By Jake Corbin
Everything changed in June of 1999.
Shawn Fanning, then just a student at Northeastern University, didn’t see it coming. Neither did the record labels.
That summer was the year Fanning unleashed his online service, Napster—the first major peer-to-peer file-sharing site—upon the album-collecting masses, quickly becoming the music industry’s biggest nightmare.
Nearly 10 years have passed since the music-swapping site made its debut, but downloading music illegally hasn’t slowed down a bit. In fact, music piracy has become an everyday occurrence for many audiophiles.
As a result, the entire industry has been called into question.
“Are record labels going to be able to survive in the downloading age?”
“Is downloading hurting the bands?”
“Should the record industry continue to even put out physical products?”
The question that nobody seems to ask, however, is: Just why is everybody so into downloading music?
Corey Taylor, lead vocalist for the band Slipknot, had a rather candid answer to that very question in a recent Kerrang! magazine article. The front man placed the blame on the record industry itself, not the downloaders.
“Why would you blame [people who download music]?” said Taylor. “Half the f---ing albums that are out there are s--t. I don't download, but at the same time, I don't buy new music, 'cause it all sucks.”
“People want to blame the decline of album sales on downloading; I think it's actually the record companies' fault,” Taylor added. “I think it's the quality of the product.”
Ironically, many would argue that Slipknot is a perfect example of the “inferior product” Taylor mentions, but the overall point here is—there is a lot of garbage flooding the music market.
One look at the Billboard 200 seems to add more evidence to the pile. On Sept. 14, the top five artists listed were (in order) Young Geezy, New Kids on the Block, The Game, Kid Rock and the aforementioned Slipknot.
Really, New Kids on the Block? No. 2? Seriously? What year is this?
There is, however, more to downloading than just avoiding money wasted on musical rubbish; just ask Christian Smith.
Smith, age 27, is an advocate for downloading music, but his reasons for doing so go beyond the need to keep extra cash in his pockets.
“My purpose is to check out new music; see who’s out there,” said Smith. “I’m exposed to so many more bands than I was before. I remember in the ‘90s, you just heard about local bands or ones promoted by the big labels on radio stations.”
With the discovery of new bands (and the cash he didn’t spend buying their CDs), Smith buys concert tickets. Lots of them.
“One year I went to 100 concerts,” Smith said with a laugh. “There are only 365 days in a year; I think I do my part.”
At that rate, he is doing more than his share.
Besides a cut of the ticket sales, bands stand to make more money from concertgoers (like Mr. Smith) who buy merchandise at shows. For every t-shirt, album and sticker bought from the lonely merch guy at the back of the concert hall, that’s money going directly into the artists’ hands.
CD sales, on the other hand, account for a very small profit. For every CD sold in stores at $15.99, the artist receives only $0.16; more than half the money goes to marketing and overhead costs, according to a Wired Magazine article.
“If the band saw $10 of the $15, I might be more inclined to buy the CD,” said Smith. “But that’s not the way the big labels work.”
“And if I’m going to pay $50 for a concert,” he added. “I don’t see why I should have to pay for the CD, too.”
From a consumer’s point of view, it’s hard to argue with that logic. That must be why—even after the courts sank Napster’s ship long ago—the music pirate’s flag continues to fly high.
2 comments:
Excellent column.
The column begins with a nice tight lead and an explanation brief enough to get the reader interested.
Then the column brings us to the present and a reasonably thorough discussion of the issues.
The column also presents some new arguments for the downloading of music, most prominent that because most of the music is, well, sub-standard, people need to listen for free to be able to choose the good stuff.
Of course they don't pay for that good stuff, it's already downloaded.
The writer could have actually had some fun at the expense of the people who use that argument. It's like saying the food at McDonald's is mostly bad tasting, thus they should give it away for free.
Still, the column was very well done and very fast read.
I look forward to downloading a lot more of these in the coming weeks.
that last line is fantastic, but what about partying like it's 1999....?
good job jake, you communicated a lot in a short amount, always a difficult feat but you pulled it off.
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