I have none other than the friend that's up his neck into this business so you hear a lot of inside rumours

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Storyteller Website | Storyteller @ Facebook | Storyteller @ Beatport | Storyteller @ Soundcloud | Stephen J. Kroos - Europa (Storyteller Remix)
Anthony Mea - Get It On (Storyteller Remix)

quote:

If less is more think about how much more more would be. -Frasier

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Originally posted by Fledz I completely agree with you except you also missed another reason why a lot of music doesn't sell. It just simply isn't good enough.

Totally true, but strangely, there is a lot of very shit music on radio, and in #1 spots? How do you account for the lack of correlation between quality and success? I put it down to good marketing, luck, good social skills and a good career strategy - basically the same things you need in any business IMO.

I just find it amusing to see how often these debates about music sales come up around here without any real understanding of how most people - especially key markets like DJs - consume music.

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New Mix: March 2010 Promo
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you can't compare major labels with underground dance music. they're throwing millions of dollars behind their artists in promotion, are guaranteed top radio airplay, more outreach than anyone else, etc...

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Originally posted by derail How do you propose that illegal downloading be "negated", while still allowing people to connect with each other (such as via emails)? How would a new "hard medium" such as vinyl prevent people from recording it and turning it into digital versions?

That's the point. A hard medium might mitigate some of the loss, but it's indeed a quixotic undertaking to attempt to make pirating impossible. It was more of a hypothetical proposal which answers the question as to whether or not illegal downloads hurt artist's revenues.

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Now with extra singles!
my old stuff, not quite up to snuff - but I still dig it - UPDATED 9/23/2012

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Originally posted by EddieZilker That's the point. A hard medium might mitigate some of the loss, but it's indeed a quixotic undertaking to attempt to make pirating impossible. It was more of a hypothetical proposal which answers the question as to whether or not illegal downloads hurt artist's revenues.

But there actually is a way to virtually kill of piracy, at least for the masses and in that respect limit losses to a just few ardent and super technical consumers - follow what the satellite TV industry did:

Anyone who has done any FTA (free to air) "testing" for Nagra3 knows what I'm talking about

It requires a combination of a few different measures. The first being to implement a type of encryption on the media, especially one that requires a regular update to make it continue to work. The next thing you do is go after manufacturers of software and hardware that bypasses it. Even if you can't convict, you can tie them up in court so hard they go bust. Then combine that with a few very high profile and well publicised arrests for coding teams (killing a monkey to scare the chickens). Then finally, work with ISP's to send threat letters to those consumers suspected of using measures to bypass encyption (i.e via group keysharing etc) and to those forums which even so much as mention anything about circumventing the technology.

The end result is a massive drop in piracy at least for as the average consumer.

It has worked with satellite technology, to the point that the vast majority of people have given up trying to get get free TV.

I know music files are not the same thing, as they are single media files (not a stream) but all it would take is to get the industry aligned as such (and it's already happening with spotify et al), and frankly there's huge incentives to do so; it only costs a fraction of the potential lost revenue to implement this system and everyhting that goes with it.

@ RANN: That sounds like more layers of DRM, something which seems like more of a problem than a solution. It's just a shame, however, that it's coming to that, as there seems to be some (nominal?) sacrifice in quality as well as portability. But correct me if I'm wrong on my understanding of what you're proposing.

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Now with extra singles!
my old stuff, not quite up to snuff - but I still dig it - UPDATED 9/23/2012

to me the whole piracy thing is a dead issue. nothing can be done about it, so move on and find new ways to make money from music.

look at someone like Pretty Lights who gives away all of his music for free...he's one of the biggest electronic music acts in the USA.

a much bigger issue and one of my BIGGEST PET PEEVES is the whole performance rights royalties racket that has been going on for years. clubs are paying huge blanket licensing fees for the music in their clubs and all that money is going to Lady Gaga and Katy Perry (ASCAP and BMI pay all PRO royalities to only the top 10 or so grossing touring artist acts bc previously its been hard to account playlists) when the technology exists now to accurately ID and account for every track ever played in a club and pay out the artists whose tracks are being played systematically with no real extra costs. DJ Monitor (http://www.djmonitor.com) is one such technology (think Shazam on steroids with GPS capability) and also DJs can use Pioneer Rekordbox to keep playlist histories and submit them to publishers etc.

don't mean to change topics but to me this never really gets the attention it deserves and it could be the answer to a lot of the finance problems and bitching about piracy in the electronic dance music industry.

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It's times like this I'm glad that I realize my hobby needs not be stressful. I make a very good living doing what I do and knock on wood don't have to stress about where the next paycheck is coming from.

