Get Ready For Classic Songs Of The 50s & 60s To Disappear From Internet Streaming Thanks To Copyright Lawsuits
from the bye-bye-1960s-classics dept
Say goodbye to the musical hits of the 50s and 60s, if you like that sort of thing and listen via online services. Chances are they may start to disappear, as the places where you now get your streaming music realize they need to protect themselves against a possible massive liability. As we've covered for some time, there have been a few lawsuits filed recently over the licensing status of pre-1972 sound recordings. There's a lot of history here, but a short explanation is that in 1909, when Congress redid copyright law, it didn't think that sound recordings (then a relatively new concept) were copyrightable subject matter. Of course, in the years following that, as the "music business" turned into the "recording industry" pressure mounted by that industry led to a bunch of state regulations and common law creating copyright or copyright-like rights for sound recordings.With the 1976 Copyright Act, rather than "federalizing" all sound recording copyrights, Congress basically left all pre-1972 recordings under those state laws, while effectively wiping out those laws for everything else. Since then, all copyright is under federal copyright law, but old sound recordings are still subject to those state laws. But those state laws were somewhat limited -- and at no point did anyone seriously believe that there was any sort of public performance licensing required for those recordings. Well, not until a few years ago, when some big record labels started searching under the couch cushions for other ways to squeeze money out of online services. They'd already convinced Congress to force internet streaming sites to pay compulsory performance royalties (at insanely high rates), even though radio doesn't have to pay those.
But that wasn't enough. So, they started to focus on those pre-1972 recordings and said that while those aren't subject to the compulsory rates, perhaps they could hold them hostage and force the streaming sites to pay insane amounts for them. The streaming sites, rightfully, pointed out that none of those state laws really had a public performance right as a part of it, and thus there was no licensing required to perform those works and... eventually the lawsuits began.
Late last year, there was a series of separate but similar rulings in courts in California and New York that more or less upturned decades of copyright consensus about what rights were afforded to pre-1972 recordings.
And now additional lawsuits are starting to show up -- and you can expect a lot more of them. A holding company called Zenbu Magazines has sued Apple's Beats Music along with Google, Songza, Slacker, Rdio, Sony and Grooveshark using the same basic template as those earlier lawsuits. Zenbu claims to hold the copyrights for recordings by the Flying Burrito Brothers, Hot Tuna and New Riders of the Purple Sage. And it wants to get paid. Big time.
In fact, Zenbu is looking to make this a class action lawsuit, meaning that the holders of lots of other copyrights on pre-1972 recordings may pile on as well -- and the potential liability facing all of these streaming services could quickly grow to astronomical numbers.
Given that, it seems quite likely that at least some, if not all, of these services are going to quickly realize that their best move is to simply remove all pre-1972 recordings from their catalog. History for music may end in 1972 thanks to these self-defeating lawsuits from copyright holders desperate to squeeze extra money out of these services. It's hard to see how that benefits culture in the slightest.
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Filed Under: classic rock, copyright, flying burrito brothers, hot tuna, music, new riders of the purple sage, oldies, pre-1972, pre-1972 sound recordings
Companies: apple, google, grooveshark, rdio, slacker, songza, sony, zenbu magazines
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Call the bluff
Let's see how they enjoy having their music simply cease to exist on such services, I'm sure they'll love that little change.
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Re: Call the bluff
They want their music heard, then they get to work for it.
I'm going to risk saying bs but most artists for the songs in question aren't probably alive anymore so it's a question of either their Estate destroying what they lived for or some copyright morons that bought the rights and are trying to squeeze money out of it now that they noticed the legal route is open. You see, if you bought it for pennies and couldn't care less about the music itself then it doesn't matter if the works go into oblivion as long as you make a good buck out of them.
And this, my friends, is the marvel of copyright. Fucking up culture and hurting creativity since it was enacted it seems.
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Re: Re: Call the bluff
That their actions are likely to result in less money in the future is an issue that they completely ignore, preferring to focus on the possibility of some money now.
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Also, if you don't think 'No listeners and no money' won't hurt them, you seem to underestimate their greed, money is pretty much all they care about, losing any will get their attention very quickly.
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Re: Re: Re: Call the bluff
The only way I see is to fight back, lobbing with EFF, etc.
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To save time
And, just in case you don't already know, take a wild guess as to who has been the staunchest opponents of harmonizing pre- and post- 1972 copyright law, such that it would all be covered under federal copyright law? Yeah, as if you even had to guess...
