From Katheryn Glass.

After years of attempting to battle illegal downloading of musical tracks on the Internet, the recording industry has taken its case to Washington. The industry backed a bill, which was introduced in the US Senate this fall.  The bill would shut down sites facilitating illegal downloads, and this idea that fans should actually pay for music seems to be gaining traction, both legally and among consumers.

It won’t be easy: only one in five digital music tracks is downloaded legally.

Now, the combination of legal progress, coupled with a shift in listening patterns, appears to support a system where consumers would ultimately pay for the privilege of listening to music. It also begs the question: Is a truce in the battle between fans who support free content, and an industry that wants to monetize music, on the horizon?

Even if it is, the road to harmony will be a long one. The Senate went on recess before the industry’s bill could be voted on, thus prolonging the debate about whether or not legislating curbing file sharing will be able to stop the problem.

“It’s convenient, it’s right there and no one is watching. So what you’re saying is that if somebody is watching you, it will stop you?” said Michael Wood, a former recording artist who’s now a music professor at Algonquin College in Ottawa, Canada. “If they can’t illuminate something so vile as child pornography on the Internet, then where does file sharing fit in?”

Musicians’ core complaint is that the illegal distribution and download of musical tracks violates intellectual property rights.

“We’re a country where manufacturing has gone south, customer service industries have moved abroad, so what do we have left? We have intellectual property,” said Rich Bengloff, president of the American Association of Independent Music, a nonprofit trade organization for independent music labels. “Intellectual property needs to be protected because that’s all we have left to make a living in this country.”

Record labels argue that piracy diverts more money away from the label, which leaves less funding available for the label to spend on the development of new artists.

“You need the sales of your current artists to invest in new artists,” said Jonathan Lamy, senior vice president of communications for the Recording Industry Association of America, a trade organization representing artists.

Finally, there’s the question of whether file-sharing is actually a hindrance or a help to artists, since more downloads — legal or not — help to promote artists’ music further. For all of the difficulties the Internet has caused for the music industry’s traditional business model, many musicians have certainly benefited from the array of websites that help with promotion, merchandising and fan connections.

Nevertheless, momentum seems to be turning against the tide of “free,” Internet content, as musicians, as well as artists from other creative fields such as writers and video producers, seek methods to assist them in monetizing their creativity.

Many fans argue musicians and labels are still making money. Live performances, endorsement deals and merchandise sales are all valid sources of revenue, but the industry says that those revenue sources are not enough to make up for the loss of album sales.

Lamy concedes that legislation isn’t the only solution and that the music industry needs to be able to offer fans a “compelling legal experience” in which to consume music, but he thinks having the ability to shut down illegal sites would go a long way in restoring a stable revenue stream to the industry.

Pay to Play

In the attempt to devise a new strategy for monetizing the music itself, a plethora of new ideas have been bandied about. The Internet has clearly emerged as the designated location where music is, and will continue to be, consumed, and many tech companies have attempted to create a legal model for consumption. Apple, Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) both have pay-per-download systems, which have succeeded in getting some consumers to pay for their tracks, but have yet to eclipse peer-to-peer downloads.

Pandora, an online streaming radio site which has become immensely popular, hitting 65 million registered users earlier this month, has helped generate revenue for the industry. The site provides exposure for new artists and encourages listeners to pay for songs they like by linking to legal purchasing sites.

Spotify is another music service that looks promising. It exists now in Europe, allowing fans who subscribe to a free service (or low-cost premium option) that permits unlimited playback of favorite songs, stored in a “locker” in the cloud, and also promotes legal purchase and downloads. The company is working to bring the service to the United States, but it is not yet available. MSpot, a similar idea, facilitates web-streaming of Android users’ music once they upload it to the cloud.

Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) is unveiling its own music store, according to a Billboard magazine report last month. Google’s marketplace would offer pay-per-download as well as cloud storage, or a music locker that consumers pay $25 a year to use.

While the industry seems poised to see legal sales of music increase, some say its reluctance to adapt to a changing consumer landscape is still a hurdle, which may further delay the “truce” many fans and artists seek.

Wood, the Algonquin College professor, said when he and a business partner tried to set up a system in Canada that would make digital music available for legal pay-per-download, they ran into difficulties. He said the record companies wanted too much money for the sale of the track.

“They still wanted 73 cents a track and other royalties to be paid on top of that,” Wood said. “You’re trying to negotiate a deal with a bit of an archaic system that’s not willing to bend.”

LimeWire chief executive George Searle agrees that the music industry’s reluctance to change its business model has added difficulty as it tried to combat peer-to-peer sharing.

“If as a community we have achieved nothing else, we’ve come to recognize that containment is a red herring,” Searle said. “We’ve got to do more than stop people from sharing copyrighted files. We’ve got to provide advanced, legal alternatives.”

