quote:

Originally posted by Elendil What about those who don't play live? Gee... ummm... there is more than one way to make revenue as a non touring artist? Merchandise. Sponsorship. Publishing royalties. You people don't seem to really know the record industry to begin with. Record sales have NOT BEEN A MAJOR SOURCE OF REVENUE FOR MOST ARTISTS FOR A DECADE. I'm not saying this as some outsider downloading cowboy. I'm saying this as a SIGNED, PUBLISHED artist who has both a Platinum and Gold record here in Canada. 1 dollar per CD (At the most) has never fattened artists wallets. Its ALWAYS been publishing royalties, tour revenue, and sponsorship. What I'm telling you is that ARTISTS need to re-examine the way they look at their revenue structure. Their music is ADVERTISING, drawing people to their BRAND IMAGE. Now, how many businesses would KILL to have people downloading their advertisements at the hundreds of thousands? Artists need to look at themselves as corporations, and lets face it - if you are looking for a living in the music industry, thats exactly what you are. Give away a CD for free, and people will divert funds towards more tangible goods - T-shirts, Posters, Online Journal Subscriptions. Not to mention, the more people who WANT TO HEAR YOUR MUSIC will request it on radio. Gee, Radio? Isn't that where ARTISTS HAVE ALWAYS AND WILL CONTINUE TO MAKE THE MAJORITY OF THEIR INCOME? Why, yes, it is! And what happens when tens of thousands of people are downloading your FREE CD? Other corporations will take note of your success in the industry, and want YOU TO USE THEIR PRODUCTS AS PROMOTION. Gee, amazing! Sponsorship revenue! Honestly, there is no problem here. The only problem is that idiot artists aren't seeing their chance to SUPERCEDE THEIR LABELS as efficient corporate entities capable of creating vastly more wealth than they could have previously. The old school, non-adaptive, traditional record industry junkies are just going to be left behind in a graveyard of "Where's my record sales!?" while those who had foresight will be cashing in.

end of story.

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Keep it real, and stay single, always mingle...

quote:

Originally posted by Elendil Djeso, the more people that download and listen, the more artists will be able to demand for their bookings. As an artist, I'd rather have 10,000 fans who illegally downloaded my album than 10 who didn't, and thats the bottom line. If I couldn't illegally download, then I would by next to no music at all, because of the expense - and NONE of these acts would see ANY of my dollars.

so you're saying that club owners figure out who to book by asking the public, I think how well a track sells is a better statistic for a club owner/promoter.

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Great Music Stations: 2HP.ca Radio & etn.fm

quote:

Originally posted by djeso That extra money goes to the club, has nothing to do with him, I'm sure sander is very pleased with you that you're are illegally downloading his music which took him nothing to create anyway, he just turned on the computer and clicked that create a track button on the keyboard. Point is you're not going to be supporting the scene all your life, if his tracks don't sell it won't make a difference because his bookings will decrease. If you download a track, buy it, otherwise you're stealing. With this ideology you might as well steal something like a car, you can tell the judge you were providing free promotion for a certain car maker, if people see you enjoy the car, that was easy to build anyway, people will want to buy it. Say what you like but there are no exception for stealing music.

Peter pretty much summed it up.

At the end of the day, it's still stealing. If you dont care because you'd rather get it for free, fine.

But at least fucking recognize thats it wrong and not right; that despite this you want to keep doing it anyways because it costs you nothing... and because you dont wanna pay for something (rightly or wrongly) if you can get it for free and not be caught or punished.

I'm not saying in this speech dont do it, but that dont be naive and try to tell yourself its "ok" and "right". Keep stealing music away, but at the very least acknowledge that what you're doing is a crime, as recognized by laws

Dont do it and somehow try to justify the act is a good thing; if you do it just know that its wrong (and keeping doing it anyways as you please)

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TECHNO IS THE BEST NOISE ON EARTH.
Save Techno - Stop Minimal / Tech-House

some of you get it, and some of you dont.

ill leave it at that

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quote:

Originally posted by jester Everything in this country is illegal.

"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery…" Winston Churchill

‎"If you have ten thousand regulations you destroy all respect for the law" - Winston Churchill

Okay so get this. Vivendi Universal now wants to strike a deal with Apple to get money for each and every single iPod sold. This is already happening with the Zune.

Reuters

quote:

Reuters said: NEW YORK (Reuters) - Universal Music Group Chief Executive Doug Morris said on Tuesday he may try to fashion an iPod royalty fee with Apple Computer Inc. in the next round of negotiations in early 2007. Universal, the world's largest music company, owned by French media giant Vivendi, was the first major record label to strike an agreement with Microsoft Corp. to receive a fee for every Zune digital media player sold. "It would be a nice idea. We have a negotiation coming up not too far. I don't see why we wouldn't do that... but maybe not in the same way," he told the Reuters Media Summit, when asked if Universal would negotiate a royalty fee for the iPod that would be similar to Microsoft's Zune. "The Zune (deal) was an amazingly interesting exercise, to end up with a piece of technology," he added.

This is the same person who said:
(Billboard (Nov 10))

quote:

Billboard posted: "These devices are just repositories for stolen music, and they all know it," UMG chairman/CEO Doug Morris says. "So it's time to get paid for it."

They also said:
(again, Reuters (Nov 9))

quote:

Reuters posted: "We felt that any business that's built on the bedrock of music we should share in," said Doug Morris, chief executive of Universal, owned by French media giant Vivendi.

