Goodbye to the music industry … maybe

I love Pandora. I have told so many of my family and friends about it. They are always amazed by it and many have become hooked. I have honestly purchased a lot of music that I discovered through that medium and know some others who have as well. This is really sad.

Yes! Somebody think of the children!

Actually, though advocates keep claiming this is all about small operations, Yahoo and other giants would benefit most from lower fees. They don’t need charity.

It will all go underground. Pirate Internet Radio stations will flourish. Music will be free.

*sigh*

i still think the folks at http://podbop.org/ created a great way to discover music. They won top prize at mashup camp last year. Their service mashes up concert info on eventful db and user contributed links to public mp3s to create a city-focused podcast you can subscribe to.

Podesta: I disagree. Yahoo is a business and will cut off divisions that are bleeding money unless they can see a business reason to do so. When it comes to music I can’t see it.

Aren’t kids going to find out about music through myspace? I mean, I know Facebook is the valley favorite, but myspace has an easy feature that allows users to click and have a song playing on their page. That song comes from the artist’s myspace page, so I’m thinking there’s no issue there. Artists are allowing that use on myspace.

Artists don’t set the fees. SoundExchange is. MySpace would have to pay the new fees too.

Preston is right…kids find out about new music more often than not via myspace, not internet radio stations.

there is one other thing that could happen out of this Robert and that is a big backlash against big media .. http://www.winextra.com/2007/07/12/watch-out-music-honcho-backlash-headed-your-way/

LayZ: the way I understand it anyone who plays music has to pay these fees. Or can you guarantee that MySpace doesn’t have to pay these new fees?

Very unfortunate. I never ever listened to the radio before. I wanted to be in complete control of what I wanted to hear. But when I discovered Pandora I instantly fell in love with it.

Needless to say, since I live in Sweden, a couple of months ago I wasn’t allowed to listen anymore.

I’ve been trying out LastFM but really haven’t found it’s charm. But maybe that’s because I don’t have a sponsor account yet?

However, very unfortunate. Although all the brilliant geeks will probably come up with some kind of solution or new system.

First, Robert, your observations are astute, as ever.

And, this is clearly the ‘wild west’ in terms of rights, enabling technologies and social norms in the Webasphere.

The innovation that leads to our ability to digitize music, share, and discover it only continues to get better. By creating technology that allows people (all of us) find, listen to, discover and share can’t be wrong.

The real question lies in how this is monetized.

The labels are on notice, and that’s not bad. Its what WE (the royal and collective WE) do with the window to transform the model is where it gets interesting.

In general, its true; the ‘kids’ find music wherever its easily and readily available to them. They are totally unconcerned with where, and how Web 2, or legal it is. This should be a good indicator.

I am one of those kids, yet, I am 37 years old, and hopeful that we will all stop polarizing ourselves and get real that it is all about exposure. This has always been true. Its simply that the vehicle by which we find the exposure has shifted.

-LaurieAnne

Having once upon an age worked at the counter of a record store, slinging CDs to people, I can’t say I’m overly surprised at the state of the music industry at this point — they didn’t get it back when MP3 wasn’t even a glimmer in the eyes of The Kids(tm) and they certainly don’t get it now. I’m still a package fetishist, which means no matter how digital the record labels go (and it’s certainly a good idea) I’ll always want the artifact in my hand. The problem is that the music industry has little interest in giving people what they want. How else can you explain the elimination of the single as a physical entity just as the industry was again pushing towards a singles-based mode of operation? (When your choice is a full album packed with filler for $12.99 vs a single for $10.99, you might choose to skip both and simply steal the single on P2P no matter how much you think the artist should get paid for their efforts.)

At any rate, this is just the latest example of the industry not getting it — rather than accepting that this maybe might just possibly be actual PROMOTION for their piddly little acts, they’re shutting it down. So when the big labels finally collapse under their own weight, I won’t actually feel bad about it.

Robert, I think they’re talking about bands that put their music up on MySpace. When you do that you’re giving MySpace not only the right to have the music up there, but it used to be that you were also giving them future rights to the music as well. I haven’t checked lately to see if that clause is still in the user agreement, but it used to be there.

Mr. Scoble, where are you getting this MySpace issue from? They’re not a radio station and these are very specific fees as they’re being presented everywhere I see.

We’d of heard from Murdoch and those MySpace founders by now as well as online tv folks and all sorts of people not labeled radio and not being heard from.

Evidence on this one is on you homie.

I got it from Tom at Pandora. When music is played in full on the Internet the Internet Radio rules apply.

If that doesn’t apply to MySpace I wanna hear why it doesn’t.

Adam Curry said a week or two ago that it definitely won’t apply to the podsafe music network (and other podsafe sources). The new fee can be waived by prior arrangement with the artist – i.e. the agreement the artist must accept before posting their music. Myspace can do the same thing (if they haven’t already).

I haven’t listened to the radio in nearly 3 years myself. I discover all of my new music from podcasts, there are occasional gems in the mainstream industry but for my money the best music is coming from independant artists via podcasts.

