Posts by Simon Grigg
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I know you are, but you seem to be stuck to the concept that piracy is definitely doing dreadful damage to the music industry.
Ah, no..I'm on record here and at a multitude of places saying quite the opposite. It's you that's assuming that I'm saying that. If you go back here a year or so you'll find me saying that Soulseek is your friend amongst other things.
I've long advocated embracing piracy and tried to force a label to release a single via p2p almost two years back. None of what you are saying here is radical stuff Mark. It may be to majors' legal teams, but not to the people at the coal face. I find it funny when industry outsiders, like that Professor Fader, try to tell the industry things they've known for years as if it's some sort of revelation from above.
I agree that there is piracy, and I agree the music industry bodies (labels and advocates) are not seeing the same revenue they grew used to during the nineties. .
Yes, but you've still failed to back your argument that piracy is not having an effect. A few figures here and there and a few blog posts prove nothing. And the handbag is relevant if you are quoting the lost jobs research because that's pretty much what it relates to..handbags, golf clubs, watches, software and music and anything else.
It's wide ranging and I'm not sure it's correct and mostly it's not relevant to the recording industry because kids don't sit online scouring the web for handbags. You raised that data.
gosh, wasn't Napster around then
But not fast broadband which is the killer. Not sure why you quoted those figures, they're neither here nor there as the real downturn came from about 2005 onwards and correlated to the arrival of such.
I'm not disputing the downloading happens. I am suggesting that the negative impact on the industry is heavily overstated.
which, once again is what I've been saying for years, although I'm thinking that it may be you that's heavily understating it too, and it's an opinion you are free to express but you seem unable to back it.
Yes, kids have. But they may have heard a wider range from radio when there weren't so many niche stations.
Maybe from an NZ perspective but in the world's bigger markets it ain't true and hasn't been for decades. And I'm confused as your idea that new music ain't selling...that's exactly what IS selling, just not in the same numbers for a variety of reasons, piracy being one.
You don't seem to want to consider that piracy might not be the Big Bad the industry says it is. In fact, you say it must be a factor.
Yes, I think it's a factor in the downturn, and not an insignificant one, especially in absence of any evidence otherwise and tossing logic into the mix: kids listen to music pretty much as they always have; they have machines full of it; that music is free all over the place; a certain percentage is stolen. Do I think that is the only reason? No and nowhere close to it.
I don't agree, as I think the crap business model the industry is still labouring to preserve is more at fault (plus the economy).
Ah, yes..exactly as I've been saying for quite some years. Please don't put words into my mouth.
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As for FFD, I never said that there couldn't be breakthroughs, just that it's so much harder than it was because of the little musical ghettos.
although a quick check of the NZ album chart would indicate that it may be easier now than at any time in the past. There were 13 NZ acts in the top 40 albums a couple of weeks back including several that are platinum. This is not only a first but a radical first.
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Fair enough. I'd ask that you actually observe and analyse what the industry is saying, rather than accept and repeat it as "fact"
Considering I'm actually agreeing with parts of what you say that's an odd thing to say
Umm, firstly you can't prove a negative and secondly, this is merely industry cant. Not fact. If you can't prove your point, stop making it. I've provided material to back mine up.
No, all you've really proved is that the industry waffles, large parts of your evidence is either a) thoroughly dated and therefore of little use, or b) irelevant to the music industry. When I can download a handbag then we will talk.
Most of those links at your google link are little better...blog posts, dated data etc. I've provided personal experience as to why piracy hurts sales, and you haved really countered that beyond the Ï don't think so level. Maybe, to use a poliing term since it's that time of the cycle, my daughter and all her friends are outiers, but I don't think so. Can you tell me perhaps why they are the exception? Why that particular group of 40 or so kids are not average, because everything I'm seeing says they are. And if they are it's pretty clear that piracy is causing industry losses.
