The Insider: No Sell Out / No Sale – Why the audience are not blameless in the free content debate.
Amidst all the talk of a new way of selling music through brands and using advertising to make tracks free, seldom does anyone within the music industry actually ask themselves the question as to whether this is a good thing. Partly this is because the people in labels who have to make the books balance are so battered by trying to square figures that simply don’t add up and so beleaguered by the real and perceived pirating of their product that any golden goose, however unlikely its egg production, is better than none. That said, it seems that, half the time, you lot, the fans, also seem a little confused on how you want the future to be (or not to be).
See the reaction to the Pirate Bay trial. Without wishing to get involved in what, for me, was a head on collision between corporate vested interests and four people in love with their own self appointed image as renegades battling ‘the man’, the reaction of the public shows us just how far we have to go in terms of music being free or sponsored or ad supported. The same people defend the Pirate Bay’s right to host links and the whole concept of free content whilst complaining at the corporate sell out of artists who deliver music for ads or sign up to admittedly lucrative tour sponsorship or other advertising or sponsorship deals. The question that remains unanswered is just how do you expect these artists to survive if you take their art for free? Man and woman cannot live on goodwill and ‘cool’ alone. Crews don’t lug gear for the fun of it and producers don’t work for nothing.
Of course, it isn’t a particularly controversial opinion to see a dichotomy between the concept of rock ‘n’ roll as understood since its beginnings in the mid 50’s and the involvement of major corporations outside of the labels themselves selling product. If artist’s links to products become more overt then the concept of the musician as a force of rebellion, social change, outsider from the normal world becomes increasingly hard to maintain. This is a slippery slope that we are already well down but the growth of streaming services and talk of how to monetise such facilities as Spotify and Last.FM is driving this argument faster and faster towards some direct accommodation between artist and sponsor. The parallel growth of targeted advertising online conceivably means that more and more the free music listener on such services will be subjected to advertising based on evaluations of their tastes and desires. How that squares with genuinely counter cultural artists is a question that remains unanswered at this point. As for the idea of subscription services, the recent experience of Spotify and the low take up for their premium service would suggest that, given the choice between something for nothing with interruptions and something for something without them, the vast majority of us prefer the former.
In a sense, this is a retrograde step with the corporations taking the place of the wealthy patrons of the past who supported the likes of Shakespeare and Marlowe. However, the motivations behind the modern concept of sponsorship are very different in the main from those of the wealthy gentlemen of old. Whilst both are looking for some of the glitz, glamour and ‘edge’ of their chosen artist to rub off on them, in the case of our modern sponsor they are also looking for a market for their product, which, paradoxically, is more likely to knock the edge off the artist than deliver it to them. See Jack White and Coca Cola for a decent example of this. Whilst I can sympathise with those who have to take on sponsorship to make tours work and I have sympathy with the arguments of both gig and festival promoters that the bills they can provide would be impossible without the corporate money, we seem to be increasingly prepared to allow free rein to those carrying the loot bags to the detriment of the art we all claim to be our first concern. But, as I stated earlier, we don’t seem to be willing to go the other way and accept that this stuff costs money and fork out for it.
We destroy our argument if we argue for all content to be free but remain explicitly opposed to sponsorship or advertising attached to that content to pay for it. Lost in the clamour of blogs and tweets about the Pirate Bay trial painting the four as some kind of modern day Robin Hoods was any kind of understanding of what artists and labels need to survive. And, before someone comes back on this shouting about how we want to see the majors collapse, the labels means your favourite run-from-a-front-room indie, as much as nasty horrible old Universal. All the labels and all artists work on pretty much the same economics at a basic level, the scale differs but that’s it. Even for an artist recording at home there’s the question of their time being worth money and the costs of rehearsals for live shows, mixing, mastering, artwork and more besides. For most, signed or unsigned, there are studio costs as well. Making music isn’t a zero cost option and, if you want to make a living from it, then you have to find a way to make it pay. Contrary to what everyone thinks, the vast majority of artists do not make much if anything from touring until you get to the Brixton Academy venues and you can pretty much work out that’s hardly the majority. Even then, the margins are not as great as people seem to think and, if the artist decides to put on a decent show, those margins are squeezed even tighter. Talking to artists of all hues, you may be surprised how many are more than happy at the Pirate Bay result whatever is said (or not said) in public. Not just Metallica aren’t keen on being pirated.
