RIAA at it again

[SirFozzie]

(From The Register)

Remember how online music stores were going to route around the music industry? The pigopolists have barely got their feet under the table and already demanding more. The Wall Street Journal reports that the major five labels think that 99 cents per song is too cheap, and are discussing a price hike that would increase the tariff to $1.25 up to $2.99 per song.

Uh.. let me put it in words of one syllable.

FUCK YOU,RIAA.

[Draft Dodger]

someday we're going to find out which music-industry haters are secretly behind the RIAA - everything they do seems to be aimed at destroying the music industry completely.

[Tekneek]

The RIAA is so out of touch with the marketplace. If their prices were believed to be reasonable, people would not be pirating the product in such numbers. A lot of people thought 99 cents a song was reasonable...

[Desnudo]

If people can get something for free and not face major repercussions, they won't pay a dime for it.

[Easy Mac]

So $1.25-$2.99 isn't price gouging? Assuming the average CD has 12 songs, thats anywhere from $15-36 for a CD. That's insane, considering they don't have to do any print material or anything for it. If I actually thought any worthwhile songs had come out in the past year, I would have paid 99 cents for them. Thanks to the Pepsi-Itunes hookup, I got 20 songs for nothing (I drink Pepsi anyway), and the only thing I've actually bought from there was the REturn of the King soundtrack.

I haven't illegally downloaded music in over a year nor do I do it legally. Put out good shit and I'd pay for it, but not if you try to gouge prices.

[Desnudo]

Who said that it isn't price gouging? If the RIAA holds a monopoly on music distribution, then you can assume that they will price gouge.

[Gallifrey]

The major problem is generated by WEA, Universal, Sony, Warner Chappel Music and a few others. The RIAA bends to their whims.

[clintl]

The RIAA is an organization made of up record labels, right? So wouldn't any kind of attempt to set prices by the RIAA as an organization violate antitrust laws? I would think that the RIAA is setting itself up for a lawsuit against them.

[Tekneek]

Originally Posted by Gallifrey

The major problem is generated by WEA, Universal, Sony, Warner Chappel Music and a few others. The RIAA bends to their whims.

And these are very corporate structures that don't understand the market, or the technology. These policies are being set by stuffed suits who desperately want to hold onto their bloated 7 or 8+ digit salaries.

[Cringer]

i but from independent labels anyway, screw the majors labels and clear channel for trying to dictate what people hear.

[Draft Dodger]

Originally Posted by Tekneek

The RIAA is so out of touch with the marketplace. If their prices were believed to be reasonable, people would not be pirating the product in such numbers. A lot of people thought 99 cents a song was reasonable...

there's actually a pretty significant number of people (myself included) who think that 99 cents is still too much.

[Desnudo]

Originally Posted by clintl

The RIAA is an organization made of up record labels, right? So wouldn't any kind of attempt to set prices by the RIAA as an organization violate antitrust laws? I would think that the RIAA is setting itself up for a lawsuit against them.

If it can be proven that these music labels have a monopoly or pricing power over the marketplace, then they could be brought to trial for collusion.

[Tekneek]

Originally Posted by Draft Dodger

there's actually a pretty significant number of people (myself included) who think that 99 cents is still too much.

Yeah, but more people found that reasonable than the previous situation.

[Cringer]

Originally Posted by Draft Dodger

there's actually a pretty significant number of people (myself included) who think that 99 cents is still too much.

Since i can buy a new CD for $10 (from the indy labels i buy from), that has atleast 14 songs, that ends up being just over $0.70 a song. Subtract the fact that they don't have to ship the CD to me, don't have to put the music on a cd, put the cd in a jewel case, and put some lovely little insert into the case with lyrics or "thank yous" and crap like that, i would be fine with $.50 a song at the most. Until then they can lick my salty balls..........

[Draft Dodger]

Originally Posted by Cringer

Since i can buy a new CD for $10 (from the indy labels i buy from), that has atleast 14 songs, that ends up being just over $0.70 a song. Subtract the fact that they don't have to ship the CD to me, don't have to put the music on a cd, put the cd in a jewel case, and put some lovely little insert into the case with lyrics or "thank yous" and crap like that, i would be fine with $.50 a song at the most. Until then they can lick my salty balls..........

not to mention that the quality of most legit downloads are "good", but nowhere near the quality of CD audio. 99 cents just seems too much for an mp3/aaic encoded at a medium-quality bitrate. $2.99 just seems criminal.

[GrantDawg]

Originally Posted by Draft Dodger

not to mention that the quality of most legit downloads are "good", but nowhere near the quality of CD audio. 99 cents just seems too much for an mp3/aaic encoded at a medium-quality bitrate. $2.99 just seems criminal.

Here, here.

[Maple Leafs]

As much as I back the RIAA on the file-sharing issue and scoff at most of the "but it's just sharing" arguments... man, $2.99 would be ridiculous.

