(This is a comment I made on another blog, in response to the iTune Music store’s announcement that they are now the #2 retailer of recorded music.)
Itunes is winning because it got there first with a complete solution that includes:
1. Software that works and is easy to understand.
2. Hardware (ipod) that.. ahem.. works and is easy to understand... and plays mp3’s as well as DRM tracks.
3. Content. (and the agreements necessary to do provide it.)
One thing that doesn't seem to make the transitional journey to is the complete package.. the intended project that the artist created.
This is the thing I miss the most.
The songwriter might see a song as a complete package, but I think the artist sees the whole recording project as the package. ( a chunk of their creative life / a phase they were going through ) The album art is part of this, as well.
The current digital sales model doesn't succeed in preserving this part of the artistic process, and as the resulting sales results dictate, the process is forced to change; pragmatically trying to create tracks that will sell individually.
While the single song sale is a necessary element, the calculated 'sure-thing' nature of single selection (and creation) seems to dilute the art. How do you preserve art while clinically removing risk.
I’m at a loss when it comes to ideas that would change this trend, except to say that it is naive to think that you can sell a collection of songs for close to the value of the sum of the individual tracks. The consumer is smarter than that, and has answered with his pocketbook.
Try to imagine another YELLOW BRICK ROAD, or SONGS IN THE KEY OF LIFE in the current digital model. Easy to imagine an artist creating it.. but marketing and selling it? How would that look in an iTunes-only world. Would LOVE LIES BLEEDING sell separately from FUNERAL FOR A FRIEND? Would the songs on those albums.. the ones that ring in our heads, but never got airplay... would they even have been heard?
iTunes will be number one in the new model, but is it because they're delivering what the consumer wants, or is it because they're the closest, so far?
Itunes is winning because it got there first with a complete solution that includes:
1. Software that works and is easy to understand.
2. Hardware (ipod) that.. ahem.. works and is easy to understand... and plays mp3’s as well as DRM tracks.
3. Content. (and the agreements necessary to do provide it.)
One thing that doesn't seem to make the transitional journey to is the complete package.. the intended project that the artist created.
This is the thing I miss the most.
The songwriter might see a song as a complete package, but I think the artist sees the whole recording project as the package. ( a chunk of their creative life / a phase they were going through ) The album art is part of this, as well.
The current digital sales model doesn't succeed in preserving this part of the artistic process, and as the resulting sales results dictate, the process is forced to change; pragmatically trying to create tracks that will sell individually.
While the single song sale is a necessary element, the calculated 'sure-thing' nature of single selection (and creation) seems to dilute the art. How do you preserve art while clinically removing risk.
I’m at a loss when it comes to ideas that would change this trend, except to say that it is naive to think that you can sell a collection of songs for close to the value of the sum of the individual tracks. The consumer is smarter than that, and has answered with his pocketbook.
Try to imagine another YELLOW BRICK ROAD, or SONGS IN THE KEY OF LIFE in the current digital model. Easy to imagine an artist creating it.. but marketing and selling it? How would that look in an iTunes-only world. Would LOVE LIES BLEEDING sell separately from FUNERAL FOR A FRIEND? Would the songs on those albums.. the ones that ring in our heads, but never got airplay... would they even have been heard?
iTunes will be number one in the new model, but is it because they're delivering what the consumer wants, or is it because they're the closest, so far?
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