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Re: To save time
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I smell the distinct odor of collusion here.
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I smell the distinct odor of collusion here.
'Hey now, you know those of us in the radio business have always been good to you, providing a relatively cheap way to dictate what is and is not popular in exchange for some small sums changing hands. But lately, those internet streaming sites, they've been posing a threat to the both of us, threatening to take away our listeners, and your ability to dictate what gets played. As such, don't you think it would be a good idea to do something about them, hmmm?'
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The Internet is more of a distribution service, allowing listeners to listen to what they want to. It also enables independent musicians to reach an audience.
The Internet therefore threatens the labels monopoly on music distribution, and must be killed by ant means that are vaguely legal.
Also, vague laws are fodder for trolls who want to extract tolls from society.
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Utter nonsense completely detached from reality.
Bullshit. It's pretty trivial and has been since the 70s.
If anything, it's much easier to pirate off of radio than any of these streaming services. Radio is an unencrypted analog medium and most playback devices have had built in recorders for decades now.
Just hit the record button.
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Re: Utter nonsense completely detached from reality.
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Re: Utter nonsense completely detached from reality.
I think it's been many years since I saw a radio that had a record button. If I'm not mistaken, most of the devices people use to listen to music these days (phones, iPods and other MP3 players, and personal computers) don't have radio tuners in them. And most of the devices people use to listen to the radio (car stereo) don't have recorders. In the 80s and 90s it was easy when lots of radios also included a cassette recorder, but these days it's WAY easier to get music from a torrent site than to record it off the radio. And that doesn't even get into the editing issues AC raised.
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Re: Terrestrial radio
Legally speaking, they are. It's just that rights holders haven't gotten around to suing them yet.
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It is not about creation.
It is not about promoting art.
It is not about promoting science.
It is not about getting artists paid.
It is about taking things away.
It is about control.
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OK, I work for a vinyl collecting magazine for 5+ years now, so I constantly get introduced to obscure music, not counting the fact my father collects some obscure stuff, but I've never even heard of these bands
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http://hottuna.com/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIWdMlsTzp0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHtYgiRI44w
enjoy..
Nigel
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time marches on
It was, of course, Patti Smith. I couldn't believe that she'd become invisible to a serious fan of indie rock by the 1990s, but there it was.
The Flying Burrito Brothers, Hot Tuna and NRPS were all bands which serious rock fans would have been aware of in the 1970s. Hot Tuna had the highest visibility because of their connections to Jefferson Airplane, and New Riders of the Purple Sage had some association with the Grateful Dead.
But listening to 1970s rock bands now is like listening to Glenn Miller & the swing bands when I was in college.
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I strongly doubt that any of the numerous people who participated in any of these will ever see a cent from the record companies. (Especially since a number of them are dead.)
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Since it is pre 1972
Bye, Bye Miss American Pie
Shed a tear for culture.
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I fully confess that I've not looked at very many such services and even then it was a few years back, so thing s may be different than my perception. Nonetheless, I personally cannot see an advantage to streaming services that makes it worth investigating them. That's not a knock on streaming services at all -- it's just that they don't meet my personal desires. Others certainly differ.
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Same for me. Streaming hasn't caught my fancy either. Since I already have an extensive mp3 library, most of which was ripped from my wife and I's combined CD collections. When you add in the fact that I'm not very impressed with most of today's new music, then streaming just seems like another scam to pay for music I already own.
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I think the big ones all run in web browsers.
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Interesting, I've never heard a web browser described that way. Obviously there are a bunch of devices you can't play it on. A car, a refrigerator, a ten year old iPod, a dumbphone, a Commodore 64, the list goes on and on. I don't see how that makes a web browser "special client software". After all, there is literally nothing that will run on every kind of device ever invented.
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That's what I mean by "special client software". If that software is browser-based, then that just means the special software required is a combo of the browser + whatever javascript/plugin is required.
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If the standard id HTML5, then it's a web service. A web service means that you need to be using a web browser of some sort. That's "special software". Also, the mere fact of using a new standard for streaming means that existing devices won't work, so it doesn't satisfy the "use any device I want" part. Better to use the standard formats that we've been using for years.
