Brian Eno Explains How The Recording Industry Is Like Whale Blubber

from the then-gas-came-along dept

Just before I sat down to write this post, I was having a very interesting (and fun) conversation with someone about the recording industry (someone very deep in the industry, who's been there for many years), who was arguing that selling recorded music needs to be a part of the business model. I was trying to suggest it was a bygone era, and that technology had made the idea that you need to sell music obsolete (though, if you can sell recorded music directly, more power to you -- I just don't think it becomes increasingly difficult). I made the point that technology always makes certain aspects of larger industries obsolete, pointing to the usual example of how automobiles made horse buggies obsolete, but certainly didn't harm the transportation industry. We started thinking up other examples, of industries massively changed by technology, that wiped out segments of that industry, and while I came up with a few, I was definitely searching for better examples.

Then I go back to my computer, and see an anonymous submission of a wonderfully brilliant interview with music legend Brian Eno... and right there at the end, he has a beautiful description of what's happening to the recording industry -- comparing it to whale blubber:
"I think records were just a little bubble through time and those who made a living from them for a while were lucky. There is no reason why anyone should have made so much money from selling records except that everything was right for this period of time. I always knew it would run out sooner or later. It couldn't last, and now it's running out. I don't particularly care that it is and like the way things are going. The record age was just a blip. It was a bit like if you had a source of whale blubber in the 1840s and it could be used as fuel. Before gas came along, if you traded in whale blubber, you were the richest man on Earth. Then gas came along and you'd be stuck with your whale blubber. Sorry mate -- history's moving along. Recorded music equals whale blubber. Eventually, something else will replace it."
I think we've got ourselves a new analogy worth remembering.

The rest of the interview is definitely worth reading. I won't spoil it, but I will say his thoughts on Bono are quite amusing. Separately, he had an interesting story about when he was producing both U2's last album and Coldplay's last album at the same time... and got scared that the same song would end up on both albums:
"It was fine. A few jokes. I felt like a ­philanderer who was with another woman and might make a slip and call her by the wrong name in bed. I had one computer that had all of the Coldplay stuff and all the U2 stuff. I had to very carefully label each folder because I was paranoid that I might end up with the same basic track for each group and I wouldn't notice until it was too late. There was a chance the same track might have appeared on both albums."
Given the somewhat ridiculous accusations last year about Coldplay copying music from The Cranky Boards, no, Joe Satriani no, Cat Stevens, this seemed like a fascinating admission -- but one that shows how different musicians might totally innocently end up with similar songs on their albums, not because of any vast copyright conspiracy, but through random other factors.
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Filed Under: brian eno, music, recordings, whale blubber


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  • identicon
    Chill, 26 Jan 2010 @ 9:25am

    (though, if you can sell recorded music directly, more power to you -- I just don't think it becomes increasingly difficult).

    I just think it becomes increasingly difficult

    fix'd that.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Dark Helmet (profile), 26 Jan 2010 @ 9:27am

    Bwah?

    "I just don't think it becomes increasingly difficult"

    Anti-Mike...is that you?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    ChurchHatesTucker (profile), 26 Jan 2010 @ 9:34am

    Peak Whale?

    So the record industry has passed Peak Whale? I like it.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    The Infamous Joe (profile), 26 Jan 2010 @ 9:42am

    Meh

    I dunno, whale blubber is good, but I still like comparing buying recorded music to buying ice.

    When the only way to get ice was to buy it, sure people paid a pretty penny for it; Now that anyone can make ice at home, the only people who buy it are people/companies in niche markets. Should be have legislated the refrigerator out of existence so a few large companies could keep their business model?

    But, hey, if whale blubber floats your boat... :)

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 26 Jan 2010 @ 12:32pm

      Re: Meh

      Seems like people are able to make whale blubber at home now if the people I see in the street are any indication.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      McBeese, 26 Jan 2010 @ 3:47pm

      Re: Meh

      Your ice analogy doesn't work. Here's why:

      The ability people now have to easily make ice at home does indeed eliminate a lot of the market for the large ice-makers and these ice-making companies may decide to stop producing ice. It's important to note that this won't affect people's ability to continue making ice at home.