It almost makes you wonder if they just don't want the legitimate downloading operations to fail as quickly as possible so they can point, say "see, music fans will never pay when they can steal" and demand the courts shut everything down.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Tell ya what ... let's just bust up all the major labels. Shut 'em down entirely.
Make every artist an independent, restrict the number of artists a label can have or whatever method you want to use.

Let's see how much music worth is actually commercially available at that point.
And, more tellingly, let's see how much actually gets bought.

My point being, that minus the hype that labels produce through various methods, sales will dry up relative to their current levels. Generally speaking, hype moves product, not quality, that's pretty obvious considering the crap that seemingly everyone agrees consistently tops most sales charts.

Problem is, without the labels involvement in the hype machine, there's not enough working capital to generate the hype required for sales through the so-called independents. Catch-22.

[Tekneek]

If radio stations had to program music by what it sounds like, rather than the payola they receive, it might not be a bad thing. The vast majority of music I have bought was never played on commercial radio to begin with. Now I generally buy them from artists that run their own "music label."

[yabanci]

What a joke. Truthfully, piracy is the only thing that will keep music prices somewhat reasonable. The goal of the music industry is clear: make people believe that listening to music is an terrible, terrible crime (with big help from the media, which is owned by the same companies that own the music industry, and the government, which is bribed with campaign contributions) and then go for the throat with these outrageous prices once their monopoly is safe agian.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Tekneek

If radio stations had to program music by what it sounds like, rather than the payola they receive, it might not be a bad thing.

And if what they were playing didn't produce listeners, it wouldn't exist at all.

I spent 2-3 years as the music director for a "reporting station", which basically meant what I played (well, really what I reported as dropped/add/ heavy rotation/etc) helped determine what some of the charts were. No different really than the monitored airplay charts of today (assuming you accurately reported the drop/add info).

Unfortunately for my bank account, I had the misfortune of being in that position at the time when payola was pretty much a dead issue. It was replaced to a very minor degree by perks like open bar tabs (which I enjoyed), vacations (which I never took) & little goodies like framed pseudo-gold record plaques and such. But direct cash? It just didn't happen in the late 80's/early 90's.

But neither did stations who "program music by what it sounds like".
That hasn't existed in nigh on 40-50 years, if it ever did. If you were successful, you picked the majority of your music on the basis of "what will work with the listeners", not whether you thought it was worth a damn in any other way. (There were always exceptions, my biggest might have been a steadfast refusal to add a song that I truly thought was one of the biggest pieces of crap I ever heard more than a decade. Unfortunately for me, the piece of crap in question was "Who's Bed Have Your Boots Been Under", Shania Twain's first mega-hit & one of the hottest records a female artist had managed in country radio in several years at that time)

Today's "payola" is a little more sophisticated in some ways. And it might have become cheaper overall, with so much of airplay dictated by so relatively few "consultants". I put that word in quotations because I remembered an old radio joke "What's a consultant? An out-of-work program director"

And why are those consultants so influential? Largely because so many stations are owned by so relatively few companies. And what made that possible? Deregulation. But wait a minute ... I thought the FCC was evil, what enforcing all their regulations & all? Now I'm confused. And I digress.

For what "Payola" is or isn't, I'd recommend checking out this
http://www.openupandsay.com/opinion/...?date=20030107

I don't know the author, Bryan Farrish, from Adam's housecat. But his various articles about "how things work" relating to indies, radio, airplay, and several other topics are pretty spot-on IMO.

I'm also impressed by some of the hard truths he, apparently an indie record promoter himself, is willing to tell his potential clients (and everybody else). In a column called "Airplay 101:Payloa"

For a grassroots artist to think that payola or Clear Channel is holding them back, is like a sixteen–year–old hostess at a restaurant wanting to open her own 1,000–seat restaurant in Manhattan; and then, when she is turned down by the banks (or the banks' secretaries) for the ten–million dollar loan, she blames the problem on corporate corruption, thinking that you can only open a restaurant by paying people off. Forget the fact that she only has worked as a hostess (the only job she ever had) for three months. This could never be the problem. This situation might seem funny, but this is how experienced label (and all radio) people view indie artists who are complaining that payola is what is stopping them from getting exposure.
http://www.openupandsay.com/opinion/...?date=20021203

Damn, he just nailed that in one try. Especially how the complaints are viewed from inside radio. Remember, I've BTDT. And whether you're talking about rock, urban, country, Christian, whatever the format ... "radio people" are "radio people". Or at least the ones making decisions usually are. The techniques they use may vary (especially the specific numbers you plug in to various categories) but ultimately there's more similarities between formats, programming rules, music scheduling, etc. than there are differences.

You might not believe it from any of what I've said here, I was actually one of the most liberal MD's around when it came to adding indy artists, even moreso about giving a chance to artists on one-shot deals with majors & mid-majors. And I like to believe I hit more than I missed, but yeah, I've been "that one guy" who took an airplay chance on someone that wasn't getting even one spin anywhere else, and never did break through.