"Is it the concept of DRM that puts you off"
DRM factors into it, but not in a philosophical sense. In this discussion, I object to it for the same reason that I object to requiring a web browser to stream: it means that I can't play the stream on any device I wish.
"just desire for the ability to use the service however you choose?"
It's this. A service that requires me to use prescribed software is a service that is less valuable. In the case of something like a music service, it's a lot less valuable.
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It is the DRM at issue. Being able to cache local content unencrypted, as most open standards tend to, is a big no-no for the industry. I seem to remember this being one of the things that got Pandora unjustly attacked (and ultimately walled off from most of the planet).
I agree that we should just be able to stream on whatever we choose, but that day is not here yet. At least DRM is only a practical issue here - I despise DRM on purchases but understand where it has its place in rental situations like this, even if practically we'd all be better off if they didn't waste the time and effort on something that doesn't even impede piracy.
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Meh - anything over 15 years is public domain anyway...
Control copyright by returning it to it's original timeline. If the governments won't do it, do it yourself.
If the entire population of the planet did this, what are the governments going to do?
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Re: Meh - anything over 15 years is public domain anyway...
Tax everybody 200% of their income to replace the lost income of the publishers, labels and studios. That way they reduce the people to servitude by creating a debt that they cannot pay.
/S
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Re: Re: Meh - anything over 15 years is public domain anyway...
The Governments would topple after every member was hung up by their balls until dead.
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Streaming services pay less then other forms of radio even with the performance royalty and the statement "They'd already convinced Congress to force internet streaming sites to pay compulsory performance royalties (at insanely high rates),"Just shows the author's inherent bias. Other countries pay performance royalties. Is there some reason the U.S. should not? These are the "insanely high" performance rates for the 3 different webcaster types:
Broadcasters Per Performance Royalties
2011 – $.0017 per performance
2012 – $.0020 per performance
2013 – $.0022 per performance
2014 – $.0023 per performance
2015 – $.0025 per performance
Statutory Webcasting Per Performance Royalty Rates
2011 – $.0019 per performance
2012 – $.0021 per performance
2013 – $.0021 per performance
2014 – $.0023 per performance
2015 – $.0023 per performance
Pureplay Webcasters Per Performance Royalty Rates
2011 – $.00102 per performance
2012 – $.00110 per performance
2013 – $.00120 per performance
2014 – $.00130 per performance
2015 – $.00140 per performance
http://www.broadcastlawblog.com/2011/03/articles/final-webcasting-royalty-rates-published -a-comparison-of-how-much-various-services-pay/
The amount streaming services pay is well documented as unsustainable and many artist will continue to pull their catalogs in Taylor Swift fashion if they don't increase. It is interesting to imply that content is asking too much without exploring whether streaming services are paying too little.
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Lies, damned lies, and total innumeracy.
So a SINGLE spin on KROC could be equal to that entire bad statistic you're throwing around up there. By your own calculus, a single spin on KROC should cost $1370? Does it?
A "spin" on Pandora is a single person hearing a single recording ONCE. What's the value of that? Pretty miniscule I would imagine
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Re: Lies, damned lies, and total innumeracy.
You're absolutely correct about this. However, the rates that LAB (and the Broadcast Law Blog) are quoting are all rates for Internet streams. They are paid to the artists and copyright holders, not songwriters; they are the royalties that terrestrial radio stations don't pay at all.
This makes LAB's argument even less persuasive, since the amount paid to these people by "other forms of radio" is zero.
Some other details that LAB (intentionally?) left out:
Emphasis in original.
Note the detail about the minimum 25% rate. This is about five times higher than terrestrial radio stations pay to songwriters.
Also make sure you read another article that LAB posted in another comment:
- Pandora Paid Over $1,300 for 1 Million Plays, Not $16.89
Make no mistake about it: digital streaming is far, far more of a "sustainable" business model (for musicians) than terrestrial radio ever was or will be.
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Re: Re: Lies, damned lies, and total innumeracy.
The rates are unsustainable in that many artist just won't license their music or license very few songs to a streaming service(i.e T, Swift).
The point has been made that a spin on terrestrial is more valuable than on internet. I agree. However, I would argue that in many instances, one spin reaches more than one person. To ignore many small businesses use streaming services, artificially devalues a spin on the internet because the number of listeners is inaccurate.
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Re: Re: Re: Lies, damned lies, and total innumeracy.