So uh, is he saying that we can pirate whatever we want as long as they get paid royalties for each unit sold? Neat.

quote:

So uh, is he saying that we can pirate whatever we want as long as they get paid royalties for each unit sold? Neat.

at the end of the day, it's all about the benjamins...

people can get away with a murder if they have enough $$$ to pay for a good lawyer... so what's all this fuss about a few songs/albums, eh?

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Keep it real, and stay single, always mingle...

Guys, non commercial artists will retain fans because non conventional music attracts non conventional fans. These fans are WILLING to pay for music, in order to support them. However, YOU are naive to think that a small scale artist will earn enough to survive off of small scale record sales If you want to make music for the love of it, then do it - you won't make money. Making money, and making music are NOT MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE.

This is not about right and wrong guys - its about who is smart enough, quick enough, and persists long enough to survive the paradigm shift.

And where do promoters check for big acts? Increasingly, sources like myspace, viral marketing campaigns, etc. It isn't about sales guys - thats so freaking one dimensional its not even funny - and if you think of it that way, you clearly aren't, or haven't, been in the i ndustry for very long.

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If you enjoy music with depth - music that may spontaneously induce fantasies of distant realms, places, or states of being - you may enjoy the music on the following link. However, there is also a chance that you will be re-directed to a horrid vision that will claw away what remains of your dwindling childhood innocence. Are you willing to take that risk? I thought so... I thought so.

http://soundcloud.com/michaelandryan

quote:

Originally posted by Elendil Guys, non commercial artists will retain fans because non conventional music attracts non conventional fans. These fans are WILLING to pay for music, in order to support them. However, YOU are naive to think that a small scale artist will earn enough to survive off of small scale record sales If you want to make music for the love of it, then do it - you won't make money. Making money, and making music are NOT MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE. This is not about right and wrong guys - its about who is smart enough, quick enough, and persists long enough to survive the paradigm shift. And where do promoters check for big acts? Increasingly, sources like myspace, viral marketing campaigns, etc. It isn't about sales guys - thats so freaking one dimensional its not even funny - and if you think of it that way, you clearly aren't, or haven't, been in the i ndustry for very long.

I'm not disagreeing here, and (personally) I'm not aiming for riding on production and the like for the rest of my life; it's only a hobby which makes something on the side, and that's the way it suits me.

To argue, however, that your downloading music by illegal means is justified because the artist is responsible for his/her own promotion and income through various other forms is not valid. This is the statement I have a problem with. I don't care much for income (as it stands - I can't speak for the future) because as I said it's just a hobby - though money doesn't hurt and is a nice motivator. This obviously doesn't stand true for all artists but I'm only speaking for myself in this particular case.

I'm not telling you download or don't download; I've already mentioned I hate preaching this kind of stuff. But if you're looking to justify yourself by projecting the problem onto someone or something else, then clearly you're misleading yourself.

Dude, you aren't seeing the whole picture. This isnt about a PROBLEM. Downloading is a SOLUTION for the artist, you just have to flip the old ways around in your head. You are missing the point that this way is MORE profitable for your average artist. Its not me trying to aleviate myself of some responsibilty or guilt. Its the way people can CAPITALIZE on people like me.

___________________
If you enjoy music with depth - music that may spontaneously induce fantasies of distant realms, places, or states of being - you may enjoy the music on the following link. However, there is also a chance that you will be re-directed to a horrid vision that will claw away what remains of your dwindling childhood innocence. Are you willing to take that risk? I thought so... I thought so.

http://soundcloud.com/michaelandryan

quote:

Originally posted by Elendil Dude, you aren't seeing the whole picture. This isnt about a PROBLEM. Downloading is a SOLUTION for the artist, you just have to flip the old ways around in your head. You are missing the point that this way is MORE profitable for your average artist. Its not me trying to aleviate myself of some responsibilty or guilt. Its the way people can CAPITALIZE on people like me.

Your comment which said more or less 'I make up for not buying music because I go to Sander's gigs' is completely false is what you're not getting though - and that is an attempt at justification whether you want to call it that or not.

I know and understand what you're saying about artists needing to find other sources of income - my only problem was the way you phrased things to begin with because it looked like (and was) an attempt to justify your actions.

I think that until the people who download music see some repercussions of their actions first hand, they will continue to download.

For the time being there are still big djs coming to town, great music coming out and a lot of local talent blossoming so wheres the incentive to stop?

Lets face it, people are selfish and will do what suits them the most rather than pay heed to the plight of others so as long as they are getting both top notch entertainment as well as very good productions , the downloading is not going to stop.

Now if armin or tiesto stop coming to town suddenly and VH1 shows a video of them riding a bicycle wearing a raggy t shirt that says downloading killed my career , then maybe everyone will start having second thoughts.

No, you read that because thats what you wanted to think I was saying. I didn't justify my actions, I said the benefits of my actions, as opposed to the potential of me NOT downloading.

___________________
If you enjoy music with depth - music that may spontaneously induce fantasies of distant realms, places, or states of being - you may enjoy the music on the following link. However, there is also a chance that you will be re-directed to a horrid vision that will claw away what remains of your dwindling childhood innocence. Are you willing to take that risk? I thought so... I thought so.

http://soundcloud.com/michaelandryan