SteveD 's BestNetTech Comments

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  • On the post: Elderly Classic Rock Musicians Don't Like Music Video Games

    SteveD ( profile ), 14 Sep, 2009 @ 04:16am

    Encoraging not to learn

    Can't help but think he has a point somewhere in there. Rockband might not 'encourage kids not to learn', but it certainly doesn't do anything to encourage them to learn. By giving kids a shortcut to the thrill of playing a great song, perhaps it will have a negative effect on learning.

    On the other hand, perhaps it will just lead to less rubbish guitar players bothering to learn in the first place.

  • On the post: How Performing Rights Groups Funnel Money To Top Acts And Ignore Smaller Acts

    SteveD ( profile ), 10 Sep, 2009 @ 12:07pm

    Similar situation in the UK

    If you look at the big collection body in the UK, the PRS (something Mike has covered in the past) then you get a similar picture.

    To determine how to distribute royalties the body gets the major radio stations to submit full lists, but it only does random sampling of the playlist of the smaller regional stations, clubs, bars and licensed premisses.

    These methods made sense in an analogue world where it was impractical to collect such comprehensive data, but not in a digital one.

    The problem with random-sampling methods is that its not likely to pick up the one-off plays of smaller artists, and their share goes to the big artists instead. That makes it hard for a new artist to get much return from royalties even if he's getting some airplay.

    In PRS's defence they do give a proportion of the cash to charities that support young artists, but it does seem like their methods could do with updating.

  • On the post: Singer Claims Sony Music 'Pirated' His Songs; Has Police Raid Their Offices

    SteveD ( profile ), 10 Sep, 2009 @ 09:53am

    Re: Re: Re: Re:

    I will concede that.

  • On the post: Singer Claims Sony Music 'Pirated' His Songs; Has Police Raid Their Offices

    SteveD ( profile ), 09 Sep, 2009 @ 04:34pm

    Re: Re:

    "But, the point that I was making -- which I thought was more interesting -- is that it shows how the interests of the labels and the artists often diverge."

    My problem with this is I disagree on it being interesting; it almost seems like stating the obvious. Such interests can diverge just as they do in every form of business contract.

    But perhaps this isn't what really bugs me. I think that might be the title, and a comment-threat full of people gloating over the 'evil record companies'.

    What has BestNetTech become?

  • On the post: Singer Claims Sony Music 'Pirated' His Songs; Has Police Raid Their Offices

    SteveD ( profile ), 09 Sep, 2009 @ 05:59am

    It's a contract dispute, then?

    Not to get short with Mike, but is there really much of interest to this story?

    That two parties that undertake a contract together want different things is part of a contracts purpose. That afterwards the two parties fight over how the resulting assets are split is hardly unusual.

    A label and an artist having 'unaligned interests' should be obvious; so do many people who enter into contracts. It doesn't mean there is anything sinister or unusual to it.

  • On the post: The Good And Bad Of Banks Too Big To Fail Getting Bigger…

    SteveD ( profile ), 01 Sep, 2009 @ 05:16am

    Re: Hey, wait a minute

    I think your reasoning is flawed in the same way the capitalist thinking that got us into this mess is flawed; you believe that people will behave rationally.

    In light of the bailouts it makes perfect sense that bankers will start to take huge risks with the assumption of a Government safety-net, but in reality the precise opposite of this is true.

    In the current climate people are worried that a recovery will be delayed due to the risk-adverse culture that has been created in the business world as a result of the meltdown.

    But back to the central issue...the immediate problem is one of restoring growth and stability to the economies of the world. For that I don't think too many Governments are going to regulate very heavily in the short-term, but rather focus on what can be done in the long term.

    The danger is that a lot of people in the financial industries are desperate to return to how things were, and will fight desperately to resist the needed reforms that might increase regulation to prevent systematic problems.

  • On the post: EMI's CEO Admits Company 'Lost Touch' But Doesn't Seem To Know How To Fix It

    SteveD ( profile ), 16 Jul, 2009 @ 04:22pm

    Re: If you don't know, ask!

    I don't think its a case of them not knowing what their customers want, rather its a case of them knowing what they want but having no idea how to make money from it.

    The problem isn't leveraging 'as much money as they can', rather getting as much money as they used to make with analogue sales. EMI was bought by a private equity firm; if they have to shrink the company significantly to return it to profitability they risk ever making a decent return on their investment.

    Speaking of which, the latest rumours are that the EMI owners are looking to write-off a significant portion of their debt to CityBank: http://www.hypebot.com/hypebot/2009/07/is-emi-in-deep-fiancial-trouble.html

  • On the post: Pandora: If We're Getting Taxed So Heavily By SoundExchange, Radio Should Be Too

    SteveD ( profile ), 14 Jul, 2009 @ 01:54pm

    This is no time for idealists

    Pandora is doing what it needs to do to survive. If the only route to that is to work with the system (and don't try and tell me they haven't pursued every other possibility), then so be it.