I can name at least 3 artists who have lost money from me due to this - many more if we include the artists I'd already bought music from before streaming existed (and thus am not in the market for, although I would stream if I could).
You need to consider all sides of the conversation.
"However, I would argue that in many instances, one spin reaches more than one person."
But, surely you're not saying they have the same reach as a standard radio station?
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Funny you should use her as an example. Those 'unsustainable numbers' don't really seem to match up, because while individually they might be minuscule, with a couple million people listening, they can get pretty freakin' huge.
'With Taylor Swift’s entire back catalogue now removed from Spotify, fans using the service can’t stream her tracks, including recent single ‘Shake It Off’.
Which, as it turns out, was the most-streamed song on Spotify globally in the three weeks before its removal. How do we know? We have the stats, harvested from the streaming service’s APIs by Music Ally’s Leonardo Toyama.
‘Shake It Off’ rose from the 35th most-streamed track in the week ending 21 September with just over 3.5m plays to third with 10.1m plays in the week ending 28 September; second with 11.3m plays in the week ending 5 October, then first in each of the next three weeks with respectively 11.9m, 11.6m and 11.4m plays, for a total of just under 59.9m Spotify streams.
Or – because we can never see a Spotify play-count without wanting to cross reference it against the company’s claimed average per-stream rate of $0.006 and $0.0084 – a total payout of between $360,000 and $500,000 to rightsholders (Swift’s label and publisher) for that one track. Or, in those last three weeks before its removal, around $84,000 a week.
Source:
http://musically.com/2014/11/05/shake-it-off-spotify-taylor-swift/
If $84,000 per week, for one song, is 'unsustainable', then someone at the label is really bad at managing money. Or, more likely, really bad at making sure much of that money actually made it to Taylor Swift herself, leading her to think that Spotify, rather than her label, was screwing her over.
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And this attitude is exactly the problem. For starters, of course artists want more money. Artists (and labels) will always want more money, and always argue for more and more. Just because they want more money doesn't mean they deserve it.
But the real problem is this assumption that streaming services are required to make up for album sales. They believe they must be equally compensated and must make the same amount of revenue. Why should they be equal when they are not equal things?
Consider that if someone buys the CD today, that's all the money the label gets. The customer presumably has the music for the rest of their life. But a streaming customer might still be listening and creating revenue 5, 10, or 15 years from now. Yeah, streaming's never going to match sales the first week of release, but after a couple of decades it will bring in a whole lot more.
And isn't that the whole point of these companies pushing for these ridiculous copyright terms - to monetize the same content for a century or more?
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The works that sell for 10 years or more are rare. The reason for long copyright terms is to maximize sales, and profits for this weeks, or years new works. Long copyright terms mainly keep works off of the market after the first few years.
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And this attitude is exactly the problem. For starters, of course artists want more money.
The argument of Swift and many others is that the service cannibalizes record sales. That is why they might want more. I suggest to any artist. Don't release a new record to a streaming site until it's sales run has completed. Why should Swift or any other artist wait 5,10,15 years for the monetization from streaming services when they can just hold it initially from the site, increasing demand for the purchase of the music?
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But demanding streaming sites simply pay more because of a drop in album sales is ridiculous.
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Though the market is not free, market forces DO exist, forget that at your peril.
The idea that content is property is the crux of your argument and on that rock it falls and breaks. Pretending that a non-scarcity is actually scarce and attempting to maintain control of it is where the problem lies.
You've been reading Techdirt long enough; why have you not realized that yet?
Artists need to stop trying to control their output and work with the market. Otherwise, they'll be desperately clawing for control for the rest of their lives, and wondering why the ****s won't do what they're told.
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The point? The reason I posted those numbers was the debunk the ridiculous idea that streaming is 'unsustainable'. She(or more accurately her label, as I imagine the cut she got from that was drastically lower) was making, on average, $84,000 per week, for a single song. If that kind of money is 'unsustainable', then like I said, someone is either terrible at managing money, or terrible at making sure the actual artist sees any of it.
So she pulled her music from the site entirely. This move aided in her in having the best first week sales figures for a record since 2002.
And while that may or may not have increased CD sales, those CD sales are a one time purchase. Once that money is in, that's it, the bulk of the money she will get from that album is in, with only a tiny trickle from new purchases likely to follow.
