inputs/outputs

In my post about Radiohead, I had hoped that other bands would follow suit and start releasing music for free. Nine Inch Nails, Jamiroquai, and Oasis are all bands that have decided to give away their upcoming albums, or at least have considered it. It makes sense. This is a tipping point.

Most new bands sign record labels because it seems makes sense, even in the world of digital music. But it only seems to make sense. Most artists probably know that signing with a record label in order to finance the production of physical CDs is a risky investment, especially with the way the industry is currently going. At the same time, any artist or band that is interested in turning a profit doesn’t want the responsibility of being the first to explore the outrageous option of releasing an album for free online, especially when the success of such a project is so fragile.

But that fragility is only due to the fact that no popular band, before Radiohead, had taken the great leap. Because even though the arists know that they could get just as much PR riding on the energy of their live shows, the fans, viral/grassroots marketing, they can’t bring themselves to give up the CD. It’s unexplored terrain.

Now that the wall has been broken, and other bands are going to follow, the terrain will almost definitely change. Here are some possible scenarios.

1. Perhaps the big boys who have established careers won’t mind giving up the CD sales to get past the bureaucracy, but what about the newer artists? Maybe giving away the music for free will provide more exposure, and will get more people to come to the shows. And if it doesn’t, will we be forced to pay more for tickets (which are already pretty expensive)?

2. A&R execs don’t get to decide who’s popular anymore, the internet does. The internet decided that Tay Zonday was popular, and they decided that Britney Spears was fat. Does this mean that, in order to be successful, you should be a little sensational or remarkable? It sure would filter out a lot of the garbage, but it might leave out some of the gems that are handpicked.

3. And there’s the issue of noise. Right now, two or three bands are giving away music for free, and it’s remarkable because the terrain is unexplored. I’m sure that people have downloaded the music just based on the fact that it’s freely available and completely legal, but try to imagine a world where all music was free. On one hand, if a lot of people like a certain band, their music will spread to a very large audience. But I may never hear about a band that fills a niche genre for a smaller market unless I’m involved with a community of listeners in that market. And the typical user doesn’t necessarily have time to commit to that sort of thing.

4 . Along the same lines, what happens to radio, the so-called “mainstream” and Top 40? I’m thinking that not much will change here. Ideally, Pandora would become a major player and your radios would tailor the music it plays to your tastes. That’s right - no more AM, no more FM, just total internet radio. Realistically, money will probably play a role in the exposure of bands through a push marketing strategy (the way that radio currently is). This means that music PR firms aren’t dead. It also might turn into something that’s socially based - for instance, Radiohead is asking its listeners to decide how much their album is worth. Could radio turn into a collection of the songs for which people paid the most?

The fact is that sooner or later, recordings will end up being free. The combination of Radiohead releasing an album for free (technically), Amazon moving towards non-DRM music, and the way that the internet works, it will be a slow but steady move to the day that all recordings of music will be worth as much as you want them to be.

The interesting part will be seeing how the artists create enough value in their artistry to make sure that they can make a living. This may be a case of strongest-survive, but it’s needed. Capital is what make talentless bands popular and rich. I can’t wait to see what happens when it all comes down to the tunes.

Amazon has three things to offer us as they’re pushing their new alternative to the iTunes Store.

1. Better quality. Better bitrate, better tools, VBR. If you know anything about audio quality, you’ll be pleasantly surprised to hear this huge step forward from the 128kbps bitrate on the iTunes store. Problem is, most iTunes users I know don’t know that their music is encoded at such a low rate, and probably can’t tell. When no problem exists, there’s no problem to solve.

2. No DRM. Songs actually belong to you. This is great if you want to download the song to a non-iPod, or if you want to send them to a friend.

3. Cheaper. This is the one most consumers will understand. The songs are 10 cents cheaper than their DRM counter parts on iTunes, and 40 cents cheaper than the iTunes non-DRM files.

The problem seems to be that, with any new alternative, there needs to be a perceived problem with the current one in order for it to be de-throned by the new one. So, a better quality MP3 will not be enough to switch users from iTunes to Amazon. What about price and no DRM? Maybe.

Amazon doesn’t offer any type of management system for the downloads. There’s an application that acts as a downloader, but it doesn’t actually play the files. People are still going to use iTunes as their player, which means that the 10 cent discount and the DRM-free files come at a cost of having to run a separate program, with a separate user account. It means that the files that are downloaded need to imported into the iTunes library (as opposed to automatically appearing under “Purchased”). It means that the user actually has to deal with the physical file, rather than a line in the iTunes browser (many users don’t see the link between physical files and the the iTunes line item).

So I guess it all depends on how important non-DRM files and 10 cents off matter to the legal music downloaders. I know that I’m going to turn to Amazon for my downloading, but my dad will probably stick to what he knows, and to what interfaces with his iPod the easiest.

Just as a sidenote, I wish there existed a program for Windows that could manage any MP3 playing device that was plugged in.