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Category Archives: strategy
Music v. Tech – How to Stop Fighting Yesterday’s Wars
Google recently released some startlingly large numbers relating to the number of copyright infringement takedown requests it receives and continues to act upon. Almost at the same time (it can’t entirely be a coincidence) the UK book publishers’ trade association … Continue reading
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The Relative Incompetence of the Music Industry
Perhaps in the days of paper forms and typing pools it was excusable that the music industry shied away from line by line accounting in favour of statistical sampling and pro rata share outs of royalty pools. An additional copyright … Continue reading
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Some Numbers In The Digital Music Industry
There are now very few barriers to entry in the digital music industry, if you are lucky enough to be middle class in a developed economy. Production tools are essentially free if you have a computer; broadband connects you to … Continue reading
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Sony’s Gatfield Shows Mutual Misunderstanding Between Music & ISPs As Deep As Ever
Nick Gatfield, recently appointed CEO of Sony Music UK, took the opportunity of an interview with the Guardian newspaper to do a bit of grandstanding on behalf of the music industry. Broadband businesses he said “are being built on the … Continue reading
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Unreasonable and Discriminatory Licensing in Online Music
Some time ago I was asked to provide a note that could be circulated to European ISPs about some of the practices employed by music copyright owners which, in my view, represented obstacles to the growth and health of the … Continue reading
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We Need a Creators’ Revolution in Music
It is telling how difficult it has proved in the UK for artists and songwriters to find their own voice. The Featured Artists Coalition (artists signed to record labels) has started for sure, but unless I am mistaken its funding … Continue reading
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Lessons for Music from the Steam Age
If you go to London’s Science Museum and look at some of the early commercial steam engines you might notice a ‘pump counter’ which ticked up with every pump of the piston. Boulton and Watt’s original business model was to … Continue reading
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Pandora Tries to Flatten Earth – Cloud Dumps on PRS
A few years ago Pandora tried to launch in the UK, taking a PPL or nothing approach to licensing which unsurprisingly failed. I thought they missed a trick, and could have established a strong foothold with independent catalogues – which … Continue reading
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Music’s Lap Dancing Future
Music can learn a lot from other industries. So I was delighted to see a piece of research into the UK’s lap dancing boom reported in yesterday’s Financial Times newspaper (which I find shrugs off butter and jam far better … Continue reading
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Amazon, GaGa, & UITS
Amazon’s inability to ship Lady GaGa album downloads is getting a bit of attention currently. I doubt they under-estimated demand – if anyone knows about demand it’s Amazon. It was unlikely to be a basic scaling problem either. Just about … Continue reading
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