Streaming however, is long term. The payment at a given point may be low, but it's also repeatable, musicians signed up to streaming services, assuming they can keep their fans interested in their music, will be getting paid over, and over, and over again for the same music. The musician can essentially 'sell' a given song numerous times to the same person, it's not just a single purchase and nothing after that.
CD sales might be good for a quick buck, and showing a nice immediate profit, but for long term sales, streaming and similar services are where it's at, and where it will increasingly head. I hope she enjoys the money she got from the CD's, because by removing her entire catalog of music from Spotify, she'll be getting nothing more from them.
Another point. Assume you're right, that pulling her music was a large contributor to the boost in CD sales due to people who were listening to her music going out and buying CD's so they could continue to do so. By pulling her music, she's eliminated that first step for her following albums, taking away the ability to 'sample' her music, and thereby increase demand.
She's eliminated the publicity that Spotify was providing her, and paying her for. As the whole payola crap shows, those in the music industry know that that sort of publicity is quite valuable, and yet she has completely eliminated it for an entire service. You can bet that's going to have repercussions when it comes time to release her next album, as those that heard her music on Spotify, and decided to pick up a CD as a result of that, will now not be able to listen, and get excited for, her new music, decreasing the odds that they'll care enough about it to buy her next album.
If people aren't buying records (which many streaming services subscribers don't) then wouldn't an artist want the streaming service to pay more?
CD sale drops have less to do with streaming services, and more to do with people tired of being screwed out of their money by being forced to pay $15-20 for a CD, when they only want one or two songs off of it. Unbundling, selling songs on an individual basis is where the market is headed, those that cling to CD's are just stuck in the past, and their shrill cries about how it's 'unfair' that their little plastic discs aren't selling as well are nothing more than whining about how the market has moved past them.
As well, it's not the streaming service's problem to 'make up' for 'lost CD sales' that might be caused by their company and it's offering. People who listen to radio might pick up less CD's, should the radio stations be forced into paying out the difference as well?
Musicians and labels are not owed any set amount of money, they do not have the 'right' to always make today what they made yesterday. If the advent of streaming services decrease CD sales, and profits overall? While that may be unfortunate for those used to the profits CD's allowed them to make, they are not owed those same levels of profits, so tough luck for them.
Now, would they like to be able to demand more from Spotify and other streaming services? I have no doubt they would, but they are already taking a 70% cut from Spotify, how much more do you think they should get? And if they drove Spotify into the ground, which I have no doubt would happen if they got the cut that they felt they were 'owed', then they'd be getting nothing, and while I'm sure they imagine that without streaming services people would just go right back to buying CD's, that ship has sailed, and the sooner they get used to it the better off they'll be.
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I keep seeing this phrase tossed about and I would really like to know you mean by it. Unsustainable for what? Unsustainable to retire upon? Unsustainable to live until a new song is written? Unsustainable for your grandchildren to live on?
By your metrics a CD sale is also "unstaianable" too. Quick back-of-the-napkin math says this:
Price of CD = $15.00
Price per song = $1.25
Lifespan of CD = 10 years
Estimated plays a year = 25
$1.25 divided by 250 = 0.005 per play
Then consider that a CD is a one time purchase for most. Streaming is now until forever. Then toss in the fact that a purchase from I-Tunes is also an one time purchase for a file that will never degrade like a CD.
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The only improvement I've seen over CDs is 5.1 surround on DVD. mp3s are an improvement on portability, but since they can be easily made from CDs, it's easy to have both.
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The unsustainable royalty rates for streaming comes when an artist realizes,(like Taylor Swift) " wait with the royalty rates streaming services are paying, they are essentially giving my music away for free and destroying my album sales which, in this day and age is hard enough as it is. The move by Spotify to work counter to her efforts selling her new record made her pulling her catalog the only logical end result.
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I think the artists making more money from album sales than anything else are a very small percentage, and shrinking. Just to be clear your argument is about a very tiny slice of the very most successful musicians.
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Recorded music is and has always been a small portion of an artist's income. This report on data from musicians themselves shows it to be around 25% or so for pop & rock musicians and even less for those not in the top 5% earning percentiles.
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Maybe that's true and maybe that's not -- but the figures you cite don't address the claim one way or another. What counts isn't the per performance payout at all. Because a single "performance" on radio actually reaches thousands of people, where a single "performance" on a streaming service reaches a single person, comparing payouts on a per-performance basis is illegitimate. If you want to do that sort of comparison, you need to cite the figure per listener, not per performance.