On a different, but related topic -- I'm probably about as big a critic of ownership deregulation as you'll find. Hell, it's one of the primary reasons I decided to leave radio. I figured out early in the curve where it was headed & knew I'd never survive, much less thrive, in that environment. But ... of the 1500 or so stations that Clear Channel owns right now, I'd say it's a safe bet that as many as 1/3rd of them would have simply ceased to exist between then & now if CC (or another mega-group) hadn't bought them. The profit margin is radio is getting smaller & smaller, and without consolidating overhead, about the only way smaller single-stations survive is by going with a lower-cost option like satellite programming ... and that doesn't provide much in the way of "variety" or "diversity" either. So, pick your poison -- too many stations owned by too few groups OR too few stations.

Anyhow, that's my stream of consciousness ramble for the afternoon.

[wig]

Tekneek just got pawned!

[Tekneek]

Come on. That analogy is crap. Not everybody on an "indie label" is like the hostess who has only been on the job for three months. Not every "indie label" only has new or unknown artists. It's a fact that a lot of good music could only be found on college stations for years. It's not because the artists were new, or the label was new, or that they did not sell a lot of records. It was because they did not have the corporate machine pimping them. So, while that statement may be accurate on some levels, it is extremely simplified to the point of not seeming relevant. I worked closely with a station manager for a college station for a year, and while some labels tried the payola game that only made it harder for the artist/album to get into regular rotation.

[mtolson]

Originally Posted by SirFozzie

(From The Register)

Remember how online music stores were going to route around the music industry? The pigopolists have barely got their feet under the table and already demanding more. The Wall Street Journal reports that the major five labels think that 99 cents per song is too cheap, and are discussing a price hike that would increase the tariff to $1.25 up to $2.99 per song.

Uh.. let me put it in words of one syllable.

FUCK YOU,RIAA.

Knew it wouldn't take long. I own about 700 cd's. I sometimes used KaZaa to download songs I liked until the full albums were released. Once released, I would purchase it. However, once they started selling songs for .99 I decided to just purchase the songs I liked. Now I spend about 4.00 per album as instead of the normal 12.99 of more. U have saved a bunch of money in the process by only purchasing from local stores when I feel the album has 5 or more songs that I like to have in the best quality possible. Now they see records sales dip and want to make up for the the lost sales.

YOU GET WHAT YOU ASK FOR.

[Gallifrey]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Tell ya what ... let's just bust up all the major labels. Shut 'em down entirely.
Make every artist an independent, restrict the number of artists a label can have or whatever method you want to use.

Let's see how much music worth is actually commercially available at that point.
And, more tellingly, let's see how much actually gets bought.

My point being, that minus the hype that labels produce through various methods, sales will dry up relative to their current levels. Generally speaking, hype moves product, not quality, that's pretty obvious considering the crap that seemingly everyone agrees consistently tops most sales charts.

Problem is, without the labels involvement in the hype machine, there's not enough working capital to generate the hype required for sales through the so-called independents. Catch-22.

I was signed to a major, and it wasn't the greatest period in my music career.
I am now signed to my 4th different indie, and I tell you, it is so different in so many ways.
First off, the artist can get a higher % of publishing rights and a higher points % for records produced. So the money in most ways is better.
But, as mentioned in the quote above, it is true that your machine backing you is only so strong, so your market is only so large. The worst disadvantage an indie label artist or band faces is with booking agencies. When on a major I knew we had a chance to get at least a few good support slots on larger tours. With an indie your most likely will never have a shot at such tours. The difference between playing to a half full 12,000 seat venue or a full 750 seat venue.
Good and bad in everything.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Gallifrey

But, as mentioned in the quote above, it is true that your machine backing you is only so strong, so your market is only so large.

Thanks for posting this, it's a very big part of what I was driving at with my stream of consciousness epic above.

One of the points the guy I quoted makes in another essay/column is that there is a definite pecking order amongst so-called "indy" labels. The difference between a mid-to-high level indepedent vs the bottom-tier is quite similar to the difference between "major labels" & upper-tier indies. Yet people outside the business have a tendency to oversimply & try to lump them all together -- reality is that you really can't do that accurately.

If all the major labels vanished tomorrow, it would be a matter of time before the mid/upper level indies became "majors" and lower level indies became the middle and a new crop of indie labels filled the bottom tier.
And we'd be right back where we started ... just like it's been for longer than many artists have been alive.

[SirFozzie]

The problem isn't that some record companies are big and some are small, it's that the five recording companies have formed an OPEC-like cartel, and using it to price gouge and to freezeout competition.

[Gallifrey]

Originally Posted by SirFozzie

The problem isn't that some record companies are big and some are small, it's that the five recording companies have formed an OPEC-like cartel, and using it to price gouge and to freezeout competition.

Interesting you use the word "cartel" when talking about the major labels.
It was the first big eye opening event for me all those years ago when I first found myself sitting in a board room in Rockefeller Center, when I realized that it was a small number of very powerfull people that ran it all. Did whatever they wanted to feed their ambitions. A book come to life. Made Scarface and Spinal Tap so much funnier, or not so funny, so real. I was confused.

The post above is accurate where if the majors went away today, indie's would create another situation much like we see today. Nature of the beast.