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Dear Artist, how many copies of your album were sold?
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bbgun
Started Topics :
2
Posts :
741
Posted : Dec 4, 2008 19:53
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Basilisk
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
168
Posts :
2984
Posted : Dec 4, 2008 20:23
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On 2008-11-27 15:37, Moki.Time.Wave.Zero wrote:
The point is that even the media business world wide has already brought it straight to this conclusion. I am talking as someone who has studied also media management and really observed what is happening in the world out there and wrote the degree paper on Web 2.0 and Media, the new revolution in Media. It is a process that is called the Long Tail in the media buseness theory. It states that the only products that have a chance to survive nowadays are the products of the non main stream. And it is a theory that compares the music market with a fractal of smaller and smaller Sub Styles. And the point is that at the end of the day , it is the Long Tail that will survive, that means all those small products that have even less than 100 listeners, cause in the summe they make more profit than a big big product of a mainstream star. But i will stop by that, let me know if you wanna know more about this media management theory, then i will write more. |
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You have grossly misinterpreted what the Long Tail is all about. Chris Anderson wasn't saying that the hits no longer matter or won't be profitable--only that the new digital economy opens up the possibility of exploiting niche markets in ways that haven't really been possible thus far. Take his example of CDs: Walmart, the world's largest CD retailer, sells something like 1,500 different titles every year out of a population of tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of releases. The point of the Long Tail is that if you can offer all those low sellers together in one place then the minuscule sales that result from each individual item in the long tail will rival those of the hits (if everything is done right). We are facing a progressive fragmentation of mass culture into smaller niche cultures but this does not mean that the hits won't be hits or that the sleepers will necessarily form the bulk of the profit for any given company. The Long Tail is a market that has been largely unexploited until now--not something that is going to necessarily destroy the hit-making big business models of pop culture.
If you look around the forum you will find other places in which I have suggested how Long Tail theory applies to psytrance. To ground this post, I'll give you one big example: label back catalogues. When a psytrance label signs up with Beatport or Cytopia they often load up their latest releases--which, in the experience of most labels, are the only ones that ever sell well. Of course, when you have a label with a big back catalogue, it still makes a lot of sense to get that all online. Sales for older releases might be much lower but together they might begin to rival the sales of new releases. Applying the principles of the Long Tail to psytrance, one finds that the best thing to do is put everything you can find online, provide customers with a good user interface and a powerful means to both search and find, and let the market do the rest. It is news for all those labels that go digital and only offer their last 3 releases. Beyond that, label managers and digital download shop owners just have to think about designing for the Long Tail i.e. how to push traffic down the tail to really make use of it.
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moki
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics :
38
Posts :
1931
Posted : Dec 7, 2008 16:01
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i see this topic again now, and i really have to admit something, if i read the first sentence , i am not sure what should i say. i mean , can you write a little bit more polite in my presence please? i will read the post right now, and response after i chill out with a warm cup of tea, but anyway, i am not so sure that i have misinterpreted it cause, you know, it is not so easy to get a university education on media management in one of the most commercial countries in the world and i guess our professors have a little clue about it, since they are on top of the industries too. not sure i have misinterpreted it, cause they would tell me that after my graduate paper. but anyway, i will read it now and respond, just a sec to smoke a cigarette.
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Penelope Pitstop
Inactive User
Started Topics :
2
Posts :
80
Posted : Dec 7, 2008 16:22
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On 2008-12-07 16:01, Moki.Time.Wave.Zero wrote:
...can you write a little bit more polite in my presence please?
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Classic FAIL  |
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moki
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics :
38
Posts :
1931
Posted : Dec 7, 2008 16:42
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so. i still dont see what i have misinterpreted. i dont say that the hits will not be profitable at all anymore, i just say that if a label concentrates on the hits only, it is losing its position on the market in comparison to a label that concentrates on the niches.
earlier the music industry was mostly dependent on hits - to take your example of walmart: earlier they could not even offer the niche products because at the times before web 2.0 the costs connected with such products ( physical storage, rents, marketing and distribution) were much too high , especially if you consider that the customers themselves did not have a niche attitude - the listeners were not even looking for niche products to that extent, because they were concentrating on the mainstream hits.
