I would say this is a bad move that reduces competition, but the Big Four have been acting like a Big One for a while, conspiring together against us normal folk who like music.
EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.
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Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.
#72Wow. I knew the labels' economic relevance was declining, but I'm amazed that one of the four key "factories" in the commercial music industry just changed hands for $1.9 billion - less than half of Dropbox's recent valuation.
Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.
#73Wow. I knew the labels' economic relevance was declining, but I'm amazed that one of the four key "factories" in the commercial music industry just changed hands for $1.9 billion - less than half of Dropbox's recent valuation.
That's been mentioned a few times, someone even said four big tech companies (e,g. Apple Google Facebook and Microsoft) should just buy one each and cross-licence, the customers would love that.
Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.
#74Unregulated markets do lead to monopoly. Why? Because it is the very nature of competition. There will be a winner (or a few) and most will either be acquired or they will die out. With monopoly comes political power and this leads to crony capitalism. Then the monopoly can now dictate prices and influence both legislation and government regulation. The idea that companies will compete in perpetuity and benefit consu…
I'd argue otherwise, in any other case, but since a label's success solely depends on the success of its artists, which isn't always predictable, and considering the shrinking number of artists wishing to be signed onto a major label, there's a possibility of the music labels consolidating even more. Then again, by the time they do, they just might stop mattering altogether. I keep hoping for self-implosion, anyhow.
I think the innovations in social media and file sharing will help artists become more independent and distribute their work directly to consumers. The trick is finding a way to monetize this efficiently and minimize the risk of people just getting it for free. Maybe adding advertising per download would be a viable option, I think there are some start-ups that are already doing that.
Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.
#75Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.
#76Without the sales to support such a large "industry" of lawyers and business people, and without the need for many of their services (marketing and distribution, at least), are major labels not irrelevant? With dwindling sales they seem willing to further exploit their one resource, the artist. Artists on twitter are talking about getting monthly cheques for ~7 cents from Spotify. Guess who made that contract? I feel…
One of the conclusions one could draw from your comment is that the wrong kind of people (professionals) have been the ones involved in developing musicians' careers. ie, lawyers, corporate marketing-type people, etc. As a professional musician I think this is correct. The biggest challenge that I face is in my career (besides the creative challenges of creating compelling music) is this: there are very few smart, ta…
Hi Ivan, thanks for your response.
Incidentally I just ran into https://twitter.com/RentARep - while seemingly rap-oriented they seem to be entering the market that you are envisioning.
Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.
#772 billion doesn't sound like a lot of money to me. Apple could use, say, a third of its cash and own the entire music industry outright? not that the labels would ever sell, but still. amazing how tiny that industry is given how much noise it makes.
I am not sure what their incentives would be. Certain, they don't want the labels as businesses, which can only shrink.
Their back catalogues have value, but Apple could just license them ad hoc.
Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're assuming all the record labels do it distribution. But they also do management. Without a startup that tackles the management side of things (which is pretty complex relationship wise, this includes relationships with venues and between producers and bands, just so much) attacking distribution is only half of the issue
Labels provide one or more of the following to various degrees of capability: - Management - Tour support - Publicity (photos, PR, etc) - Radio promotion - Video promotion - Tour routing and agent of record - Marketing - Distribution and Sales - Websites, fanclubs and direct-to-fan - Merchandising (physical and e-commerce), including distribution/sales (Hot Topic, etc) - Art - Video production - Online marketing and…
What is the subset of these services that are (1) competitively defensible and (2) viable?
To be defensible, a major label should hold a significant competitive advantage in providing the service.
For instance, distribution and sales has been locked up by major labels for a long time because they have the infrastructure and relationships to strike deals with major retailers.
But direct-to-fan isn't defensible and websites aren't defensible.
To be viable, the service should matter 5-10 years from now.
For instance, video promotion is likely to be relevant for many years; it's expensive to produce an excellent music video and channels like Youtube mean they continue to matter.
Terrestrial and satellite radio promotion on the other hand is going to be irrelevant in 5 years.
Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.
#79Does this mean we finally get Pink Floyd and the Beatles on Spotify?
My understanding of the Beatles situation is that it isn't label-driven. I'd love someone to clarify that.
Soon after Apple (Computer) set up business, the Beatles' record label (Apple) asked Apple to change their business name. They didn't, so Apple (Computer) signed a contract with Apple to never enter the music industry.
They broke this twice. Once in the 80s when they released music hardware, and in the 2000's when they founded iTunes. The Beatles weren't pleased about this contract breaking, so they denied permission to distribute the Beatles on iTunes.
Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't want music to ever be free. I want my artists to be able to continue their craft and keep their concert costs relatively low. I want to pay them for their goods :) The people I listen to tend to be good enough for at least a dollar a song.
you don't need to pay a dollar a song. You could also go to their concerts, buy their gear, go to their appearances, etc. This is how music industry works in Korea, where most all music is given away for free
The problem with this is it assumes you can reasonably get to their concerts. One of my favorite artists is playing a gig on his home ground next Wednesday. It's 1,500 miles away from me. To the best of my knowledge, it's been years since he last played within a thousand miles of my house. I haven't seen him perform since 2006.
Also, I don't know about you, but the idea that you should support musicians by buying "gear" (I assume you mean stuff like t-shirts) just seems very, very mixed-up...