http://dancehallhips.wordpress.com/2008/06/23/kid-rock-promotes-piracy/ In an opposition to an iTunes-obsessed world, Kid Rock has now encouraged listeners to “steal” his music. In an interview with the BBC, the musician explained why most of his music isn’t found on the Apple-oriented music store: “The internet was an opportunity for everyone to be treated fairly, for the consumer to get a fair price, for the artist to be paid fairly, for the record companies to make some money. But [iTunes is] an old system, where iTunes takes the money, the record company takes the money, and they don’t give it to the artists.”
The Major Record industry is vicious. You basically pay them to get exposure to a large audience. Unless you are on an independent label or you just control your music entirely you will not see much money when it comes to CD, MP3 sales. Buy shirts and go to shows if you love your band.
This isn't necessarily true. Artists that self-release pay to have their releases distributed to various online retailers then keep a majority if not all their sales. Indie artists also tend to have much more favorable deals with their labels and will keep a larger percentage of their online sales. Major label artist get hosed when you buy their tunes, true, but they're screwed if you don't. Online sales, like CD sales, go towards paying off their advance. Typically, if an artist does not recoup all his cost on one cd, the sales of the second will be put towards the debt on the first. And because the industry has become so risk averse, when an artist does not sell, they're dropped or shelved.
The record company has a legitimate interest in the intellectual property of the musicians. The musicians freely entered into a contract with these companies in order to chase fame. If it was such a bad deal for them, they should not have entered in to the mutual agreement. If you don't want the record companies to have your money, that's fine. Don't buy any music at all. Just go to the concerts and shows. Just don't use that as a reason for taking their property for free.
I get that. My secondary question still holds though.. if every one of a band's albums/tracks had absolutely zero sales: a) would that band have enough of a following for people to go to concerts/shows? I mean, would you know about it? Would they still spread virally by word of mouth only? I don't know.. but it would seem that if everyone followed your methods, then nothing would get out there. If that's true, then in the end, you're relying on someone else to pay so that you don't have to..
One of the few who still buy CD's. 1.) I can hold it. 2.) Comes with Liner Notes 3.) Has at least some resale value 4.) No Data Loss Plus, if you're savvy enough you rarely have to spend more than $10 for any new CDs (which is what a lot of albums sell for on iTunes). For older stuff I often just buy it used, and can usually get an older CD for less than $4 on average. The only time I download something is if I can absolutely not decide whether I want to buy it from the 30 second samples or if it's a radio pop song that I like and am fairly positive I will not like the album as a whole.
The system is ****ed. I plan on being part of the reason for it's dimise. I'm sure some artist would gladly give me their album if it enticed me to invest in them by buying to concerts, buying their merchandise and blabbering all over the internet about how much I love them. The internet is allowing these bands to bypass these ridiculously contract driven companies and I'm very happy for that. Viva la Revolucion
I haven't bought or ripped any music in a couple of years now. In my life, I've mostly bought. I've stolen some, but between my bad computers and my bad computer skills, it's been a huge pain in the butt to bother.
True, but discounts, I think, what the label/record sales do to increase demand for the things you list above. I'm all for a band making it big without a label and then cleaning up on selling their wares and touring. I don't find this a justification for taking something that people put their time and money into. Generally, if $1 is too much for a song in my eyes, then I don't need to "own" the song that badly.
no option for both? i buy 1 or 2 cd's a month and half of those are used. waterloo in austin now has a massive section that is all new cd's under $10 - everything from coltrane, neil young, sonic youth, willie nelson - thousands of them. i also have been a subscriber to rhapsody since about 2002 - it costs like $12 a month and allows you to stream pretty much every album ever made except for the beatles. im using it right now, in fact - jimi hendrix is melting my face on 'hear my train a commin'. i also download stuff, but just about all of it is probably stuff that is authorized to be there or its so old/obscure that nobody cares. i downloaded the burzum album, but i didnt feel bad about that - that guy is a murderer, church arsonist, neo-nazi racist - ill illegally download his records!
Owning is a tricky word too. You technically don't own the songs you buy anyways (per the legal agreement you didn't even sign when you purchased the music). If I buy the album it will be in CD form for keepsake value only.
So, do you only illegally download music from artists whom you have also bought merchandise and/or concert tickets?
If it's somebody I really love then I'll buy it. But downloading is where I get to listen to music that I would never normally get a chance to. If I like it I'll pay to see in concert or buy t-shirt, posters, etc. Or I do it to get my money back. 350 dollars for front row seats to see KISS entitles me to download their albums forever. :grin: God I love bit-torrent.
I don't need to illegally download anything because I buy the CD's of bands I like anyways and go online to stream anything else I want to try. I'm more into Indie bands anyways so It's more encouraging to buy their albums. Technology allows you to get whatever song you want when you want it.
Services like Pandora or radio stations could serve to spread a band's music outside of word of mouth. Unless you only listen to top billboard songs, sales have no effect on gaining your attention.
The music and film industries have to find other ways to make money, unfortunately for them the goods they manufacture are very easily transferable, I don’t believe that’s the consumer’s problem.