As for FFD, I never said that there couldn't be breakthroughs, just that it's so much harder than it was because of the little musical ghettos. This kid listens to hip hop exclusively, that one to death metal, where once they would have listened to a much wider range because the outlets (i.e. radio) would try to meet the whole market. Now they can find an Internet redio station that specialises in their particular taste. Why would they listen to anything else. Without the exposure, they're not going to buy.
And I'm saying that's nonsense. Kids have always niched themselves. Do you serioulsy think there was a huge crossover between say The Clash and Chic although both were huge at the same time. It's a myth Mark.
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A couple of things things worth pointing out, Mark
a) the radio split thing you mention with regard to The Beatles etc is overstated. Most of the biggest music sales in recorded history have come from the post FM era, when radio began to split into more formats, but by the early 70s there were, in the markets that dominate, a huge variety of formats. It was not as homogenised as you suggest. Top 40, Black, Album rock, AOR etc were all established, and the biggest sellers, apart from The Beatles latter albums all came from these years onwards, and even those got many of their sales from 1970 onwards when classic rock and gold formats continually pushed sales. One of the reasons NZ was diffrent was that we didn't have these formats until the mid 1980s, but we don't matter of course in the big picture.
b) you mention the baby boom, but how that drove sales in the golden years of the late 80s and 90s was via replacement on CD, as much as new records. The CD replacement thing was a massive sales success as boomers replaced Dark Side Of The Moon and thousands of other titles on CD. This had largely run its course by 2000 and is a factor in slowing sales. -
Mark,
Ok, I thought as soon as I posted it that I'd not looked for figures and I'm not going to argue that there is a vast amount of twaddle spoken by the recording industry assaulting piracy. I don't, without going through all those links, which I don't have time to do as I'm about to board a plane (sitiing in the world's worst airport..Jakarta BTW), either want or feel the need to to study all the data especially as I keep on saying that I too don't buy piracy as the only, or even core factor in the downturn.But I'm also aware as a parent that kids no longer buy 45s (or MP3s=2008 equivalent) but listen to as much music as I did when 13 and are as fanatical as I was about the acts. They are just as obsessed but without the need to pay. They tell me they borrow the songs and see nothing wrong with it. Maybe I'm alone in this experience? But I thnk not.
I'm sorry Mark, I know it's simply throwing a negative in here, without the precise evidence you require, but, since you can't provide the evidence that piracy is not hurting sales, from personal experience, I'm stating it as a fact that artists are losing money from piracy.
And for every Beatles or Abba (who were very much derided as the death of popular music at the time) I'll throw a Pat Boone or a Mitch Miller or a Frankie Avalon at you. The industry has always had product. Heard of The Monkees? Or all the Spector acts. Or 10cc?
SAW, lets agree to differ here, but they also produced some incredible pop amongst the crap.
I'm not trying to offend but you do sound like an old guy saying it ain't what it was. Witness Fat Freddies Drop..the biggest selling NZ act of all time in an era when you say it can't break through. Or dozens of hip hop acts selling 700,000 plus in a week. You might not like them but a lot of kids do and are as excited about their pop as you were about whoever (just a shame that it's all first week sales now). Generally, it;s regarded as an industry trusim that most people stop listening to new stuff in their late 20s. They end up playing their Talking Heads or Crowded House albums forever after that. You did well ;).
There is so much music out there, consumed in large quantities (those 20,000 tracks on iPods come from somewhere...not iTunes mostly, unless iTunes ain't paying on sales) -but not being bought in the same quantities- and as the live resurgence shows, kids are excited by music and want to hear it. And there are thousands of exciting, fascinating acts out there producing new music for both indie and major labels. I rather wish it wasn't so as it would be a lot cheaper. There is rarely a week that goes by when I don't buy one new album or a bunch of new singles (mostly digitally now) by new acts.
BTW, it isn't my industry anymore. I'm just an interested observer.
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so you're saying no to finding out what market value for master recordings is?