The arguments over free content go further than just the labels and the artists. The continued decline of many music titles is not just a straightforward case of the web bludgeoning the magazines into submission but, again, the availability of free content and the unwillingness of music fans to part with cash for the magazines is undoubtedly a contributory factor. The interconnectedness of the industry is hitting titles like Q and NME from both sides. Labels cut back on advertising so they have to search out sponsorship deals and find new revenue streams from sponsored tours and commercial arrangements and then we all cry ‘sell out’ when that happens. There is certainly a debate to be had about many other contributory factors to the slide in print sales in the music sector (and the proliferation of free titles is an offline parallel in publishing to the travails of physical and paid for product versus illegal or free downloads in music sales) but the bottom line remains for me that too many of us are devaluing the music we claim to love if we will not hand over cash to listen to it or read about it. Here, there may be a glimmer of hope in slight increases in circulation for the likes of Uncut, Word and Mojo but the position of most paid for music print titles is relatively fragile.
Whatever the rights and wrongs of the pirating argument, the bottom line is that we cannot have it both ways. I hate the concept of my music being delivered with a side order of advertising, I would prefer my tours and festivals not to be sponsored, so I would much prefer to hand over my cash for the record or ticket, even to UniversalSonyEMI, than have it punctuated by sales pitches. You may be different but then accept that, if you want the music for nothing, you really can’t expect to it to be delivered through legal channels without a catch. Unless, of course, you live in some nirvana where artists live on fresh air and everyone just does it for the love of it (man). By all means carry on downloading illegally but don’t be surprised when your favourite artists start thinking more about how to get on ads and tailor their music to commercial opportunities and less on creating truly challenging and ground breaking work. The simple question is, what would you do in their position?
As a final thought, was it just irony that Pirate Bay verdict was followed on the Saturday by National Record Store day? On the one hand we are bemoaning the loss of our specialist music stores and the culture of music that is perceived to go hand in hand with them. On the other we won’t pay for the music that they sell to stay open. If we value music we need to decide where our priorities lie. Do we pay for it and get it clean or do we put up with it becoming part of a package where we tune out the inevitable advertising that allows us to carry on listening for nothing and that ultimately drives artist to think of their sponsors wishes as much or more than that of their fanbase?
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nice piece.
The last paragraph is perfect.
I've quit downloading now, it just makes me feel like a bastard. I know people who have a ridiculous amount of music on their laptops etc but how much of it do they actually listen to? There was a good interview on here with Geologist from Animal Collective and he made a great point that an album you don't like can be a lot easier to return to if you have a physical copy, otherwise you just forget about it as it becomes submerged into all the other mp3s on your pc.
People complain about the deluge of shite (Fratellis, Hoosiers etc etc) but if people didn't gorge themselves so much then this gash wouldn't get made.
Another good piece.
Good opinion piece
Pleasing Waynes World pic, too.
Great article
I don't think the great freeloading masses give a flying f**k about whether or not musicians/filmmakers etc. go to the wall, so long as they can get their beloved free content. It's been like that for a while, and the self righteousness of said freeloaders makes me sick... one must think it through... if you get all your music for free, then you are not paying the artists for it. Sooner or later, they will have to stop devoting all their time to playing music, because unless they're living off daddy's trust fund, they won't be able to afford it, and will have to get a day job, leaving them mostly exhausted and unable to tour, since you can't have unlimited time off from a day job. It's all very well saying that bands who have 'made it' are all stinking rich (usually FAR less than you think, btw), but the point is that once you make a political decision that you will get all your music for free, you're not going to means test the artists your download to see whether they can 'afford it'...you shaft everybody with equal vigour.