      Music however is different because pirates don't make music at home from scratch in the way that people make ice from water, they clone existing creative content. If artists decide it's not worth it to publish their work, there is nothing for these pirates to clone at home.

      My instinct tells me that there is a bigger plus side than down side to freely available digital music, but we sure haven't found the recipe yet. Free music is ok for big bands who can shift their revenue focus to concerts and ancillary sales of t-shirts, brand licensing, etc. Free music also works for struggling new bands because it gets them heard when otherwise they likely wouldn't be. The problem area is in between these extremes - the bands who are just beginning to make it big and are in need of label-style promotion. If these bands don't have a good revenue model, the investment in promotion won't happen. My worst fear is that the labels will then 'manufacture' even more shit like The Jonas Brothers while the real artists flounder.

      The right answer is out there somewhere, but I haven't seen it yet.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Hulser (profile), 26 Jan 2010 @ 9:45am

    Trim the blubber

    What, no puns yet about trimming the fat from the music industry?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 26 Jan 2010 @ 9:50am

    THEM STEALERS ARE DESTROYING OUR FATTY TISSUE INDUSTRY!!!

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Hemmingway, 26 Jan 2010 @ 10:04am

    large fishes

    The transition from blubber to oil came with corporate control of government and the rulemakers. This explains why these correctly distilled insights, which make so much sense
    will not be considered in the decision making process.

    Common sense left with the whale.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Rabbit80, 26 Jan 2010 @ 10:08am

    Another example...

    How about valves being replaced by transistors - or the fountain pen being replaced by the biro.. there are hundreds of examples of technology moving on - and businesses having to move on with them or die!

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      SeanG (profile), 28 Jan 2010 @ 10:04pm

      Re: Another example...

      Or, rather than move on or die out, you find a smaller niche you can be successful in. Such is the case for valves which, even with advances in digital modeling, find happy homes in guitar amps and high end audiophile equipment.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    cryptozoologist, 26 Jan 2010 @ 10:19am

    i was considering the plight of the music industry a few weeks ago trying to think of a non-material good that was lucrative and was then disrupted out of existence. the best analogy i could come up with was indulgences sold by the catholic church prior to the protestant reformation.

    before martin luther nailed 'Ninety-Five Theses on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences' to the door of the church, and for a good time afterward, the catholic church would grant you an indulgence, an absolution of your sins, in exchange for money. business was good and this was a major profit center for the church.

    for the next 130 years protestants and catholics waged holy war on each other until the Peace of Westphalia ushered in the era of christain tolerance we enjoy today.

    fast forward to the beginning of the 21st century and the record industry is out prosecuting heretics who dare question the orthodoxy of 'big content'

    the good news is that nobody is being burned at the stake and that a resolution should take less than 130 years.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      senshikaze (profile), 26 Jan 2010 @ 11:35am

      Re:

      wow, the parallelisms are fairly close.
      Not a very optimistic outlook, but still a decent comparison.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      cc, 26 Jan 2010 @ 12:47pm

      Re:

      Before Gutenberg invented the printing press, only very few rich people had books, because books were very expensive as they had to be copied by hand.

      I don't see any monks transcribing books today, so I'd definitely say Gutenberg's printing press disrupted them out of existence.

      This is the most relevant example I can think of. The copying of information suddenly became much easier thanks to the introduction of new technology, and the old ways became useless overnight -- compare this to the introduction of the internet and the plight of the CD-copy-and-distribution industry. History is repeating itself.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        chris (profile), 26 Jan 2010 @ 1:40pm

        Re: Re:



        reminds me of coory doctorow's DRM talk to microsoft.