I kinda like the idea. country pays market rates for it to make it available to its citizens, just like it does for a piece of land it wants to make into a road or a park.No I was absractly trying to point out that the line that is applied to what is and isn't culture or of cultural value is vague. Which brings this back to the question as why some things qualify and some don't. I'd argue that my old 1964 Austin Mini 850 (oh how I loved that car..did you lnow you can fit a drum kit in one?), wherever it is now, is a cultural icon and all Austin Minis should be heading into the public domain some time soon. Just like your grandma's wedding ring.
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Mark, those Zeiman figures are from 2002 and with respect, in the music industry it is a lifetime ago, as is the 2003 50 Cent example pointed to in your Napster opinion piece ( and I agree with much of Fader's piece).
The fact is record sales are down enormously and a big part of that must be due to piracy (although I'm not aware of any bogus specific figures touted by the industry that attribute actual losses to piracy, the ones you have already quoted seem not to relate specificaly to that..can you give me some from an industry body?).
And I agree, there are other very major factors that I think the recording industry ignores.
However, as an aside I'm also very wary of atrributing one of those to be what I think of as an old fart factor...the music isn't as good as it used to be, they don't sign the acts anymore, that sort of thing..that's a nonesense but it's often repeated...record companies both big and small sign the same ratio of pulp and non-pulp that they always have, with a variety of provisos that should be added concerning changing artist developement and such which would take this conversation off into another direction.
The nature of the music business has changed, and the industry has not caught up.
I'm not arguing with that at all and I think S92a is another sign that the industry simply still doesn't get it.
Judith Tizard cites reduced demand for services at York Studio as evidence of piracy damaging the industry, but is it really? Is it not more that artistes have an increasing range of technology available to them in their homes and less cash to lay in front of a production team?
Of course, but certain sorts of records need to be made in a studio, otherwise they likely suffer badly (and the odd exception doesn't break that trusim). But there are probaly more NZ records being made now that ever before and that's a fact too.
The record industry has quite a history of crying poor and, to toss in one too many metaphors, has perhaps cried wolf too many times..hence my aside about home taping above. Is it hurting? Sure, quite a bit. Do we know how much is due to piracy? No. Does this justify draconian law? No, not in my opinion.
lets see what the rights to the screaming mee mee is worth.
Rob, I think your grandmother's wedding ring has cultural value and I think society should own it....sorry, your family has had it long enough and you'll have to hand it over.
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And, as I said to Simon above (but forgot to link to) the figures are not reliable.
That link is a little irrelevant though to this discussion at least. The story relates to piracy in general..be it software, watches, handbags or Nokia phones, all of which I can readily buy with 100 metres of the the room I'm in right now, or for that matter anywhere in Asia.
The downturn in music sales is easily accessed data. The jobs lost are a fact. I personally know quite a few. But exactly why is another thing. Does piracy play a big part...only a food would deny that but there is more to the picture.
Mark, I agree with you about S.92a...I think it's another Napsterism.
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I am talking about both. The figures from overseas come from god knows where and are not reputable. I have yet to see any artists post figures showing how much piracy has cost them.
We know how much the downturn has killed album sales. Regular year on year figures are published weekly. From that it's fairly straightforward to work out losses.
The question of course which is harder to answer, is how much is due to piracy, and that I don't know.
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I'm seeing figures posted by the 'industry' but I'm not seeing artists putting their hands up and saying "we're losing money to piracy' with evidence to back it up.
Mark, are you talking NZ or internationally? If the latter, the evidence is not hard to find, although I'd add the provisos that a) I think the losses are grossly overstated by the recording industry, partially because of b) the tumble in sales cannot soley be attributed to piracy or downloading, there being a number of factors not least of which is the way the recording industry has alienated the consumer on so many levels
If talking the former the losses are harder to quantify if only for the simple fact that most NZ music is fairly hard to find online to steal even if you wanted to. Sure there is some but you need to look and is countered a little by the ready availability of so much NZ music in places like Amplifier and iTunes. If you have a computer it's much easier now to buy much NZ music than it was historically to buy the physical form for many New Zealanders.