Much as I hate it, advertising and sponsorship are the only way ahead when it comes to online music, mainly because it's sufficiently ubiqitous that said freeloading masses are unlikely to be fussy about it. What that means for the musician, god only knows. Vive la western capitalism... all those chumps pirating music are no different from bankers trying to make money out of money. Something for nothing. Damn the lot of you!
Spot on
And it highlights a point I have noticed myself, that the people who download the most for free tend to also be the first people to moan when someone gets a sponsored tour or whatever.
It's a real shame that nowadays we have to put up with hair wax backdrops and mobile phone venues when we go to gigs.
The comment above has got it spot on too.
If people didn't keep downloading the truly tertible music just for the sake of it, because it's there, free, the sponsors wouldn't back them, they would stop making money for the label, would get dropped, drift into obscurity.
I've actually stopped downloading and have gona as far as to buy vinyl as much as I can. It's a shame it's come to the point where we have to even have a Record Store day, but it is necessary in this current situation.
Music is not just devalued financially, but through lack of tangible artwork and direct connection to the artist, it's devaluing the spirit too.
Buy music. It will give us all a better quality of life.
Interesting article
Though I wouldn't necessarily agree wholeheartedly. Well done on emphasising the necessity of the shift from direct payment for recordings to peripheral payment for association (advertising and syncing etc). Narrows down that moral high ground of the "sell out!" brigade (though it's not as if those who make that claim usually have any credibility given that it's not a dilemna they face themselves).
I remain bemused by some of the reactions to unreversible technological developments - there is no point smashing the machines, as digital media is here to stay. Whether the music industry is unrecognisably different in ten years or resemblant of its former self I don't know, but either way the essential nature will have changed.
The positive result of it from my perspective is greater access for all listeners to a barely comprehensible range of music, compared with previous decades, meaning culture in some form is accessible regardless of wealth or position. Higher value products remain saleable at a margin (gigs, deluxe editions, personalised content, advance content, merchandise, high quality audio etc) - is it these non-infinitely copyable elements that should be focussed on for revenue purposes. Those who adjust to the future rather than bemoaning it will likely manage better.
I'm not saying this is all positive, of course, and it may be harder for artists to survive on recording alone than it was in the past. Ultimately though, I think it's a victory for music as an artform - with a wider range of all music widely available, if it becomes more hobbyist so be it. Those with inspiration will always create it.
Brilliant article - I wholeheartedly agree.
Speaking as a musician it's quite depressing how I find myself under increasing pressure to look for revenue via places like adverts and sponsorship that I really don't want to be dealing with. So far I've turned down the offers we've got (though I did let a song be downloadable on a jeans (or was it shoe?) company-sponsored website. (I've utterly forgotten who the company was so the sponsorship's not worked on me at least!) but it is depressing that musicians are having to look at revenue from these kind of sources to survive.
Sadly I think the horse has bolted. People are too used to getting music for free and ultimately I don't think there's a way of reversing the trend. But it does raise very disturbing questions about where the money's gonna come from.
100%
spot on. well written article!
also to theguyiwth...
the horse has never bolted, things change all the time, 10 years ago the idea of getting the amount of music from the web as we do now was pure fancy...now, it will surely swing back the other way a tad i.e. the physical product is dead, long live the physical product...i see this as a a transitional period (oooogh) where the fulcrum realigns as the industry and people readjust to physical copies, streaming issues, free downloads etc...i see a place for them all, DEPENDING on what people want. some may want to never pay for anything again that's unavoidable, but there's many who will pay for downloads or a physical piece that has had effort put into it as a whole. I honestly think that this climate will force music products to improve to increase their 'value' rather than people just accepting any old shite, perhaps
Damn right
And I'd like to see an end to people having a go at musicians with money making these points, like they're a) not allowed to care about people other than themselves and b) ignoring the fact that these are the people, like it or not, who will at least get their thoughts printed in the "mainstream" media.