        This is the overweening characteristic of every single successful
        new medium: it is true to itself. The Luther Bible didn't
        succeed on the axes that made a hand-copied monk Bible valuable:
        they were ugly, they weren't in Church Latin, they weren't read
        aloud by someone who could interpret it for his lay audience,
        they didn't represent years of devoted-with-a-capital-D labor by
        someone who had given his life over to God. The thing that made
        the Luther Bible a success was its scalability: it was more
        popular because it was more proliferate: all success factors for
        a new medium pale beside its profligacy. The most successful
        organisms on earth are those that reproduce the most: bugs and
        bacteria, nematodes and virii. Reproduction is the best of all
        survival strategies.


        to me, this is the crux of the issue. Recording Industry Music (TM) just isn't made for digital distribution, and since the market has moved on to digital distribution, The Recording Industry Inc. should stop making Recording Industry Music(TM) and move on to something more organic.

        it costs too much to make mass market radio tunes and they don't hit people in a manner that gets them behind it. True Fans(TM) get behind music that speaks to them and that mass market stuff isn't going to cut it anymore.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    jjmsan (profile), 26 Jan 2010 @ 10:45am

    Buggy Whips

    I think it is important to point out that obsolete is not the same as ceasing to exist. As Mike points out it will still be possible to sell recorded music, it will just not be the large industry that it was. For that matter you can still buy buggies and buggy whips.
    http://www.horsecarriages.com/index.asp
    http://jedediahsbuggywhip.com/

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Vincent Clement, 26 Jan 2010 @ 1:33pm

      Re: Buggy Whips

      As Mike points out it will still be possible to sell recorded music, it will just not be the large industry that it was.

      If you are referring to record companies, yes, that part of the industry will shrink. However, there is more recorded music available today then ever before.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Richard (profile), 26 Jan 2010 @ 11:27am

    My favourite analogy for the record industry

    Is the overland spice traders - who had an elaborate system of tariffs and markups -each trader taking his own little (or maybe not so little) cut as the spices made their laborious way from the far East to Europe. Then along came Vasco de Gama who found a direct sea route and totally wiped out their trade. The price of spices plummeted.

    The nice thing here is that the basic product really was the same - it was the distribution method that had changed

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    lux (profile), 26 Jan 2010 @ 4:06pm

    This makes no sense to me, please explain.

    On Techdirt, music and the recording industry are always the target, which I am completely fine with, but it's being built into a straw man as of late - if we were talking about software, of which there are many software pirates, then how would all of this logic apply?

    Is it Microsoft's short-sightedness that allowed me to illegally download Windows 7 (don't worry I didn't)? Was it their fault for not offering me some type of easy, online access to buy and electronically transfer Windows 7 to my local drive to install later?

    We seem to be saying this about the recording industry, but I'm curious to see how Mike would apply this argument to software companies, who need to sell their software to make money, and are just not worried about some royalty clause that was inserted into the contact.

    I say this because I work for a software firm. We need to sell our product to make money, how does downloading an illegal copy of our software compare to downloading a free song, or a free album or 100 free albums?

    I can certainly tell you that most software companies are not in the business of offering a "taste" just so you can maybe purchase something later. (http://techdirt.com/articles/20100125/0825377891.shtml)

    Mike, thoughts?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Dementia (profile), 26 Jan 2010 @ 4:33pm

      Re: This makes no sense to me, please explain.

      Hmmm, have you heard of time limited demos and crippleware? They aren't the full version, unlimited version, but they certainly are a "taste" of the product. However, that said, I do see your point that most software companies aren't going to be selling t-shirts. There are other options, such as support contracts and such.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        lux (profile), 26 Jan 2010 @ 4:55pm

        Re: Re: This makes no sense to me, please explain.

        "They aren't the full version, unlimited version, but they certainly are a "taste" of the product."

        To clarify, I used "taste" in the context of the referenced article, which was to say (albeit theoretically) file sharing offers people a glimpse into what's out there, and once they find what they're looking for, they make a physical purchase.

        Musicians have plenty of songs, so one or two might be considered a drop in the bucket, and may even lead to full sales of the album. But some software companies only have one product offering (thank god not mine), and while you could claim it's their fault for not having a wider product line, most startups come into existence going all in on one thing.