From Hypebot.  It’s no secret that the amount of money artists are earning from recorded music is declining.  But by how much? And as digital sales replace physical and streaming music gains traction do the numbers shift in the artist’s favor?  Infographic created by David McCandless of Information Is Beautiful from a spreadsheet of data.

Back in 2005, my former manager at Nettwerk, Tom Gates, gave me a copy of Kusek’s “Future of Music” book.

“Read it,” Gates said.  “It might be interesting to you.”

I read the whole book in a weekend and was inspired to write a song detailing the changes Kusek proposed, many of which have come true.  It seemed crazy then.  Five years later, there has been an ideological shift made very apparent by the new generation of artists and consumers; music isn’t really a physical product anymore, it’s a service that artists provide that they are then paid for (if the service they provide has cultural and/or emotional value).

The song I wrote was called “Download This Song“, and it charted in Australia where I did TRL on MTV.  The YouTube video received a half a million plays and the single was given press in the NME, the UK’s biggest music magazine.  Afterwards, a girl in Texas who was being sued by the RIAA heard the song and contacted me.  I forwarded it to Gates.  Gates sent it to Terry McBride.  Nettwerk paid for her legal fees because one of the songs in her collection was by an artist they managed.  Clearly the ideas in the book and my song had reached a large audience.

It’s honestly somewhat eerie how much of what Kusek predicted came true.  Gone is the ineffectual A&R I described in songs like “Signing Emo” who races to find “the next hit” to get their band on the radio through payola and a $200,000 video that only recoups 10% of the time.  WTF? Gone is the idea that record labels are necessary or even always helpful.  Gone too is MTV’s agency as a music network, platinum albums, and commercial music retailers like Tower Records and Circuit City.

It might seem very bleak to the common music fan, but from an artist’s perfective, things have never been better.  In the independent hip-hop community, thousands and thousands of regional pockets of talented artists working hard to perfect and distribute their material have all popped up across America and the world.  No longer do artists aim to get $1,000,000 advances, a ridiculous and usually unrecoupable amount, but find themselves as part of an emerging middle-class that Kusek predicted would come to be.

Rap crews like Twiztid and the Psychopathic collective have used their underground and independent acumen to build empires and continue to bring tens of thousands of kids to their annual midwest hip-hop festival.  Upstate New York’s Weerd Science have become a credible and influential voice in the hip-hop underground on the strength of their 2005 debut – an impressive feet for a group with no strong label backing or touring history.   Records and regional tours have directly translated to lucrative career music for some of these artists.

The Peter Principal states that in the workplace, “each employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence”.  Basically this means that you will keep getting promoted and promoted until you are unable to do the next job and that there is a subjectively manifested glass ceiling based on one’s ability to do their job.  This is reflected in the music scene because artists now get to become as famous as they care to be or deserve.  If the music is good, it sticks with people.

And this meritocracy is the future Kusek predicted – catalyzed, in part, by the broadband technological improvements made in the last few years.  HD YouTube videos are a click away, downloading speeds have increased and you can get any artist’s discography for free within a  few clicks.  I listen to most of my new albums on Rhapsody because it’s easier than keeping track of the stacks hard drives full of mp3s I’ve collected over the years.  There’s a Zen to music consumption now, one of the new simplicity of it all.

And for the record, I’m living proof that downloading doesn’t hurt artists.  Without the advent of torrents, kids can quickly get any of my albums for free at any time from basically anywhere.  And that’s awesome!  Kids have my albums, even the rare out-of-print ones, because they’ve found them for free online.  Some of them decide to help support me in other ways by buying t-shirts or getting the occasional track from iTunes, which adds up if the net is wide enough.  I then pay my bills with digital sales, college gigs, and international touring.

I can’t buy a mansion in Hollywood, but that was never the goal.  I get by comfortably and will keep making music until I die.  High five!  What more could I ask for?  The 14 year old version of myself would be very proud of how I turned out at 27.

“Music was a product, now it is a service”.

Check out a new favorite crew of mine from South Africa, Die Antwoord, luminaries in the Johannesburg “zef-rap” scene.  In a truly viral word-of-mouth fashion, another artist I’d worked with (Tina Root from Switchblade Symphony) sent me the YouTube link.

“You’ll like this,” she said. “It’s different.”  She was right.

I checked out their “Enter the Ninja” video – the raps were tight, the chorus was very catchy, the visuals were unique, and the editing was dope!  I then researched zef-rap and learned that it is an international postmodern culture that takes every regional hip-hop tradition I could imagine and amalgamates it into one thing.  It’s hip-hop of the future that I had found by the web from a colleague.