Please don't read my comment
I have nothing wise to add to this already very well written article, but I just wanted to say how interesting it was to read, and I think the debate is fascinating.
Please don't read this either
But I was making that same point about the same people who crow about 'Record Store Day' torrenting themselves stupid just t'other day. We're all such right-on self-justifactory narcissists. It's Midas Touch Syndrome. Getting what we want will destroy us.
Nor this.
But good work on pulling up that shot from Wayne's World.
this is like a sixth form summary for a debating society
It's based on a premise that is actually falacious. Only in a stupid 'indier than thou' mileueu does anyone truly slate music in advertising these days. The fundamental point that is always ignored by people promoting the anti-sharing argument is that it denies the artists money; this is nonsense - the reason record companies are spitting their dummy is because the whole business was intrinsically based on conning the public, and they liked it that way, thanks very much. The public were ushered towards hyped artists or stooge pop puppets by corporate-backed playlists and TV shows. It's ludicrous that the artists would commonly be paid 5p of every £15 spend on an album. What is mucic's worth, when itunes sells a digital copy for the same price as a cd or albums can cost £14 in HMV one week and then £5 the next? Remuneration paid to the artists based on number of plays (funded by advertising) is the only tenable way of developing the market again.
In my opinion, the rich exposure everyone has to music at a young age now will inevitably lead to invention and enthusiasm in future musicians.
Fallacy
Nobody has ever defended the hefty cut that record companies take from record sales, but 15% of the wholesale price (major deal) or a profit split (indie deal), is still money, and it still pays the rent. The enormous problem in having sponsorship and advertising as the only source of income for bands is that the corporate pressure to conform is WAY more intense than record companies ever are...why do you think commercial radio, funded by advertising, takes NO risks whatsoever, and solely plays songs by established artists.
Relying solely on advertising for musicians income would kill it as an artform very quickly indeed. Commerce has no time whatsoever for art, and has always stuck with common denominators, so while you might be thinking you're sticking it to 'the evil record companies', you're in fact taking a path that would condemn you to a lifelong playlist of reality TV winners. The business model that is definitely changing is not electronic downloads, but the internet's ability to put people together, and consequently put artists together with their audiences, without needing an expensive distribution network. Twenty years ago, selling cd's mail order would have been a one way ticket to a backwater, but now it's a very real and practical business model.
Musicians dream of 'making it' not because they want to be stinking rich, but because it is the only way they can do everyday shit like buying a house or having kids. Like playing sport, it is a career of limited duration, and the desperation to 'make it' is a desperation not to end your musical career in abject poverty (the most common way for it to end). Like I said previously...one must think it through... getting music for free means it has no value to you, it means that the hard work in writing songs, in learning to play an instrument...has no value to you, and if everyone did it, then there would be no professional musicians by default, only bedroom amateurs. You only have to take a trawl on myspace to realise how bad that would be for everyone.
This is a very concise piece on the situation
unfortunately it offers a poor solution: asking the p2p pirate to suddenly develop a conscience is farfetched at best. Also, the one part of the internet equation the op-ed piece fails to point out are all the indie bands who've made a career *because* their music was heard. I sincerely doubt Los Camps would be touring the world without myspace. So it's a double-edged sword.
IMO, the record companies will have to either come up with a way to end p2p file sharing (good luck) or lower the price of their product and make the packaging worth the buyer's money. Presently, I'm reluctant to take a flyer on an $18 cd when I can download it for free. For $6 it might be a different story.
Chances are neither of these things will happen in the foreseeable future. Bands will have to tour and the prices to see shows will rise. Instead of reading about our favorite musicians' mansions and private jets, we'll be reading about their day jobs--online and for free.
This is one particular view that I absolutely despite
"Getting music for free means it has no value to you..."
