2000 and 2006, but it's a drop from 36.9 billion to 31.8 billion. OH NOES PEOPLE ARE STARVING). the music business will go back to the way it operated half a century ago, when people who loved it were the ones running it. yeah, some mom-and-pop stores might close down, which is regrettable, and mid-level major label employees will lose their jobs--also regrettable. but ultimately, the musicians and fans will be the winners.

ok, that was too long, and didn't hold to the point very well. sorry.

[elpollodiablo]

Re: the success of iTunes: wikipedia sez

"As of January 2007, the store has sold more than 2 billion songs, accounting for more than 80% of worldwide online digital music sales."

So, in six years, the store has managed to sell the same amount of tracks that are downloaded for free over a two-month period.
I really figured Apple's market share was more than 80%, tho

[elpollodiablo]

my point, amid all these digressions: there's no money being lost on downloaded albums. you can't tell yourself that everyone who downloads the new metallica album would have gone to the store and bought it if they couldn't download it. it's flat out NOT TRUE. and you know what? of the people who do download it, a lot of them who like it enough will still go and buy the album. maybe. or maybe not, but they'll buy something else.

There are some major fucking holes in that argument Andrew. NO MONEY is being lost on downloads? Come on, dude. I used to spend about $100/month on records when I couldn't afford it. Now that I can afford it, I spend no money on records. None. I haven't bought a CD in two years. I download copious amounts of shit with no intention of ever paying for it. And five'll get you ten that I'm more of a typical "music lover" than you are--you're a collector, an enthusiast. Music is a huge part of your life. For the casual listener, this is not the case. They just wanna download the top hits for free and move on.

Also kinda what we've all been saying is that the industry is not going to go back to what it was. It's going to be changed irrevocably and in ways that we can't even really anticipate right now.

[Andrew_TSKS]

you're totally right. see, i was ready for you to be all "i don't buy music anymore", and i almost put something into that post about you and a few others on the board being an exception. honestly, pollo, as far as i can tell, you like maybe a dozen musicians. maybe there are more, but you have your interests, and you stick with them. that's fine, but i don't think you fit the profile of the typical music downloader.

well, really there are two types of music downloaders: people like me, and people who don't give a flying fuck about music at all. the latter category probably have stopped buying music. but honestly, i think the record companies created that situation too, by killing the single. they had a really great period from the late 80s til the dawn of the new milennium when they'd managed to make the single cost so much people didn't really bother with them anymore (i'm specifically referring to the $6 cd single), and figured they may as well buy albums. then you had things like hootie and the blowfish's "cracked rear view" having 3 hit singles and selling 18 million copies. i'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of the people who bought that album only bought one album the entire year that album came out. and you know what? you can find that cd in the trash these days if you want to. in fact, copies of it, even in the best condition, are pretty much worthless, because there are just so many. most people stopped caring about it within 6 months. because they don't care about music beyond the latest hits.

so yeah, you're right about that. and you're right that those people are probably not buying albums anymore. but all that means is that the record companies are going to need to focus on the people who still are buying music--i.e. people like me. there are enough of us that they can still make a living (though not as luxurious of one) off of us. and honestly, i'd say that people like me are doing at least as much of the free downloading as the people who don't care about music and just want the hits are. honestly, i also feel like a lot of those people don't mind paying $1 for an itunes download, and don't want to risk getting hit with some lawsuit, so a lot of them are probably the ones who are doing legal downloading anyway. either way, my point is that the free downloads aren't what's killing the record industry. to a great extent, they're merely a technological advance on a tape-trading culture that was already very widespread way before downloading existed.

what's killing the record industry is unnecessary profit margins that they have come to rely on.

[joseph scott]

pollo, I definitely don't argue that the sheer number of illegal downloads outnumbers the number of legal downloads. But I agree with what John said above, that it's not a zero-sum game. Just because more people do it illegally doesn't mean that in the end ALL people will do it illegally. I think if the music industry shrinks--it won't die, after all--that will be a good thing in the end.

and let's not kid ourselves--those of us who love music, but have limited budgets (i.e. EVERYONE ON THIS BOARD) have always had to pick and choose which albums we bought. and back before downloading existed, we still did anything we could to acquire the most music possible. i mean, come on, do any of you mean to tell me that you never used to trade tapes with friends? (note: years ago, in a filesharing-related argument, john told me he used to refuse tapes of albums from friends, saying he'd rather either own them or go without ever hearing them. but he's the only person i've ever heard say this.) i remember that my friends and i would plan our music purchases around what each other already had and could tape for us. i remember being at a record store and being torn between two records, and having friends say "well, i have that one, so i can tape it for you, and you buy the other one and tape it for me." that was standard. i still have tons and tons of dubbed cassettes with albums and eps on them that friends taped for me. and back then, in those times, i still spent every dime i could afford on music.

