Musicians and the Digital Revolution

[Jacob]

Interesting blog post on the effect of the digital distribution revolution on the music industry and musicians: http://thetrichordist.wordpress.com/2012/04/15/meet-the-new-boss-worse-than-the-old-boss-full-post/

TLDR: musicians are getting screwed worse than they were by the record companies.

[Admiral Yi]

I'm stunned that the pirates are not swamping this thread with posts.

[Eddie Teach]

Apple is evil, news at 11.

Also, why bother with illegal downloading when you can legally listen to songs for free on youtube?

[dps]

Apple is evil, news at 11.

Also, why bother with illegal downloading when you can legally listen to songs for free on youtube?

I'm not sure that the ability to listen to songs on youtube has any bearing.  After all, you can legally listen to songs free on the radio, too.

[Eddie Teach]

I'm not sure that the ability to listen to songs on youtube has any bearing.  After all, you can legally listen to songs free on the radio, too.

Sure you can, but the process of calling and requesting the one you want to hear is time-consuming, you're not guaranteed to have them accept, and if they do you may have to wait an hour or more to hear it.

[Monoriu]

Also, why bother with illegal downloading when you can legally listen to songs for free on youtube?

Because -

1. I don't have access to youtube everywhere.  When I am driving or exercising, I can't type.

2. The quality of the Youtube songs is often not good enough.

3. The video may be gone any minute.  Especially for obscure stuff. 

[Eddie Teach]

The video disappears, then a new one takes its place.

Sure, the illegal downloads still have uses, but it's just not worth the loss of peace of mind IMO, since I can listen to any song I want whenever I've got internet access.

[DontSayBanana]

I'm not sure that the ability to listen to songs on youtube has any bearing.  After all, you can legally listen to songs free on the radio, too.

The difference there is that the radio station's paying each time the song is played on the radio.

Also, for every "legal" YouTube listen, there are HUNDREDS of illegal listens, where, if you're lucky, the poster will just leave something like "song is not mine, no infringement intended."  Even if they're properly citing the original artist, they're not paying to use it.

[Eddie Teach]

Also, for every "legal" YouTube listen, there are HUNDREDS of illegal listens, where, if you're lucky, the poster will just leave something like "song is not mine, no infringement intended."  Even if they're properly citing the original artist, they're not paying to use it.

But is it illegal to watch those or just to post them? Cause in the first case, I don't see how the site would have survived so long.

[Barrister]

Interesting link.  Thanks.

[DontSayBanana]

But is it illegal to watch those or just to post them? Cause in the first case, I don't see how the site would have survived so long.

YouTube's overly reliant on tech- most of the takedowns are automated, via a content-matching algorithm.  There have even been "false positive" takedowns where a band member personally posted content which tripped the algorithm.

YouTube's (so far successful) argument has been that the takedown implementation is sufficient, because with the volume of videos on the site, expecting human review of each uploaded video is unrealistic.

The views are as legit as listening to a burned CD or a recorded tape- I haven't heard of any large-scale action against them, but it's more of an "enforcement would be more effort than its worth and vilify us even further" deal than any legitimacy.

[Zanza]

Youtube could easily enforce the copyrights for all those songs. In fact, it does so for German users. Just about any non-live music video will only show a message about copyrights here.

[Josephus]

I'm an old fart. I still buy music.

[Razgovory]

I didn't think most Musicians made much money to begin with.  It's never been a profession that produced much in the way of steady income.  For every chart topper there are lots of guys who live hand to mouth playing in clubs or just busking on the street.  If someone expected the internet to change that, they are in for a shock.

[Warspite]

This is going to hit the publishing industry soon enough as e-reader ownership takes off. Why pay £5 for an e-book when you can download it for free?