Entry 233, on 2005-10-10 at 15:55:08 (Rating 3, News)
According to a Slashdot article, the big record companies are becoming even more greedy than they have been previously. Already they make 70c out of each 99c iTunes download, and are responsible for the ridiculous $US2.49 price of cell phone ring tones. But they want more. One example is sharing in the revenue of ads generated by Google searches for the names of musicians they have signed. And, apparently, that's just the beginning.
I think the big music companies are amongst the worst type of cynical exploiters of creative people, and the general public, on the planet. They generate demand of mediocre and junk music. They sign up "artists" (if you can all them that) and, although many of the artists get very rich, the music companies make vast profits for doing very little (only about 10% of the cost of a CD goes to the performer).
I'm hoping the Internet can make a difference here. It provides an excellent way to distribute information, including music. To get real news now I avoid the big news companies, who are usually very biased, and primarily interested in making money, not reporting news. Alternative sources on the Internet (including blogs) give a far better picture of what's really happening.
A similar situation applies to music distribution. I hope in future that more music will be distributed this way. Paying $1 directly to the artist beats paying the same to a music company which then passes on 10c to the artist. This should also encourage a greater variety of music - instead of the styles the music companies think they can market.
Maybe I'm an idealist, and the music companies will find a way to sabotage direct music sales on the 'net. They are certainly doing their best to do that already. But in the end, you can't beat an idea or technology whose time has come, so I hope that when most people store music as a computer file instead of a CD, the music companies will finally meet their well-deserved doom.
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