Artists Embracing, Rather Than Fighting, BitTorrent Seeing Amazing Results

from the good-for-them dept

Fri, Jan 17th 2014 6:40pm — Mike Masnick

From pretty much the beginning of this blog, we've been talking about how artists who embrace what new technologies allow seem to see much better results than trying to resist the future. Last year, we discussed examples of how both Moby and Tim Ferriss were embracing BitTorrent and its "bundles" offering to amazing results. BitTorrent has now published some data on the amazing ability of a variety of artists to use BitTorrent Bundles to drive tremendous attention and revenue their way.

Moby, for example, got an astounding 8.9 million downloads of his offering -- with 419,000 of them agreeing to join his mailing list and 130,000 of them going over to iTunes to the album (many of which likely resulted in sales). And, of course, the thing Moby himself said he was most excited about was the ability of fans to remix and reimagine his works. So it's another bit of good news to see that 68,000 remixes were created. As for Ferriss, his bundle of additional material that went with his book turned into an amazing promotion. His book was published by Amazon, but banned by Barnes and Noble (because, apparently, Barnes and Noble is petty). The material got 2 million downloads, leading an astounding 880,000 of those people to go check out the book on Amazon... where the book became a best seller.

The link above provides a number of other case studies about ways in which a variety of artists are learning to use BitTorrent and BitTorrent Bundles to help gain widespread attention, and then are able to turn that attention into fans and revenue. And this is a program that only recently started, so we're excited to see where it continues to go in the future.

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Filed Under: bittorrent bundles, moby, tim ferriss
Companies: bittorrent

10 Comments

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That Anonymous Coward (profile), 17 Jan 2014 @ 7:05pm

but but but it is only a tool of piracy!
But then those words are only spoken by the middlemen who didn't have all of the control they wanted and were unable to pad their cut by charging for "publicity & marketing".
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Just Sayin', 17 Jan 2014 @ 7:43pm

The numbers aren't very good...
8.9 million garnering 419,000 on the mailing list and a paltry 130,000 to the Itunes page (with an unreported number of sales, which could have been zero)... that is response rates that make direct mailing look effective. 5% taking any action (possibly hoping for more freebies) and only 1.5% even took a step towards a commercial aspect. That doesn't seem like a very good way to get things done.

The real question would be comparing it to other ways. Moby has in the past sold over 20 million albums, but most of that was far in the past. He most recent efforts have charted poorly, and his last gold certification for sales was 3 or 4 albums ago. The current one (from October 2013) was pretty much still-born, charting well in Belgium and pretty much not getting any traction anywhere else.

So perhaps giving it away is better for him, as he appears to have reached a point where few people are actually buying. Will internet distribution become the retirement home for wealthy musicians few are interested in anymore?
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Anonymous Coward, 18 Jan 2014 @ 5:31am

what is needed even more is a link that will glue label and studio heads mouths shut, their hands tied down by their sides and their eyes and ears wide open to see and hear that success is becoming more and more obvious and they are becoming more and more obsolete!!
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Anonymous Coward, 18 Jan 2014 @ 7:51am

(R)igorously (I)nept (A)t (A)dvancement ..
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Guardian, 18 Jan 2014 @ 9:33am

tell it to the retard gene simmons
tell it to the retard gene simmons
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Anonymous Coward, 19 Jan 2014 @ 6:23am

Re: tell it to the retard gene simmons
He's not a retard, he's a very angry clown.
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Christopher Best (profile), 19 Jan 2014 @ 5:09pm

Barnes and Noble didn't 'ban' the book
Amazon doesn't sell books published by B&N, either. Does that mean they're 'banning' B&N published books?
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Anonymous Coward, 21 Jan 2014 @ 6:08pm

horse with no name just hates it when due process is enforced.
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Zuriprox (profile), 23 Jan 2014 @ 5:59am

Muy interesante igual que los comentarios
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Rhonda Merrick (profile), 24 Jan 2014 @ 9:40pm

The numbers don't sound so great
Perhaps he found true fans in the people that signed up to this newsletter. These are the people that might come to a gig or buy something he releases in the future. But the numbers still don't sound brilliant. I don't think this will help emerging artists who need to earn money off their music just to keep going. With venues (especially festivals) refusing to pay so much as petrol costs and promoters pitching 'showcase' or 'the chance to be heard' instead of cash for your time, talent and effort, it's hard enough. But who knows? BitTorrent says they're working on it with the major labels and famous artists. So they'll probably come out with something even worse for independent music.
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