Yes to all that.

it's not music that's dying. people who go into playing music with the simple hope that they'll one day be able to make a living off doing something they love will still get into playing music, and some of them will still be able to achieve their goals. the mariah carey-level pop stars will fade out, and the huge corporate conglomerates who sell music in the same way they'd sell dish detergent will get out of the business because it will become less profitable (relatively speaking: that rolling stone article laments a loss of profit between 2000 and 2006, but it's a drop from 36.9 billion to 31.8 billion. OH NOES PEOPLE ARE STARVING). the music business will go back to the way it operated half a century ago, when people who loved it were the ones running it. yeah, some mom-and-pop stores might close down, which is regrettable, and mid-level major label employees will lose their jobs--also regrettable. but ultimately, the musicians and fans will be the winners.

And yes to all that. And I bolded the part that is seriously worth keeping in perspective.

Now that I can afford it, I spend no money on records. None. I haven't bought a CD in two years. I download copious amounts of shit with no intention of ever paying for it. And five'll get you ten that I'm more of a typical "music lover" than you are--you're a collector, an enthusiast. Music is a huge part of your life. For the casual listener, this is not the case. They just wanna download the top hits for free and move on.

This is the thing that the industry is wringing its hands over, yes. But pollo, you pretty  much put your finger on it by citing this attitude--that the "casual listener" has stopped valuing music economically. This just brings me back to my original post. That's what you fucking get when you sell your music two aisles down from Charmin Ultra and contact lens solution. And those are the stores that the industry supports - they left bona fide record stores in to wither and die years ago. The music that the "casual listener" purchases is the shit that the companies are pouring millions of dollars into. That's millions and millions of dollars spent on maybe a hundred artists, who keep the behemoth afloat. Well, those artists by and large do not make the best music, so if the apparatus that supports them goes under, then so be it. But I really don't think the New Pornographers or Jason Molina are going call it quits because too many people are file-sharing. Again I'm back to my original post: the people with passion, whether they be buyers or sellers, will remain.

[joseph scott]

but honestly, i think the record companies created that situation too, by killing the single. they had a really great period from the late 80s til the dawn of the new milennium when they'd managed to make the single cost so much people didn't really bother with them anymore (i'm specifically referring to the $6 cd single), and figured they may as well buy albums. then you had things like hootie and the blowfish's "cracked rear view" having 3 hit singles and selling 18 million copies. i'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of the people who bought that album only bought one album the entire year that album came out. and you know what? you can find that cd in the trash these days if you want to. in fact, copies of it, even in the best condition, are pretty much worthless, because there are just so many. most people stopped caring about it within 6 months. because they don't care about music beyond the latest hits.

Totally. I was having this conversation with my wife this weekend and she brought this angle up. During the whole boy band era--roughly 1997-2003 or so--the industry was pumping out singles-based artists by the truckload, but it wasn't economically feasible to buy a CD single. So album sales went up. Plus you had the industry cash cow Now That's What I Call Music - this little piece of plastic that you could throw your best-selling singles on and just make that much more money without having to cultivate new artists. The NOW series was charting at #1 at its peak! That just illustrates Andrew's point - that the audiences just wanted the singles, not the filler, and they didn't give a shit about the presentation. So of course when filesharing took hold it was a no-brainer for this audience. And the record industry is bemoaning the dearth of album sales? It's their own fault for not cultivating artists who knew how to make albums.

[Andrew_TSKS]

yes to both of those posts. fuckin' a, joseph, i'm glad i'm not the only one on here who is having this reaction. i was afraid when i read the first post in this thread that i'd be a lone voice crying in the wilderness.

[joseph scott]

I'm just glad you give a shit about me again. 13 Songs won't tear us apart.

[DanielBurns11]

(note: years ago, in a filesharing-related argument, john told me he used to refuse tapes of albums from friends, saying he'd rather either own them or go without ever hearing them. but he's the only person i've ever heard say this.)

I am like this as well. I don't even like to borrow CD's from friends, but I still do of course. And if I could, I'd be downloading music every waking second. But I totally relate to the whole 'I'd rather either own them or go without ever hearing them' thing.

This has been the best thread I've read in a while.

EDIT: BTW the NOW compilations are still charting at #1. I saw it a a couple months ago, and was utterly shocked. I had no idea those things actually sold that well.

[elpollodiablo]

you're totally right. see, i was ready for you to be all "i don't buy music anymore", and i almost put something into that post about you and a few others on the board being an exception. honestly, pollo, as far as i can tell, you like maybe a dozen musicians. maybe there are more, but you have your interests, and you stick with them. that's fine, but i don't think you fit the profile of the typical music downloader.