but the human mind has generally experienced a great evolution since the beginning of web 2.0. you see, nowadays millions and millions of people spend their time searching for niche videos on youtube rather than watching the main stream videos. the media consumers are much more open minded now and concentrate mostly on the very few products that interest them. the mainstream attitude is dying. they have all available products nowadays and prefer to use the products suitable for their particular unique tastes. they prefer to go on itunes and find 2-3 products in the niche market they want to hear, rather than to go and buy the first big release they can find. they use the highly developed web 2.0 programming of the distributors, connected with search methods that we never ever witnessed before. automatic recommendations done by means of highly developed programming.
the labels should consider that they will simply not be profitable if they only concentrate on the big stars. if a label has 100 little known artists who sell, lets say 100 copies, they will be more profitable than if they just offer 5 big names. the future is the niche. and nowadays it is not difficult to offer niches - you dont have to put immense marketing costs in making your product well known, and to some extent you dont even have to print the cds anymore. you can offer the digital wavs with almost no costs other than the programming of the database and the ecommerse plattform.
and this is the future of the music industry in psy trance too. that is what i said. be a label for niches. stop referring to the big names. their sells will be going down and down every new month.
and this is actually a nice opportunity to realize that the little niche markets in trance are the future. if you have 100 artists selling 100 copies each, you have more profit than if you have 5 artists selling 1000 copies. anyway. my paper on web 2.0 was about the film producers, they have it slightly different, but anyway it is similar about the basics of the theory.
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Remy [POF]
Principles Of Flight
Started Topics :
48
Posts :
509
Posted : Dec 7, 2008 18:03
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You are right, it would make more profit, but it wouldn't be beneficial for the scene or the artists at the end of the day.
If you have 100 artists, how the hell are you going to take care of them? You will need a shit load of employees if you are to run the thing properly.
You should remember that normally the role of a label is also to take care of the artists making promotion for them and finding them gigs. Not just to release their music on a mp3 store anyone can do that, it's easy.
 On 2011-03-08 23:13, moki wrote:
listening only to free music is like having the free possibility to satisfy yourself with thousends of different free sexual acts. |
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moki
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics :
38
Posts :
1931
Posted : Dec 7, 2008 18:11
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well, from my point of view, i see the benefit for the scene in the fact that the artists will try to break the borders and make music that is unique, music that does not fit to every taste but is a special musical trip different from the rest. i have the feeling that many of them try to do music that will sell relatively good at the end - music that fits to bigger crowds.....
and even if they experiment a little bit in their studios, they dont even release the more weird stuff.....
another benefit - labels will not die:)
and what do you mean with take care of them? i mean you just need to find the right programmer for the database and that is the only difficult thing: the programming of these search methods. cause sorry to tell you that but i dont think that any of the distributors in the psy trance scene has even slightly the same search methods as the distributors from the bigger music industry. the bigger industry is simply incredible in that - you just have to check their ways of automatic recommendations. take for instance amazon, a pioneer in that. it tells you every time so presice what book you should check, that fits to your tastes. the system is following with cookies your cusstomer behaviour, where you were, which books you checked, what did the other readers buy and check. yes some distributors have a similar thing but it is in my opinion not so good developed as the big media industry does. what else do you have to take care of? if you have this programming, you have it all. then, if i am a party promoter i can also find the very unique artists i wanna invite, artists that i dont even know and never heard of. you see
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Basilisk
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
168
Posts :
2984
Posted : Dec 7, 2008 18:56
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On 2008-12-07 16:42, Moki.Time.Wave.Zero wrote:
i dont say that the hits will not be profitable at all anymore, i just say that if a label concentrates on the hits only, it is losing its position on the market in comparison to a label that concentrates on the niches. |
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You said, and I quote: "at the end of the day , it is the Long Tail that will survive." That seemed rather final to me.
I get the rest of what you are saying. It is what I have been saying (and acting on) for a long time already. One thing you might not realize is that the Long Tail mainly deals with aggregators. Psytrance labels generally have to focus on developing a brand; they can't take on 100 different artists and fiddle around with all sorts of different styles (leave that to me). No, it is the shops and distributors that need to hear the wisdom of the Long Tail.
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moki
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics :
38
Posts :
1931
Posted : Dec 7, 2008 20:11
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well actually that it what i think too. the distributors are those who have to do the programming i mentioned. they have to learn from big players like amazon, itunes and others.