Yep, this is for internet streaming of artists registered with SoundExchange t all *IN THE USA* SO internet radio in the UK (for example) isn’t affected unless they have significant US presence – UK streaming licencning gives you a 2% leeway of foregin plays before you have to pay the foreign countries.

It also doesn; touch you if you have prior agreement with the artists, so Ioda Promonet, Podsafe Audio, Adam’s PMN, Magnatune, all of those sources and more are still cool with podcsting the music.

And given I play three shows every week of new music (http://rock.thepodcastnetwork.com/ for the blatant plug) I think that if people look for music (as opposed to look at the sky being pushed down by the ‘big evil labels in the US’) they’ll find a very healthy scene of playing,listening, discovery and recompense.

[The following got a bit disjointed but what's striking me is that if you're correct and MySpace didn't go to the hearings, that's big news and the tech press should be badgering them about it, IMHO.]

“I got it from Tom at Pandora. When music is played in full on the Internet the Internet Radio rules apply”

I don’t know about that but maybe you should ask Tom about MySpace. I’m looking at legal documents and current coverage and the issue seems to come down to how “webcaster” is defined. Ask Tom about that if it matters to you but the language and arguments you’re presenting do not appear to address the legal terminology.

The issue I’m finding at the moment is how “webcaster” is defined legally. I’ve been looking at the recent legislation and coverage and nobody defines webcaster or webcasting. At this point they’re all discussing the fact that “small webcaster” hasn’t been defined.

I’m not a legal researcher and my interactions with lawyers have convinced me not to define legal terms using my own logic. I assume the term webcaster was clarified at an earlier date but I haven’t found a legal definition yet.

I also did not encounter the phrase “Internet Radio rules” in my investigation of legal documents.

However, in various sources outside of the current discussion, I’m finding webcasting referring to both audio and video streaming and this discussion hasn’t been applied to video, from what I’ve encountered.

Why only radio stations, on or offline have been involved, has to do with something that you, me and Tom are missing.

If you’re right about MySpace. One of the big stories here is that they’ve been silent and that’s really stupid. I’d suggest you start investigating that angle since you seem fairly certain about the implications for MySpace and all sorts of other entities that did not weight in on this issue. Where were they and don’t they owe their shareholders some concern, if you’re correct?

I hope by later today someone who can direct us to the correct legal documents will emerge cause so far all I’m hearing in relationship to your concerns are interpretations from nonlegal sources as to who this actually affects.

I look forward to finding out what these guys are actually talking about.

“I also did not encounter the phrase “Internet Radio rules” in my investigation of legal documents.”

My bad, I was spacing out on that one but I can’t find the text of the Internet Radio Equality Act and, until we can find a legal definition of “internet radio”, I’m not sure we’ve moved forward.

Here’s how Sound Exchange defines “Commercial Webcaster/Broadcast Simulcasters”:

http://www.soundexchange.com/licensee/licensee_cws.html

“A “commercial webcaster/broadcast simulcaster” is a noninteractive, nonsubscription digital audio transmission service that provides audio programming consisting, in whole or in part, of performances of sound recordings, including retransmissions of broadcast transmissions. The primary purpose of the service must be to provide audio or other entertainment programming and not to sell, advertise, or promote particular products or services other than sound recordings, live concerts, or other music-related events. To be “noninteractive,” a service may not offer “on-demand” access to individual sound recordings or offer programs that are “specially created for the recipient.” Playing requests does not make a service interactive provided that the service does not substantially consist of sound recordings that are performed within one hour of the time they are requested or at a designated time.”

There isn’t another category that would fit MySpace [check the left hand column of the page linked above]. My best non-lawyer thinking says that MySpace would be considered interactive and also would not fit the “primary purpose” aspect though I can see how that the primary purpose aspect could be argued differently.

This seems a bit closer to resolving the MySpace discussion than anything else I’ve seen.

Sleep is now in order.

Peace

I think the music industry is pathologically not capable to find the ‘silver lining’ in the dramatic technological changes occurred in the last 10 years. They try to stick to old distribution models, built on controlled environment. I don’t think our society will sacrifice its speed in technological development in order to keep a single or two industries satisfied with their voracious appetite for profits.

I’m sure it isn’t that bad. How about listen to BBC Radio 2 in the UK? – http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio2. What a radio station that is!!

Where will kids find new music? Myspace. Thats where. Bands are interacting directly with and developing their fan bases on MySpace for a while. MySpace is uniquely positioned in this regard. If Facebook is the ultimate “social” social network, and YouTube is the video social network, MySpace is the Music social network. The bands are choosing to publish their own music there, which falls outside of other licensing and distribution agreements–especially for unsigned bands. The thing that really sucks is that MySpace is the most ill conceived and closed social network of all.

I think it’s a death knell for the megabands. The smaller artists (that I have worked with/promoted) seem to have their stuff together with regard to online presence.

I think pandora’s loss will be my biggest shock to the system. I have found dozens of new artists there