Just because I don't make music my everything doesn't mean that there's only a handful of artists that interest me. I've got gigs of music ranging from 50s and 60s era folk to the new Timbaland record (unfortunately). I don't care much for the hype, nor do I particularly enjoy reading about music, but I'm not out of touch either. I'm just not so passionate that it makes up my entire pop culture experience. I think you're mischaracterizing me and people like me because your experience is vastly different--you write, read, and talk about music all the time, you spend most of your free time at shows, most of your friends and those you interact with are just as passionate about music as you are (these are all just assumptions, of course, based on what I've seen you post in the past). The "indie" subculture (just saying it leaves a foul taste in my mouth) are not indicative of your average music downloader. Not by a damn long shot. It might seem typical because these are the people you're surrounded with, but your average college student with broadband and Limewire does not think and write obsessively about music--they're just looking for what they like; they download it and move on. At least in my experience. The nerds are not the majority.

well, really there are two types of music downloaders: people like me, and people who don't give a flying fuck about music at all.

This is reductive, demonstrably untrue and elitist. I "care" about music. I do not devote my life to it. There are shades of nuance, here.

the latter category probably have stopped buying music. but honestly, i think the record companies created that situation too, by killing the single. they had a really great period from the late 80s til the dawn of the new milennium when they'd managed to make the single cost so much people didn't really bother with them anymore (i'm specifically referring to the $6 cd single), and figured they may as well buy albums. then you had things like hootie and the blowfish's "cracked rear view" having 3 hit singles and selling 18 million copies. i'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of the people who bought that album only bought one album the entire year that album came out. and you know what? you can find that cd in the trash these days if you want to. in fact, copies of it, even in the best condition, are pretty much worthless, because there are just so many. most people stopped caring about it within 6 months. because they don't care about music beyond the latest hits.

An interesting argument, but it ignores the simple, obvious and undeniable fact that most people--that is, the majority of people, not highly fetishistic subsets of people with very highly specialized interests--will not pay for what they can get for free. I know it's redundant, but it's the damn truth.

so yeah, you're right about that. and you're right that those people are probably not buying albums anymore. but all that means is that the record companies are going to need to focus on the people who still are buying music--i.e. people like me. there are enough of us that they can still make a living (though not as luxurious of one) off of us. and honestly, i'd say that people like me are doing at least as much of the free downloading as the people who don't care about music and just want the hits are. honestly, i also feel like a lot of those people don't mind paying $1 for an itunes download, and don't want to risk getting hit with some lawsuit, so a lot of them are probably the ones who are doing legal downloading anyway. either way, my point is that the free downloads aren't what's killing the record industry. to a great extent, they're merely a technological advance on a tape-trading culture that was already very widespread way before downloading existed.

No. This is not "merely a technological advance on a tape-trading culture." This is a global telecommunications system that makes possible the free and open exchange of all stripes of media and information. This is not dubbing a copy of the White album for your friend in social studies. This is ripping an advance copy of a disc three months before the street date and distributing it all over the globe. As a funnier man than I put it, that is like comparing Deep Blue to one of those shoes that people with clubfoot wear.
The argument has been made time and again over the years that what killed the record industry were high prices and shitty content. Fair enough. But if it weren't for the internet, do you think people would have just entirely abandoned the paradigm en masse? If there were no alternatives, would people have simply given up buying music? No. The prices went up, and perhaps the quality of popular music declined, and there was a simple, no-cost method for instant gratification available. People began using it. Do you honestly think the big labels' profits would be taking such tremendous hits if people had no alternative?
Also, the path to recovery for the labels does not lie with the loyal consumer. That's a shrinking demographic; even if they cut prices in half and hand-delivered your CDs with a smile, the fact remains that people can get the shit for free. As filesharing becomes more and more ingrained in the popular consciousness, as the next few generations grow up without record stores or prevalent physical media, more and more people will download, not fewer. There will of course be those for whom the culture of the record store will never die, and they will keep it alive--but it will be a niche market, like specialty book and antique stores.

what's killing the record industry is unnecessary profit margins that they have come to rely on.

What's killing the record industry is technology. It's not really anyone's fault, it's just the way things work.

[John]

pollo I think that your many good points are clouded by your single-issueness - "technology" isn't "killing the record industry." A hostile and exploitative attitude toward its customer base has made that base feel alienated from it and at odds with it, as your own posts here demonstrate. Your position seems to be "once filesharing technology became available, the end was at hand!" - that's nonsense. Well-structured, intelligent industries and companies survive changes that make filesharing seem miniscule. The industry responded to the challenge of new technology by trying to resist it. That's always a mistake. You seem to ascribe an almost religious momentum to the whole process, but there is no religion here. Just the age-old intersection of technology and commerce, and the familiar lesson that the latter must always be keenly aware of the former.