About the brand of the labels, well i mentiioned already in another topic, but i think many of them are doing a disastrous job because the scene is simply too small, everyone knows everyoone, especially through the internet, and they get too personal with the so called customers. and they abuse, they actually do exactly the oposite of what they should. and as a matter of fact, it may be too final, but i think that everyone should become his own label, his own statement and then work together with the bigger distributors. also i find that the business of distribution will also move in direction monopolizing and globalizing, well not total monopolizing but i think that only a few distributors will stay alive and it si good so. they should have bigger varieties, all trance styles , even techno, whateer, they should have all of that. and they should follow the behaviour of the people who go on their websites. not only the act of buying, cause you can learn a lot also only by following the visiting attitude of the freaks - who was where, who clicked on which releases.
and this with the long tail, that it is the only thing that will survive, well yes, i agree, it is too final. actually the most final thing that i see is a total utopie - that people will pay only as an act of balanced energy in the most final phase. there will be distributors who will offer everything "for free" ( cause it is anyway available for free nowadays and every interested person can download whatever), and people will only pay after they made their choise and as a way to have a balanced energy. but ok, i know i am too final with that, lets keep to reality. as i said, i think the distributors have some job to do. and the brands of the labels must be developed too.
and the concepts of the releases. i really really dont know why they dont do deeper concepts, like for instance xenomorph, it is simply brilliant. it is something that you really want to buy.....why dont they do more conceptualized work. it is really not only about the music ppl. really not. for many simple ppl it is more than that. and actually this is also another reason why i feel the need to come back to the roots - the israeli trance artists, or the first labels back in 95 - they were simply so deep and incredible. i dont see this often nowadays. the people are just joking and trying to make it a big industry. but the industry is just a side effect, the trance culture is much more than that.....never forget that.....
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pr0fane
Moderator
Started Topics :
418
Posts :
3816
Posted : Dec 7, 2008 20:33
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On 2008-11-27 05:31, Basilisk wrote:
Anyone else feel like coming forward?
I am particularly interested in the many digital EPs being released, sometimes exclusively, on Beatport. I wonder if sales are satisfactory for those involved.
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D-Nox had this to say in an interview this year:
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Last but not least, how is your label, Sprout, doing ? any plans for new releases ?
My label is doing better then ever before. This is because I quit vinyls and release on digital. That saves lots of money. I can release much faster and choose better or bigger remix artist because I have a bigger budget. Also I think I just found the way I wanna go with my label. It took some time but I was never as happy with my label artist and what they write. Last few releases are more than proper. Maybe a year ago I was about to close the label down but now things looking so much better. |
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DJ pr0fane (Iboga Records) | Multiphase
www.sunrisesupplies.com | www.iboga.dk | www.soundcloud.com/pr0fane |
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Remy [POF]
Principles Of Flight
Started Topics :
48
Posts :
509
Posted : Dec 7, 2008 20:44
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On 2008-12-07 18:11, Moki.Time.Wave.Zero wrote:
and what do you mean with take care of them? i mean you just need to find the right programmer for the database and that is the only difficult thing: the programming of these search methods.
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I honestly think labels should do exactly the reverse of what you say. LESS ACTS more QUALITY.
What you are talking about is basically flooding the market with digital releases that basically wont sell good, but sell in mass. And you think it will give room to more creativity, your sadly mistaken and even if there are creative people in the mass, they wont get noticed cause there are tones of other bad music in the mass with them. Anyway im not gonna debate with you about that, there is no point, you wont change your mind anyway.
The only thing i can say is that from an artist point of view my goal is to live from my music without having to ask myself every month am i going to be able to pay the rent.
And to really get to that point where you have comfortable and steady income and not only surviving on day to day basis you have to get known "famous". And that is extremely hard, nearly impossible alone, you have to have a label that helps you and pushes your project forward and if they have 99 other projects they have signed, it's simply not possible.
On 2011-03-08 23:13, moki wrote:
listening only to free music is like having the free possibility to satisfy yourself with thousends of different free sexual acts. |
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shahar
IsraTrance Team
Started Topics :
155
Posts :
2035
Posted : Dec 7, 2008 21:43
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The main thing a label should do is supply a musical vision. When a label supplies a good musical vision, I will follow it. I will trust it to supply me with good interesting music. This is even more relevant in our day & age, when there such a huge ocean of bad & mediocre music, with very few islands of good stuff.
As for why and if artists need labels. It's very simple. The bottom line should be- does the artist get more for giving a percentage to others who work for her/him. Strictly money-wise, If selling alone gives X income, and alternatively selling through a label+distributor+shop gives more than X after they take their cut, then it's a good deal.