What absolute rubbish - is your sense of value really dictated by strategic price imperatives of commercial entities? Do you value an album more if you paid £10 than if you got it for sale for $6? What if you get given it as a gift for your birthday, do you not value it at all? I've heard people complain that they download too much and don't really process what they acquire like they used to with CDs, but that's totally a personal matter which has little bearing on discussion of the model. The music I listen to has vast cultural value to me, and it has absolutely nothing to do with how much I paid for it.
I'm not going to get in a slanging match over this
and it's terribly arch of you to say 'what if you get given something as a present' etc. The question boils down to whether you are prepared to pay money to own a copy of a piece of music or not. Simple as that. The person who will not sacrifice the price of two to three pints of beer to buy an album clearly does not value the album as much as the person who does. ("strategic price imperatives of commercial entities"...good lord, mate!... you looking for a job in the government press office??)
except
on a program like spotify, the advertising is separated from the artist. It is a service, so no direct connection occurs. It is user directed, so if some cunt wants to listen to Girls Aloud they can, but equally they could try niche artists. Of course the carrot of money might make someone write more commercial songs, but that occurs now anyway. I mean U2 write utter excecrable shite like 'beautiful day' knowing the kickback on advertsing from all kinds of sources will be huge.
Also - "noone has ever defended the hefty cut that record companies take from record sales" --- eh? Isn't that exactly what the record companies do? They like the rip-off culture they enforced, they don't want it challenged.
I think you have a hugely careerist impression of why people make music. Also, for a true artist, the longevity of career can be many decades.
Basically, what you're saying is shite.
Making it (success) doesn't necessarily mean making it (money)
I've met plenty of bands who have made it in terms of being names that you would easily recognise on DiS but whow also have 'jobs' that pay the rent. So musicians doing everyday shit is not necessarily acheived unless you are in the upper sphere anyway.
thank you
very well put. imagine here in Belarus the government restricted sponsorship to the very bottom. it basically means that only the government supported artists have a go to tour the country of 10 million population. the piracy is all over the place - and the joke is that it was never different since the "opening" to the western market and vinyl coming of age. artists making money playing private gigs and setting hard to pay for guarantees - live sector is hardly breathing...
Interesting article
Shame I missed it when it was first posted. This is view a have come to have a lot of sympathy for and a good summary of some of the reasons why I stopped downloading music illegally a few months ago.
I accept that I discovered a lot of music I now love and have bought after downloading it via p2p and I probably wouldn't have heard it otherwise, but what with spotify, last.fm and myspace etc I think it just laziness to think one has the right to do this.
I think attitude is the most important factor here, it certainly is to me. Assuming it is your right to have access to someone else's hard work without giving them any credit strikes me as sheer arrogance, being prepared to exchange money (however much it is) for a artistic product by definition surely means that you value it more than if you acquire it illicitly because you are not prepared to pay. I personally think that holding the attitude that music is free means that you treat what you do acquire with the same respect as anything else that you might get for free, i.e. very little, and that is certainly not a healthy state for a so called music fan to be in.
So I hate that I'm just reading this now because...
...not exactly the same, but a similar idea. Me, my friend, and a bunch of our mutual friends are filming a feature length film (Written and directed by my friend, edited by me with an original score composed by me (shit yeah)) over the summer, using us and our friends who are both amateur and semi-professional (ie live in LA but as of now do bit-parts) actors. We've been pinned to the wall in terms of we're not a big enough group (a bunch of guys who hang out in a basement and film on their own) to get any sort of theater play (except maybe a local theater), but yet internet distribution is a tough beast the conquer, if you will. On one hand, it is an easy, convenient, and affordable way to show our work to people throughout the world. On the other, there is no practical way to make a profit, or even even out the production costs, unless we choose to sell t-shirts, DVDs, or other such products, which will probably barely sell anyway, seeing as how people don't typically buy merch for a movie online no one has heard of. Goddammit the internet can be amazing and suck.
Radiohead? anyone?