This is how it “zef” a uniquely postmodern hip-hop form: In one video, a rapper named Jack Parow “ghostrides” his car, dancing along side of it.  This is a hip-hop tradition that was popularized in the Bay Area in the last decade, a reflection of the car culture being so integral to “hyphy” rappers like E-40 and Mac Dre.  Zef-rap incorporates many regional hip-hop movements into one genre, which is why I’m so in love with it these days!  Would I have heard of this genre otherwise?  Probably not.  It’s all because of this viral video my friend sent.  Now I can’t stop talking about them.

When kids ask me how I got into music, I always tell them this; if you want to have a career in indie hip-hop or any other genre of music these days, you need to be dedicated, come original, and work on building your brand as something real and human that people can relate to.  Don’t expect to make money on albums, labels are essentially just banks that help promote artists as brands, with CDs being their main promotional tool.

Kusek gave me hope when I was starting out that the playing field would be leveled if you believe in your art.  The punk rock ethics that I grew up with as a teenager in the late 90s are very conducive to the new culture of music listening and consumption.

I’d also like to thank Dave for his support through the years and also for getting me into classes at the Berklee College of Music in 2007 – I’ve learned a lot from him and trust you all can too.

Much respect to anyone working to make a career in music.

Welcome to the future!

MC Lars

mclars.tv
mclars.com
comics.mclars.com

You can listen to the book on iTunes as a podcast for free. Go to the iTunes store and search “Future of Music” podcasts and subscribe.

You can buy the book on Amazon for $11.53 or less.

You can purchase the audiobook from Audible for $7.49.

Here are a few of the reviews.

Publishers Weekly
Two innovators in music technology take a fascinating look at the impact of the digital revolution on the music business and predict “a future in which music will be like water: ubiquitous and free-flowing.” Kusek and Leonhard foresee the disappearance of CDs and record stores as we know them in the next decade; consumers will have access to more products than ever, though, through a vast range of digital radio channels, person-to-person Internet file sharing and a host of subscription services. The authors are especially good at describing how the way current record companies operate – as both owners and distributors of music, with artists making less than executives – will also drastically change: individual CD sales, for example, will be replaced by “a very potent ‘liquid’ pricing system that incorporates subscriptions, bundles of various media types, multi-access deals, and added-value services.” While the authors often shift from analysts into cheerleaders for the über-wired future they predict – “Let’s replace inefficient content-protection schemes with effective means of sharing-control and superdistribution!” – their clearly written and groundbreaking book is the first major statement of what may be “the new digital reality” of the music business in the future.

5.0 out of 5 stars THE FUTURE OF MUSIC IS NOW
Gian Fiero (Hollywood, California)
This book is so brilliant that it makes the vast majority of music industry books that are being published seem irrelevant. It discusses in detail, the reasons why the future of the music industry is headed into the digital/mobile entertainment era. It also provides statistical information that professionals, marketers, entrepreneurs, and educators can use constructively. Both Dave and Gerd (the books co-author), have their fingers firmly planted on current music industry activities and trends. They also possess and display a clairvoyant eye toward the future that offers beneficial insight and foresight to those who may not be aware of what this whole digital (i.e. independent) revolution is about, and most importantly, what it will entail to prosper in it. The book is easy to read, easy to understand and simply brilliant. If you buy just one industry book this year, this should be THE one. Buy it now!

5.0 out of 5 stars Indispensible
Stephen Hill “Producer, Hearts of Space” (San Rafael, CA USA)
A stunningly candid source of concentrated, up to date insight about the music business and its turbulent transition into the digital era. This book tells it straight and will make the dinosaurs of the music industry very unhappy.

Like Martin Luther’s ’95 Theses’ nailed to the door of Wittenberg Cathedral, Kusek and Leonard drive nail after nail into the sclerotic heart of the old-fashioned music business. Their rational vision of the future of music rests on the idea of unshackling music from the hardcopy product business in a yet-to-be-realized era of open content licensing, facilitating sharing and communication among users, and growing the business to its full potential.

It provides as clear a vision of the future of the music industry as you will find, from two writers with a rare combination: a solid grounding in the traditional practices of the music business, an up-to-the-minute knowledge of the new technologies that are changing it, and the ability to think through the consequences.

I’ve dreamed about a book like this, but thought it would be impossible in today’s hyperdynamic environment where every week seems to bring a breakthrough technology, device, or service. But by digging out the underlying trends and principles Kusek and Leonard get under the news and illuminate it. Along the way they provide a brilliantly concise history of the evolution of digital media.

I can’t think of any book more important for artists to get the full re-orientation they need to survive and prosper in the digital era. It’s no less critical for members of the music and broadcasting industries who need to consolidate their thinking into a coherent roadmap for the future. In a word: indispensible.

• Music purchases (transactions) in 2008 reached 1.5 Billion, marking the fourth consecutive year music sales have exceeded 1 billion; 1.4 billion (2007) vs. 1.2 billion (2006) vs. 1 billion (2005).

• Overall Album sales (including Albums and Track Equivalent Album sales) declined 8.5% compared to 2007.