    Mike's stance is hopelessly idealistic. Pandora are arguing for a level playing field on which to compete. Web radio is never going to be able to fight the RIAA alone, but if FM radio is forced into the same position we'll see a lot more lively discussion of the issues.

  • On the post: Radiohead Manager, Nettwerk Launch New Label: Artists Get To Keep Their Copyright

    SteveD ( profile ), 07 Jul, 2009 @ 01:52pm

    Re: I wonder about other aspects of the contract...

    This has me suspicious too. People who just think labels are greedy and evil don't appreciate the very real costs involved in recording and promoting music.

    It is good that a band will be getting more influence (an artist who signs away their copyright for life really has no leg to stand on in future dissagreements), but there isn't any such thing as a free lunch.

    '50% share of profits' could mean any number of things; publishers are deviously clever with numbers when they need to be.

  • On the post: Is EA Figuring Things Out? Says 'Please Pirate Our Games' And Has A Business Model For It

    SteveD ( profile ), 24 Jun, 2009 @ 03:27pm

    Re: Re: some people are making money

    Indeed, games like Battlefield Heroes have been advertised as 'free2play' for some time now: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYQP-uBijWg

  • On the post: Ray Bradbury Still Hates The Internet

    SteveD ( profile ), 24 Jun, 2009 @ 10:31am

    Re: Re:

    "The internet has been one of the best tools ever developed to find books... lol"

    Indeed, but that wasn't the point I was trying to make.

  • On the post: Ray Bradbury Still Hates The Internet

    SteveD ( profile ), 24 Jun, 2009 @ 10:28am

    Re: Re: The Internet UR doing it wrong.

    "However, sites like popurls, Digg, Slashdot and Metafilter regularly led me down very weird paths full of new learning and the best part is I can just bookmark it and come back to it later. I never have to return the link like a library book."

    Indeed, but such sites are ultimately the product of their communities, and for voteup/votedown models (as Reddit and Digg use) the content that comes up to the top of the pile is what has the best general appeal for that community. It becomes this self-reinforcing loop where all descent is quickly voted out.

  • On the post: Ray Bradbury Still Hates The Internet

    SteveD ( profile ), 24 Jun, 2009 @ 10:24am

    Re: Re: But we never said kill the library...

    "But we never said kill the library..."

    Indeed, Mike didn't cover that part of the article. But it was the message Bradbury was trying to get across.

    "We live in a society that is driven by money. If libraries die its because they couldn't make money. Not because internet goons came over and burned all the books."

    This isn't about those with money deciding what has value in society, as libraries are nearly always publicly funded services. Libraries exist to elevate those without any money as much as anything else.

  • On the post: Is It Really So Bad If Music Is Used In A Way The Musician Doesn't Like?

    SteveD ( profile ), 19 Jun, 2009 @ 04:51am

    All publicity is good publicity?

    I can't really follow your moral argument here Mike, are you saying its funny, so it doesn't matter?

    What if the band in question wasn't one that most of the internet hates, and the group mocking them wasn't a baseball league but a rival records company (or band), could you still justify it in quite the same manner?

    I don't mean to undermine the right of use of media in satire, but if the future of music artists is to turn themselves into brands (as Matt Mason suggests), won't it become even more crucial for bands to have a tight control over the way their creations are used?

  • On the post: Entertainment Industry Still Insisting That Gov't Protectionism Is The Only Way To Compete

    SteveD ( profile ), 16 Jun, 2009 @ 08:36am

    Spooks isn't even a comercial programme in the UK

    The strangest thing about this entire story is that Garrett's company produces 'Spooks', which is broadcast by the BBC, a tax-funded organisation. How is anyone harmed by British people downloading such content? They have, after all, effectively already paid for it.

    It also seems that British TV is getting hit so hard by the digital crunch its turning into the UK version of the American Newspaper industry.

    The good news is that at least the Opposition parties politicians seem to be thinking along the right lines: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8103206.stm

  • On the post: Understanding The Pirate Party

    SteveD ( profile ), 12 Jun, 2009 @ 04:59pm

    Had they not used the name they likely wouldn't have leached off the Pirate Bay trial so well in publicity, but the question must now turn to legitimacy in the eyes of their peers.

  • On the post: Swedish Pirate Party Wins Two One Seat In EU Parliament

    SteveD ( profile ), 08 Jun, 2009 @ 05:26am

    Will they keep it?

    I'm glad the Pirate Party got a seat, but I'm not convinced I would have voted for them had they a candidate here.