Hi, I`ve just stumbled this article by accident, very interesting, I don’t believe that someone can reach a true settlement of these changes occurring nowadays, I think most comments are great in concern for the artist who really are giving in some cases and selling in others and also accepting the fact that many take it from them without paying…
Yet never anyone mentioned artist who really do it for the love of music, I wouldn’t doubt the Beatles, Bowie, The Beach Boys, and not just the great ones, but a whole lot of them, the ones that really changed the Music into what it is today, wrote songs and dirty motels, while struggling for rent, washing dishes, cleaning someone else`s house... etc. Music takes changes one at a time... ask Zappa, Lennon, etc PEOPLE FIGHT CHANGE at least the one who are comfortable with the system. The writer of the article should have his thoughts together, that if only artist can write good songs if they make money, Modest Mussorgsky, a Russian pianist and composer, who is now considered a pioneer in piano compositions died in absolute poverty, and yet his music is still played in concert halls, and as he and many artist have had a need to express Love, death, anger, anything as long as she or he needs to express it... what expression is there to find in a Britney Spears record? , in a N`sync record ?, and in the whole bag of limp headed “artists” who roam “MOST DOWNLOADED” in the Itunes Store? . Excuse me but many of them seem to be very eager for their cut as long as they put a mediocre song (a hit of merchandising effort for the Black Eyed Peas),
One guy in the responses made it very clear, there is no connection with the artist and the audience, There is no good sample in the music? Why can`t we listen to them first and see if it appeals to our taste, (I wished I could done that when I downloaded a “most downloaded” Record via I-Tunes last month and turn out to be same old, same old) wear the music, see if it fits, and buy If I like it.
I Think it very clear when the few bands that MATTER, like Radiohead, are fighting, in a way, a guerrilla war against mayor controllers of artistic manipulation, using as much as they can of the industry but relying on the fan base they have built, but never owing anything to a label, as soon as their contract with EMI ended they ditch them and release it via own web page and pay what you want, I paid 12 (pounds) and also bought the vinyl and two cd package.($98 us) I think they gave a very loud lesson to the labels, was on most blogs and magazines I knew at the time, yet no one mentioned it, less the writer of the article… hope the younger band who are fighting to be heard, listen to the changes… and hope when they have a chance to make it, don’t sell out, and give us a new Sgt. Pepper`s, and new London Calling, anyway the wind blows, music will be the one that ultimately wins… this is just a cleaning of bad blood… it has happened before… but now we have more publicity in the circus… Sure someone is going to sell out, I mean take a look, a really long look at the society in any big city? all this bombardment. this is just the symptom of a bigger affliction. and as any illness, it will have a cure.
Great Article.
This article is amazing. My opinion is: For artists, having their music downloaded illegally or obtained using sites such as Spotify predominantly causes problems, (lost sales and revenue, which leads to artists having trouble financially and if they’re on a label, the potential of being ‘dropped’). On the other hand, it also has the prospective to further an artist’s career, as it widens the audience potential for bands and artists to have their songs listened and judged by, this can then lead to legal purchasing from the same and new audiences and can lead to a higher volume for sales of live concert tickets, which is a large contributing factor to the artists wage.
I do believe people still value the music they download illegally or through sites such as Spotify, but they just do not understand the implications to artists, or comprehend the devotion and time that is poured into the music that they listen to. This devotion is probably best realised with independent labeled artists, as these are the artists it is easiest to feel closest to, yet these artists still cannot create the allure for more people to purchase their music legally even with self-designed single covers and album sleeves, and so inevitably if they want to make a comfortable living from their music career, they will need to become more commercially viable for major labels and private organisations that can help no-end with promotion through sponsorship and advertisement deals. For example The Noisettes and their second album taking a more commercially viable, pop oriented route, which appeals to the major companies and in turn appeals to the masses.
In conclusion, I believe downloading illegally overall to be wrong and harmful, but to have positives, such us in short it can boost the number of potential fans of a band, increasing the size of the venue the band can fill, which can increase a bands appeal to media outlets, and so in turn increase their willingness to write articles or cover them in the media that they produce. This can bulldoze the need for commercial interference, and so create its own appeal to the masses, which can help to further increase record sales.
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