• Total Album sales declined 14% compared to 2007.

• Metallica’s “Death Magnetic” is the best selling Internet album for the year with 144,000 sales.

• During 2008, more Vinyl Albums were purchased (1.88 million) than any other year. The previous record was in 2000, with 1.5 million LP album sales.

• Digital Track sales break the 1 BILLION sales mark for the first time with more than 1,070,000 digital track sales. The previous record was 844 million digital track purchases during 2007; an increase of 27% over 2007.

• Digital Album sales reached an all-time high with more than 65 million sales in 2008; up from 50 million in 2007; an increase of 32% over the previous year.

• Digital album sales account for 15% of total album sales compared to 10% in 2007 and 5.5% in 2006.

• 2008 is the first time a digital song broke the 3 million sales mark in a single year. Leona Lewis’ “Bleeding Love” and Lil Wayne’s “Lollipop.

• In 2008, there are 19 different digital songs with sales that exceeded 2 million compared to 9 in 2007.

• 71 Digital Songs exceed the 1 million sales mark for the year compared to 41 digital songs in 2007, 22 in 2006, and only 2 digital songs in 2005.

• Rihanna is the biggest selling digital artist in 2008 with nearly 10 million track sales compared to Fergie in 2007 who had 7.5 million track sales.

• There are more than 450,000 different physical albums that sold at least one copy over the Internet during 2008 compared to 390,000 in 2007. More long tail support.

* 14-24 year olds love music – arguably more than any previous generation.

Well I am not quite sure about this one, but lets move on.

* But their consumption of music is changing significantly – the perceived value of sharing, recommendation and copying have all increased.

The world has changed for the digital kids.

* The upshot? Emotional importance does not correlate with spending – especially compared to other entertainment sectors.

* Around 90% of respondents now own an MP3 player. They contain an average of 1770 tracks – half of which have not been paid for.

IMPORTANT TO NOTE – the MP3 player is only about 8 years old.

* 58% have copied music from a friend’s hard drive to their own, and 95% copy music in some way.

* 63% download music using P2P file-sharing networks.

* 42% have allowed P2P users to upload music from their computer. Much of this behaviour is viewed as altruistic.

* 80% of current P2P users would be interested in a legal file-sharing
service – and they would pay for it too.

* The CD is not dead. Even if a legal file-sharing service existed, over 60% say they would continue to buy CDs.

* Money spent on live music exceeds that spent on recorded music

This is all very good news for the music industry.

British Rights Survey

There are an ever expanding number of these services that offer great music from both established and emerging artists. Free Geekery has compiled an interesting list of 100 of these sources for your music enjoyment. Happy listening.

This is a blast from the past (2006) written and performed by MC Lars and inspired by the “Future of Music” book. It is interesting that the point of view represented in the song seems almost like a mainstream idea at this point. Not to say that the financial side of things is working yet, but a lot has happened in the past two years. The future is becoming clearer.

Download this Song – MC Lars

It’s 2006, the consumer’s still pissed
Won’t take it anymore so I’m writing a list
Don’t try to resist this paradigm shift
The music revolution cannot be dismissed
$18.98 Iggy Pop CD?
What if I can get it from my sister for free?
It’s all about marketing Clive Davis, see?
If fans buy the shirt then they get the mp3
Music was a product now it is a service
Major record labels why are you trying to hurt us?
Epic’s up in my face like, “Don’t steal our songs Lars,”
While Sony sells the burners that are burning CD-R’s
So Warner, EMI, hear me clearly
Universal Music, update your circuitry
They sue little kids downloading hit songs
They think that makes sense
When they know that it’s wrong!
CHORUS
Hey Mr. Record Man
The joke’s on you
Running your label
Like it was 1992
Hey Mr. Record Man,
Your system can’t compete
It’s the New Artist Model
File transfer complete
Download this song!
Download this song!
Download this song!
I know I’m rhyming fast, but the message is clear
You don’t need a million dollars to launch a career
If your style is unique and you practice what you preach
Minor Threat and Jello both have things to teach!
I’ve got G5 production, concept videos
Touring with a laptop, rocking packed shows
The old-school major deal? It makes no sense
Indentured servitude, the costs are too immense!
Their finger’s in the dam but the crack keeps on growing
Can’t sell bottled water when it’s freely flowing
Record sales slipping, down 8 percent
Increased download sales, you can’t prevent
Satellite radio and video games
Changed the terrain, it will never be same
Did you know in ten years labels won’t exist?
Goodbye DVD’s, and compact disks!
REPEAT CHORUS
You know, we just wanted a level playing field.
You’ve overcharged us for music for years, and now we’re
Just trying to find a fair balance. I hate to say it, but…
Welcome to the future.
REPEAT CHORUS

Here is what I wrote in ’06.

Check out Lars site.