    The fact is that the EU has been very good for supporting the more moderate voices against copyright expansion/3-strikes laws, so is the party's position really needed?

    But they've clearly gained a lot of momentum from the PB trail. It will be interesting to see if they can sustain it through to re-election.

  • On the post: Jill Sobule Shows She Can Create A 'Professional' Fan-Financed Album

    SteveD ( profile ), 21 Mar, 2009 @ 09:51am

    Cost vs. Quality

    The cost vs. quality argument of recorded music is pivotal to the entire debate, as music doesn't become an infinite good until it’s been recorded somehow.

    One of the big barriers to tracks being released free in some sort of promotional scheme is the financial investment in recording them; is your promotion going to be so effective that you'll make back this investment on top of what you'd normally make?

    It’s the glaring gap between recording and mixing an album on your bedroom PC for a few hundred bucks, and recording it in a studio with professional sound engineers and producers for $75,000. Where’s the middle ground? Where’s the scalability?

    So many people think an artist can go it alone these days, but only a tiny handful of artists already have the skills needed to make a good recording, and there will always be a need for studio engineers and all the assorted professions involved. The time of professionals isn’t cheap.

    For example, I know a small indie label that’s trying to develop some young talent. It’s managed to get a few recorded tracks thrown together, but mostly on verbal agreements, borrowed time, borrowed money (and mixed with ‘borrowed’ software). Now they’re bound so tightly they can’t put the entire tracks onto Myspace without burning a lot of bridges and having rabid attack lawyers thrown at them.

    So what we lack at this juncture is a balanced cost/quality way for new acts to record material without having to sell them selves into bondage (all the infrastructure that currently exists has evolved to service the big labels). Even artists with enough of a following that they can pull schemes like Jill Sobule have to start somewhere, but few new acts can afford (or even deserve) to have large amounts of money thrown at them to get started.

    So we don’t just need clever business models. We need to find a way to bring down the fixed costs that are standing in the way of these clever business models, and the success of young artists.

  • On the post: Dear Recording Industry: Stop Focusing On Just Selling Music

    SteveD ( profile ), 10 Feb, 2009 @ 01:15pm

    Re: Re: Can they really change?

    I sort of agree with you. These three things the majors used to do...there just isn't a need for the same level of infrastructure any more, not with bit torrent and web blogs.

    But there is still a need for some.

    You could probably record an album for 5k, on the cheap. But that sort of cash is only really going to pay for rental of a studio for a month. You want professional production, promotion, management...all these skillets are still needed in the digital age and very few young artists will have them.

    That means employing professionals, and so already your expenses start to shoot up. Plus if you're going to take an artists intellectual property and distribute it for free...you're probably going to have to end up paying the artist a salary (rather then royalties) for a couple of months while he/she writes and records the album. The costs aren't as unsubstantial as some like to think.

    But this is what's needed, I think. A business model that's efficient in keeping the costs of recording music down, but being able to combine it directly with the finite products Mike loves to talk about.

    And I can't see the Majors being able to do that. I see it coming from mid-level labels that used to make their cash from building up small acts to the point where the Majors would snap them up for big bucks. That used to be necessary because a smallish label wasn't saleable enough to support an artist when they became big. It was a natural progression, but I think that's changing now.

    Perhaps Twinrova is right, and BestNetTech should forget the majors and focus on encouraging those smaller businesses who have the potential to achieve all this.

  • On the post: Dear Recording Industry: Stop Focusing On Just Selling Music

    SteveD ( profile ), 10 Feb, 2009 @ 10:46am

    Can they really change?

    As hard as I try, I can’t see a way for the majors to adapt to these new models. When you’ve got million-dollar recording processes backed by a billion dollar publishing arm, all designed to produce and shift units of music…how do you adapt that to a market that doesn’t want to pay for units any more? The answer to the business model issue has to come from finding cost-efficient ways of recording music and promoting it freely to fans without sacrificing quality. Then you use the web2.0 stuff to tie the fans to the artist and bring them down to the shows and shift the merch…it could work. You wouldn't make a huge amount of money off each act after paying the artist, but with centralised resources between a couple of acts it could make a good start-up. But how does a major label do that? It’s not designed to leverage mid-level artists in the same way (it makes a loss on many of them). It’s the major acts shifting high volumes of units that keep it profitable. The bosses at Universal, EMI and Warner could wake up tomorrow and cry “Eureka! I get it now!” but they’d still have to gut their companies to change so drastically. I firmly believe that a business could be sustainable though leveraging the benefits of free music, but I don’ think there’s any way for the majors to return to the level of profitability they enjoyed at the height of the CD. Maybe that’s the reason they still live in this dream world of music taxes and subscriptions.