But, if we look beyond money, sometimes it's better even if the artist gets less than that X because of other factors: better exposure, making a name for her/himself, getting better at what she/he does because of professional feedback/outside motivation/direction/interaction, working with other people, getting her/his music to crowds who would otherwise miss it, etc.
The job of all these people who take this percentage is to give the artist a better environment to create- if they do it- the artist should work with them. Otherwise, she/he shouldn't.
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"Be the change you want to see in the world!"
M.K. Gandhi
"There is only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that's your own self."
Aldous Huxley
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Braindrop
Braindrop
Started Topics :
140
Posts :
1730
Posted : Dec 7, 2008 22:15
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IS there somebody who cld come provide actual sales figures from Digital releases?? Wld be great info if they did!
www.braindrop.in |
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Basilisk
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
168
Posts :
2984
Posted : Dec 7, 2008 22:28
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On 2008-12-07 20:11, Moki.Time.Wave.Zero wrote:
i think that everyone should become his own label, his own statement and then work together with the bigger distributors. also i find that the business of distribution will also move in direction monopolizing and globalizing, well not total monopolizing but i think that only a few distributors will stay alive and it si good so. |
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I like the idea of empowering artists to take on all the stuff the labels previously did for them... but I have discovered that a lot of artists really like having a label take care of the business end of things (booking, licensing, marketing and promotion, and so on). Plus, not everyone is good as setting up their own web site and managing their affairs online. Many artists would rather spend time in the studio writing music.
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On 2008-12-07 20:11, Moki.Time.Wave.Zero wrote:
actually the most final thing that i see is a total utopie - that people will pay only as an act of balanced energy in the most final phase. there will be distributors who will offer everything "for free" ( cause it is anyway available for free nowadays and every interested person can download whatever), and people will only pay after they made their choise and as a way to have a balanced energy. |
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Moki, have you ever visited my web site? I am that distributor. Ektoplazm presently serves up more than 40,000 releases a month! That's a lot of music.
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moki
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics :
38
Posts :
1931
Posted : Dec 7, 2008 22:38
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I honestly think labels should do exactly the reverse of what you say. LESS ACTS more QUALITY.
What you are talking about is basically flooding the market with digital releases that basically wont sell good, but sell in mass. And you think it will give room to more creativity, your sadly mistaken and even if there are creative people in the mass, they wont get noticed cause there are tones of other bad music in the mass with them. Anyway im not gonna debate with you about that, there is no point, you wont change your mind anyway.
The only thing i can say is that from an artist point of view my goal is to live from my music without having to ask myself every month am i going to be able to pay the rent.
And to really get to that point where you have comfortable and steady income and not only surviving on day to day basis you have to get known "famous". And that is extremely hard, nearly impossible alone, you have to have a label that helps you and pushes your project forward and if they have 99 other projects they have signed, it's simply not possible.
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well, you are not gonna debate but you do it though:))))). no, i can always change my mind if i see that it is needed and it is wise. but this doesnt happen often. actually i truly believe that there is a simple missunderstanding of the word quality in this debate. cause okey, for you it is probably quality to be an act that is respected by many people and fits to bigger crowds. but for me for instance quality is connected to uniqueness in the music, breaking borders. i noticed that the acts i find really interesting are not interesting for the majority of people. and actually i am all the time trying to find acts that almost noone knows or that have little to do with fitting into big crowds. this is the quality for me. i noticed that i find some releases genious that have only 300 sold copies.
and this is exactly the idea of the long tail. quality is relative. if a product has 3 listeners, it can be very qualitative for them, althought it will be real garbage for millions of ppl....
and it gives free room for creativity cause the artist can create whatever he wants without taking care to fit into the crowd. and come on, you cant deny that many of them do exactly that - try to fit into the big crowds. they have far more weird ideas than what we witness on the market, but they dont release them.
and okey, if you think that i label pushes you towards, then okey. i just dont think that the labels do it often. i agree that for many it is not possible to be their own label, and actually i think it is mainly because the artists are too creative minds to handle with burocracy, thats why they let others do it. but in fact, it is only some days of burocracy and then it is over. and they dont even need to press the cds themselves, cause the distributors do it often instead.....but for sure, labels dont have to die all, at least in the phase now. well anyway, i agree with shahar completely, it is about a musical vision. i also only follow visions of labels if they fit into mine, otherwise i dont need to be a part of the commercial system. most artists dont even care to see how the freaks live, what is their reality. they just travel and travel and do music and expect that we literally feed them but this has definitely no future. this is what i think.
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