I feel bad for true talent like JOOF or even BT that gets overlooked in favor of Jesus van Boring. True that BT is craaaazy talented and can do soundtrack work -- plus he's hooked up in the industry. I am just surprised when he releases rock-type of pop crap or drops to lowest common denominator with stuff like Jericho.

BTW, about "image" - look at that crazy Gaga bitch. Gotta give her props - keeps her image in constant spotlight and in words of Boiler Room: ABC - ALWAYS BE CLOSING (sales).

She's a marketing genius, all else aside.

As far as Blewmen (sorry Robby) - I'm glad I'm not alone in pointing out how disposably cheesy his kiddie trance is. Him, Kandy, Arnej, few other purveyors of pungent gouda make me cringe every time I hear their shit.

Speaking of piracy - downloaded entire Coldharbour catalog few days ago - only ended up keeping less than 10 tracks out of 104+ releases. Those were bought in WAV through beatport.

Oh, and one last thing - WHAT THE FUCK IS WITH "RESTRICTED" ON BEATPORT? I want to LEGALLY obtain a track - but I can't. because BEATPORT DECIDED SO. You know what? Fuck that shit. If I can't buy it legally, I'll download it. Thanks for completely missing the fucking point, Shitport!

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Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate

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Originally posted by aNYthing Oh, and one last thing - WHAT THE FUCK IS WITH "RESTRICTED" ON BEATPORT? I want to LEGALLY obtain a track - but I can't. because BEATPORT DECIDED SO.

It's not Beatport who decided so, it's the labels.

Basically a label in France (for example) might decide they don't have the presence to promote a release in the US (for example) and so might decide to licence a track to a label based in the US who can promote and distribute it locally.

It then wouldn't be fair if a label in France still got all of the sales revenue, when the US-based label has done all the groundwork.

The problem comes when the label in the US decides to delay its release of the record to fit in with its other releases (not to compete with itself, etc), to fit in with their supply chain, etc, so the record comes out on different dates in different countries. And as a result if you're in the US, you see the record listed by the French label and you can't buy it.

If the labels could release the records at the same time in every country, it would be fine, but sometimes there can be months between. It's all down to bad planning if you ask me!

This system is a bit outdated tbh, as now so much promotion is done online - and anyone can do that anywhere.

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Stu Cox |

The Dutch ascap equivalent buma-stemra has been turned upside down a few days ago. Members have the right to vote for certain items. A lot of buma stemra members are angry about their lack of insight. It's a money black box. They get like 200 million from youtube and noone has ever seen a penny thus far. Not even dutch music videos receiving millions of views. There are established fees for airplay, never seen anything of it either. Never had royalties for digital downloads other than from dutch companies while it is said buma stemra works internationally.

Music industry is pretty much fucked on all levels heh.

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Storyteller Website | Storyteller @ Facebook | Storyteller @ Beatport | Storyteller @ Soundcloud | Stephen J. Kroos - Europa (Storyteller Remix)
Anthony Mea - Get It On (Storyteller Remix)

quote:

If less is more think about how much more more would be. -Frasier

quote:

Originally posted by Blake_Jarrell a much bigger issue and one of my BIGGEST PET PEEVES is the whole performance rights royalties racket that has been going on for years. clubs are paying huge blanket licensing fees for the music in their clubs and all that money is going to Lady Gaga and Katy Perry (ASCAP and BMI pay all PRO royalities to only the top 10 or so grossing touring artist acts bc previously its been hard to account playlists) when the technology exists now to accurately ID and account for every track ever played in a club and pay out the artists whose tracks are being played systematically with no real extra costs. DJ Monitor (http://www.djmonitor.com) is one such technology (think Shazam on steroids with GPS capability) and also DJs can use Pioneer Rekordbox to keep playlist histories and submit them to publishers etc. don't mean to change topics but to me this never really gets the attention it deserves and it could be the answer to a lot of the finance problems and bitching about piracy in the electronic dance music industry.

Couldn't agree more.

In the UK, if a DJ submits a tracklist to the venue they have to send it on to the PRS / PPL (our performance rights licensing groups). Do they fuck. A LOT of licensing money is paid to these companies and it all just gets split between the big labels.

Admittedly as Top 40-style clubs make up a decent chunk of the nightclub licence payers, that's not such a ridculous thing, but the amount paid out for underground nights which clearly never goes near the artists and labels behind the music is still significant.

Nightclubs in the UK pay £87 per 1000 people through the door, so a 1000-cap venue should generate royalties of ~ £1 for each record played in a night (minus a bit for the licensing companies to hang onto).

If you get radio plays it's worth registering with the relevant society though - all radio stations have to submit tracklists and those get used to dish out royalties. This includes Mixcloud...

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Stu Cox |

Last edited by Stu Cox on May-25-2011 at 06:58