So I promise this will be my last rant on American Idol...the show's gone today anyway. The last point I want to make is about the constant attack on internet downloading as the culprit in the collapse of the music industry. Yes, downloading has made a dent...but it's not the only factor. And not even the main one. The music industry will throw out ridiculous stats to confuse you...but they don't give you both sides of the story.
Their big stat is that 40 billion tracks are illegally downloaded every year. Where did they come up with this? Well, it's an estimate based on how many files are downloaded during a periodic sampling of multiple sites. Here's the problem with that...there's no way of telling if every track that's being traded is a copyrighted track. In fact, they have no idea what each track is. They don't have anyone looking at each traded track to decipher whether it's legit or not. Do you know how long it would take to inspect 40 billion tracks? So, in fact, they have no idea. It's probably close to accurate that 40 billion tracks are being downloaded. But whether they're legal...that's a whole other issue. They could be live bootlegs...Demos...Unsigned bands....or even songs that bands have given permission to freely trade. There's NO WAY to tell.
According to their own research, 28% of those interviewed buy less music or no music because of downloading. They combine the "less" and "zero" stats so there's no telling what the real stat is. That means 72% still buy the same amount of music...if not more. At worst, sales should only be down 28%...but they're down 50%. That's a huge difference. Something else is a factor. I know this is hard to believe...but I have no doubt that American Idol is the real culprit.
Why?
Back to my original point, our lives are too busy. We no longer have radio...we no longer have MTV. So, our only capacity to seek out new music has either been in the form of the internet (which only really affects younger people) or in the form of American Idol. When the only 25% of the contestants on American Idol get albums, you're ignoring a huge demogrpahic. Your niche demogrpahic. When you wait 8-months to release an album, you're also losing a giant chunk of the "impulse" buy from your audience. If everyone is investing their new music capacity into hearing new music in American Idol, they are not seeking out new music in other places. Therefore...sales suffer on both ends.
Thoughts?
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Our lives are definitely too busy. I download a lot of music - but only music I can't buy - bootlegs and the like. I also buy far more music than I've ever bought before. Statistically I have about 150 CDs that I haven't listened to yet, and about 30gb of music I haven't listened to on my hard drive. I literally don't have time to listen to everything, but I keep getting more.
ReplyDeleteGiven how much music I have already, it's a great challenge for any artist to get me to spare 3 minutes to listen to their song. I essentially already have to want to listen to them. And there is more music available now than there ever has been before, but you know, we only have so much time that we can devote to listening to music.
I don't know how much of the American Idol audience represents the entire record buying public - to be fair I don't think many of that show's audience are people that are passionate about music. If they were, they wouldn't be watching a competition to find something new and great, they'd do it themselves like people always did before the internet, and like many people are now using the internet to do.
I said before that I only download music I can't buy. I guess that's not strictly true - I do download new music for the purpose of being able to listen to it at my convenience (usually at work) to decide whether I like it, and whether I'm going to buy music by that artist, ot whether I'm going to go to their show. I do delete these tracks after I've listened to them, though. Honestly, I really do. I don't listen to the radio - music downloads replaces the radio for me. I don't have to listen to a dj or adverts and I don't have to wait for a track to come on. I can download it, and listen at my convenience. This is good for the music industry, because I'm deciding what artists I get to hear rather than having a programme controller - and the music industry itself - deciding for me. Perhaps that's what the music industry doesn't like; it's losing the power to tell the consumer what to buy, so instead of adapting it's complaining that we're all stealing music.
Sure, some people will always abuse such useful tools. They always have. We've all copied records onto tapes for friends, or burnt cds, and some people do seem to want to get everything for free because they can. Well, you know: music is art and it belongs to everyone, and it's the fat cats who have been making their millions from it all these years that are ruining it for all of us. As usual.
Dude, you totally forgot about "Stan". Possibly one of the greatest Rap songs ever should be on that list. Once again...great blog.
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OK, a few years late.
ReplyDeleteThat means 72% still buy the same amount of music...if not more. At worst, sales should only be down 28%...but they're down 50%. That's a huge difference. Something else is a factor.
Perhaps that those 28%, as a whole, purchased more than 28% of the music before they started downloading? Not all music purchaser purchase the same number of tracks/discs per annum.
Not only would this make the maths work, but it seems likely. One need look no further than commenter Neil -- or me -- as an illustration of the sort of person who would go to the trouble of learning how to download music, be it legally or illegally; that is, the large consumer of music.