        This only begs the question further IMHO.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Richard (profile), 27 Jan 2010 @ 12:18am

      Re: This makes no sense to me, please explain.

      Software is different for three reasons

      1) Most programmers write bespoke code (always have - always will). You are unusual if you write for a company that sells "off the shelf" software. So although there may be an issue for software companies - there isn't an issue for programmers like there is for musicians.

      2) The free software movement has reached critical mass already. Few people need to buy software now. There is no need (and in my opinion therefore no excuse for piracy except in a few specific circumstances). If your company is still able to make money selling software then it must be offering some good "reasons to buy" (eg support) already.

      3) Major companies like Microsoft already give their stuff away to large groups of users. I still use their (some of) their products - but only because to me they are free.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        lux (profile), 27 Jan 2010 @ 7:21am

        Re: Re: This makes no sense to me, please explain.

        People aren't interested in Support offerings of a software company. It might be a nice perk, but they expect the software to work...No one makes a purchase based on the fact they might have a good encounter once the software fails, they choose the least buggy software and forget about Support unless they absolutely need to.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          Jason, 27 Jan 2010 @ 8:44am

          Re: Re: Re: This makes no sense to me, please explain.

          Maybe home users, but in the corporate world, businesses certainly do pay (massively) for support contracts.

          link to this | view in chronology ]

        • icon
          PaulT (profile), 28 Jan 2010 @ 1:23am

          Re: Re: Re: This makes no sense to me, please explain.

          Please explain how your comment deals with the reality of open source products, where entire companies revolve around free of charge software. Red Hat, et al. make their money from these support contracts that you claim nobody buys.

          link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Jason, 27 Jan 2010 @ 8:38am

      Re: This makes no sense to me, please explain.

      75% of what we sell at my day job is free software (Linux-based). Sure our customers could get it for free, but instead they pay us to configure it, manage it, monitor it, update it, and secure it.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    The Anti-Mike (profile), 26 Jan 2010 @ 10:36pm

    Perhaps Mr Eno would like to also give us a lecture on how to be a commercial success in the 21st century.

    Wait, he's from the whale blubber generation. 'nuff said.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 26 Jan 2010 @ 11:05pm

      Re:

      Yes, he's from the whale blubber generation who, in the face of change, stopped using whale blubber and started using other fuel. Just like everyone else.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      PaulT (profile), 28 Jan 2010 @ 1:25am

      Re:

      So... you're saying that Brian Eno cannot give his opinion of how poorly the music industry is run because he made some money in the pre-internet days? How does that make sense?

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 28 Jan 2010 @ 9:36am

      Re:

      Oh, cool, so that means we can ban you from commenting once your generation has passed? Awesome. It already has? Even more awesome!

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    GGaler, 27 Jan 2010 @ 11:20am

    Better Analogy - Radio to Television

    I always thought the horse and car analogy does not quite work with what is happening in the content space.

    Maybe a better example is what happened to the radio industry when television came along. Radio is still around but has greatly morphed into niches and has had a long history of struggling. (I may suffer from nostalgia but the shift has not made radio better).

    The Internet made the entertainment space more crowed with other options for consumers. Instead of sitting around listing to the latest Pink Floyd album, we can surf the net (play hours upon hours of video games) or many other options.

    In terms of music – there are many factors that would cause sales to drop:

    * Other forms of entertainment (many free)
    * Ability to buy one song instead of a whole album
    * Less volatile music collection (I don’t need to keep replacing scratch CDs anymore)
    * Easy access to other music. It is now so easy to find older albums that new artist are really competing against a much bigger playing field.
    * Piracy – A greatly inflated problem but still a problem

    I think with a much more crowded entertainment space and people being suckers for free, other established content provides are going to see contracting markets.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    bob, 28 Jan 2010 @ 1:08pm

    I love

    Here Come The Warm Jets, Baby's on fire.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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