And, I would argue, even that doesn't mean very much. What actually matters is the total amount of royalty payouts.
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Exactly, I see this kind of fuzzy math on that silly Trichordist site all the time: "I'm comparing apples to oranges, so it's quite obvious that the selling price for kumquats is way too low."
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It's far from obvious which method is the more profitable to the artist involved, so some sort of analysis is needed to make the argument anything more than pure speculation.
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As for profitability, for Swift it was a no-brainer. And I believe her first week sales speak for themselves.
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I'm not saying that behavior isn't common. I'm saying that it's not clear that it actually reduces income for the artists. The ones you "only stream" get paid each time your stream. The ones you buy get paid once and never again.
Which way gains the most profit for the artist? It would depend on a lot of factors, and the answer to the question isn't obvious on the face of it. I rather suspect that there is no one-size-fits-all answer as well. Some music may do better one way and other music may do better the other.
In any case, as I said, we're engaging in pure speculation until those numbers are crunched.
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Plus, the crossover between the two categories is ignored. It's not uncommon for people to buy an album after streaming it. It's also not uncommon for people to stream music after they've bought a copy. If you block streaming, you're definitely blocking the latter income stream but you may also block the first as well.
Taylor Swift is a bad example, because her music was pushed so heavily through standard mainstream outlets (and allowed to stream through all but one of the big streaming services, to the best of my knowledge), that the benefit to her from the discovery and sharing aspects of Spotify would have been minimal. I honestly think there's money being left on the table, but we'll have to wait for the industry to stop creaming itself over the single successful datapoint they have tried to provide.
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Some, I stream *after* I've already bought them, because it's easier to stream while I'm on the move than to accurately predict which songs to sync with my phone before I leave. Some, I've not bought because I've been ripped off so many times on blind-buys and I won't buy something I've not been able to preview first. Since I don't pirate, no streaming = a lost sale from me. I'll listen to other music.
It's not a black-and-white issue, and pretending it is devalues any point you're trying to make.
"And I believe her first week sales speak for themselves."
Correlation != causation, especially since she pulled the tracks from Spotify AFTER the album had been released (music was pulled from Spotify on November 3rd 2014, the new album was released on October 27th, 2014 - i.e. the first week sales INCLUDE the time that Spotify had the tracks).
I can see where you're getting your logic from, but it's faulty.
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Again, that's an apple to oranges comparison. That low royalty rate is spread out over many, many years.
Calculate the total royalties for the entire span it's on the streaming service (say 20 years or so) and compare that to a one-time sale and where do you end up?
Whenever I see people using stats to slam streaming services they always leave out the fact that streaming is cumulative and ongoing. Your money keeps flowing in with streaming.
Maybe streaming isn't that great of deal for artists or maybe it is. I don't know because no one can seem to give me an actual apples to apples comparison. Comparing the profit from one month of streaming to one month of sales is meaningless because it doesn't include the cumulative profit over the lifespan of the streaming service.
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And if the listener was not going to buy it anyway, then the royalties are just gravy.
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Great idea, give people more reasons to get the music illegally rather than paying for it. What does she think, people are going to go buy her CDs en masse if they can't get her music on Spotify?
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Also, if we say for the sake of argument that it is because she pulled from Spotify, that still means little all by itself. There may be something unique about her audience that makes Spotify a less desirable distribution avenue for her music.
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In the 50's labels were paying quite a bit to get airtime, The artists should be paying spotify to promote their music - you see, that will lead to sales of their (whatever they are selling).
I like the steaming and radio logical fallacy, but I like to use to drive my payola agenda.
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New business model required.
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Like I said, that's if you're interested in the truth, as I know many here aren't interested in that at all.
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And rather than simply insult this website and say other websites are better, how about participating in the conversation in a constructive way?
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Techdirt is wrong because: No reason given.
These other sites are better because: No reason given.
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Like these articles?
Streaming Will Soon Be More Profitable Than Sales
Streaming Leads to Three Times More Sales Than Radio, Study Finds…
Music Sales Are Up in Sweden. Thank You Spotify!
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Well played.
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Re: Should Be,
As far as I can tell our current culture is ran by a group of One Percenters that see the U.S. economy as a resource grab, and they are trying to out grab each other before the current culture collapses or they die.