[elpollodiablo]

Fair enough. What's another industry that has had to face an onslaught like this, other than entertainment? What's another consumer product that technology has enabled its consumers to duplicate, share and trade free of charge?

[elpollodiablo]

Also I'm not ascribing any mystery to the technological advances. I'm just saying (for like the fifth time now) that the technology has made this media free, and once people can get something for free its market value plummets. Nothing mysterious about that.

[John]

You do speak in rather mystical terms about the whole thing. Very apocalyptic, only-one-way-of-seeing-it all-you-dummies-have-your-heads-in-the-sand. My bullshit detector starts goin' nuts when anybody starts assuming that sort of tone - again, I do mean this with respect, I think you make many excellent points. But "now that this change has taken place, the end result can only be as follows" isn't one of them. You're asking "when has this exact thing taken place," but you're missing the point. The only point is that seismic, unpredictable changes are a constant of any industry; it's the nature of progress. You seem to think that "the product is now free" occupies some very special place in the history of market change; that the situation is unique in its particulars can't be denied. However, I think the guys who got rich marketing Evian to the U.S. might take issue with your argument that you can't sell people something they've always been happy getting for free.

[Andrew_TSKS]

Fair enough. What's another industry that has had to face an onslaught like this, other than entertainment? What's another consumer product that technology has enabled its consumers to duplicate, share and trade free of charge?

well, libraries didn't kill the publishing industry...

Also I'm not ascribing any mystery to the technological advances. I'm just saying (for like the fifth time now) that the technology has made this media free, and once people can get something for free its market value plummets. Nothing mysterious about that.

and see, in response to this, i can only say that yeah, while someone who just likes current pop hits and will buy a now comp instead of the individual albums those singles came from may look at downloading as getting something they would normally have to pay for for free, i don't. i do download, but as i said, i don't consider myself to have an album that's a bunch of files on my hard drive. i just have something that's equivalent in my mind to a dubbed tape. i still want the actual album, if i like it enough. and i think you're underestimating the amount of people who agree with me.

i could use the example of books again. a lot of people read books from libraries instead of buying them, but the publishing industry can still survive selling books. now, a hardcover book can sell 80,000 copies in the us and hit the new york times bestseller list, while a cd that sells that many isn't notable at all. so yeah, book publishers are selling less books. but again, there are people out there who don't think checking a book out of the library is the same experience as owning the book, and those people keep book publishers afloat. i really think that music will always have sales on at least that scale (probably more) and therefore that a music production industry will always exist--just not on the scale it exists currently.

[jebreject]

i want to marry joeseph scott

[jebreject]

and john

too bad they're both already married

and i'm already married to andrew tsks

[elpollodiablo]

Branded or not, water's a staple of life, man. Recorded music, however romantic you wanna be about it, is a luxury item. That's a pretty spurious analogy there.

Maybe I'm taking too authoritative a tone, and if that's the case, I apologize. But the numbers and trends seem to vindicate my argument. This isn't the only way things can go. This just seems to be the way things are going.

xpost x3

[Andrew_TSKS]

but miles, BOTTLED water is a luxury item. and i have no idea how many bottles evian and their competitors sell per year, but it's a lot. and all of that water could have been gotten for free from a tap.

[John]

Branded or not, water's a staple of life, man. Recorded music, however romantic you wanna be about it, is a luxury item. That's a pretty spurious analogy there.

Maybe I'm taking too authoritative a tone, and if that's the case, I apologize. But the numbers and trends seem to vindicate my argument. This isn't the only way things can go. This just seems to be the way things are going.

xpost x3

It's not spurious at all - recent studies demonstrate authoritatively that the water you can get from the tap is better than the water you'll pay for, but it's not going to touch the bottled water industry, because they're smart and have played their cards brilliantly. People in NYC pay for bottled water even though it's common knowledge that the water from the tap in NY is completely delicious! The music industry, on the other hand, isn't smart, and grew rather too quickly for its own good. The numbers and trends indicate that the music industry is failing to adapt, and, as I say, there has been & will continue to be a very excellent market correction. The age of millionaire auteurs, be they artists or producers, is probably at an end. The age of artists making a living from music, recorded and otherwise, will however continue uninterrupted.

Andrew's point stands: the staple of life is free. The product isn't. That's a distinction that will be meaningful to artists as people begin to accept music as something they have free access to and which they need not pay for.