Embracing technology, change and fostering better music would be a smarter

With story from CNN

The business model of the music business is doomed to failure when it revolves around suing customers and using old technology.

As an industry technology put it last week in Toronto, “the Genie is out of the bottle and he’s too big to go back in.”

Digital distribution or downloading has been resisted by the RIAA and the big music businesses like Warner and Sony for almost 20 years.

Did it stop the proliferation of downloaded music? Did it stop the number of sites that allow downloading?

According to the analyst and comments from other like Bob Lefsetz, the music business is circling the wagons trying to live off its old catalog.

What’s the big music release this week? Two versions of the Beatles, remastered in mono or stereo. The Beatles Remastered with ancient technology due September 9.

That’s yesterday. Today something new would be a bootleg of Paul McCartney’s concert in Halifax which is new and fresh. Forget that, just watch the video clips on YouTube.

No wonder the major record labels are in trouble

Cliff Hunt of Yangaroo, digital media distributors in Ontario, says the record companies are obsessed with tracing who gets promotional materials. They still rely on physical disks that are encoded against piracy and courier distribution.

A watermarked compact disc (the file is embedded with the individual’s identification) is delivered from a mastering studio to a couple of key executives at the record label headquarters, most likely in New York or Los Angeles.

These CDs are then duplicated and again watermarked with the identities of additional key executives, and distributed to them in order to get their feedback on the album, and to begin the process of choosing the first single to be released to radio. This process takes time and money as these watermarked CDs are created at specialized labs.

These additional discs are then distributed, within the label headquarters and in many instances to regional promotion offices throughout the country, all by secure courier at significant expense. When a consensus is arrived at as to what should be the first single — the one that the label will promote most heavily — a release date is chosen, and literally thousands of promotional singles known in the business as “CD Pros” are pressed and readied for distribution to radio, press, consultants, concert promoters and other individuals that are influential within the music business. CNN

Sounds very old fashioned. They ought to make the songs down-loadable.