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Torrents are your friend
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Do as Google does
Musicians depend on distribution more than anything else. That's what put the recording industry's attorneys and businessmen at the top of the food chain in music. Even though they didn't create the music themselves.
Today's musician depends on search engines and streaming. If some misguided individuals become too intent on reversing the clock, let them do without. After a (small) initial outcry from the listening public, their songs will rapidly fade into a well-deserved oblivion.
Being a child of that era, and therefore a fan of that sort of music, I'll miss it. But not too much or for too long. Because any time somebody tells me "Take it or leave it - and we need you answer now!" my first, last, and final answer will always be: "No."
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Re: Do as Google does
This is an excellent policy, and is a rule I follow without fail. If someone is pressuring you for a fast decision, their goal is to prevent you from making an intelligent decision.
As an aside, I also follow the "chandelier rule": if you are being sold something (usually a business deal), the bigger the chandelier in the room during the pitch, the worse the deal is for you. I have turned down a few business deals because I was treated lavishly during the wooing phase, and in every case that ended up being a fantastic decision.
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What they are really saying is:
You don't spit into the wind
You don't pull the mask off that old Lone Ranger
And you don't mess around with Jim
(with Jim being a euphemism for 'Lawyers out for a buck')
With thanks to Jim Croce for those culturally deprived young'uns reading this.
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Spotify
All these companies knew this was a gray loophole that copyright holders would likely challenge.
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Re: Spotify
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Doesn't seem like a loophole to me, they were just doing something nobody had been given an exclusive right over. Now courts have started deciding retroactively that such a right does exist.
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Now you did it. You've stepped into a pet peeve of mine....
Following the law as written is not a "loophole". It's following the law as written, no more, no less.
I'm sure you don't consider crossing the street at the crosswalk a "loophole" to jaywalking laws, do you? So why would you frame it like that for laws concerning music?
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Re: Spotify
I disagree. They were following the policy set for decades. However, it is supply and demand. If these services really want the music then they will pay. If they don't then they won't. It should be a simple cost benefit analysis by the streaming services. I am sure some will be pro-active.
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As I noted in my second comment, the current problem is that the state copyright laws, which the pre-1972 sound recordings fall under, do not include statutory licensing, not to mention differ state by state, which means that to stream that music, the streaming service would have to work out individual deals, on a per song or per album basis, via extremely one-sided negotiations, something that would be prohibitively expensive to do.
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And for those who have to have old tunes then get on a vpn and p2p.Or go on music blogs.
FUCK THE MAFIAA !
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Ummm...ok.
Care to explain what "civil rights" are being trampled and what "problem" we are being flippant about?
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Talk about clueless.
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You're a complete fucking idiot.
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That does not look like the actual musicians to me, but rather some middlemen buying up copyrights to try and make their fortune from the streaming sites
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I don't really care what it "looks like" to you, pirate boy. Those "earlier lawsuits" were filed by musicians. Y'know, those people you tech douches love to try and screw.
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Re: screwing the musicians
Also, we'll gladly screw over their bloodsucking lawyers, their scumbag managers, insane PR reps and the lame-brained idiots giving them lousy advice regarding preventing people like me buying and playing their music how, when and where I want to. If a musician doesn't want to make his/her music available to me in a way that allows me to purchase it then he/she should stop being a musician and go back to waiting tables and sweeping floors
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But, no worries... You Americans are used to having a knife held to your throat. I get the feeling that you like it.
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Copyright is not civil rights.
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The only time I suspect it's Lowery is when the so-called "musician advocate" cannot debate the actual issues on their merits and resorts to childish insults instead. That's Lowery's modus operandi to a tee. He's nothing more than a schoolyard bully who thinks that yelling louder wins arguments.
Thus far with your use of "pirate boy", "tech douches" and "dolts", I'm putting you in the same category as Lowery. As far as I'm concerned it doesn't really matter if you are actually Lowery or not, your comments are disregarded as insignificant and childish anyways.
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I just realized...
Coincidence?
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That made me spit my coffee out.
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The worst part of this is that...
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Obvious question
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Copyright holders
New to this forum. This is a shot in the dark. I want to include song snippets (20-30 second portions) of 50s and 60s songs in an eBook via hyperlinks. My problem is tracking down the copyright holders to get permission. I've talked to BMI and ASCAP. They suggest I contact the writers/composers. There I hit a dead end. Any thoughts appreciated.
Thanks,
Dennis
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