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Comment by CWuestefeld | Hacker News Reader

It's nice that a lot more people like Iron Maiden. But the article doesn't tell us what effect it had on the problem with in-store sales that it laid out in the first paragraph.

I happen to think that in-store sales are a red herring, and overall sales are more interesting, but that's not what the introduction laid out. But even total sales aren't cited, just a number of social media friends.

I'm also not sure how much we can take from observation of mega-bands like Maiden. I doubt that their experience will translate very well into the long tail of musicians.

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while not "in-store sales", i think this helps: "The result was massive sellouts. The São Paolo show alone grossed £1.58 million (US$2.58 million) alone."

personally, i'm with you. in-store sales are a red herring.

for the entire history of music -- aside from the last 60 years or so -- musicians have been paid for performances or on commission. music, my friends, is a service, not a product. and it has been for century upon century.

it's really this recent machination created by the recording industry that is the anomaly. music piracy is really just the correction back to the mean.

I agree with your conclusion but not your argument.

What does it matter if making a living as a musician through record sales is a historical anomaly? And can you really call it an anomaly if previous generations didn't have the option of selling records as the technology didn't exist? That's like saying "cars are a historically anomalous mode of transport". Great. So?

And by the way, in the early 20th century Broadway made a lot of money from sheet music. A product.

It matters because the distribution situation has changed, so now you have to actively and aggressively impede the distribution of all recorded sound in order to preserve the business model.

It's like the government tearing out everybody's plumbing in order that the outhouse builders can still make a living.

>And by the way, in the early 20th century Broadway made a lot of money from sheet music.

By harassing and imprisoning people who would play music without buying it first; a vile little historical chapter.

> It matters because the distribution situation has changed, so now you have to actively and aggressively impede the distribution of all recorded sound in order to preserve the business model.

False dichotomy much?

Yeah, really. Just about everything we take for granted as part of modern life is an historical anomaly. Electric lighting is an historical anomaly. Clean drinking water is an historical anomaly. Etc.

It's a 'sound byte' that popped up in response to the people that preach doom and gloom if the "piracy problem" isn't solved (e.g. "music is doomed") as if all music would cease to exist, and no one would have motivation to be a musician if it wasn't for record sales.

two quick things.

on the cars -- horses were bought and sold. trains. boats. you name it. buying a product that is transformed by technology is not the same as trying to take a service and transform it into a product through technology. you can augment the service (large margins) or automate the service (thin margins), but you can't turn it into a product.

on the sheet music -- precisely! that's the exact analogy. note the incredible consumer demand for sheet music today! it's not exactly a booming market outside of the niche training/instruction arena.

edit: btw, that last bit about the incredible demand today for sheet music was sarcasm. just in case it didn't come across....

> you can augment the service (large margins) or automate the service (thin margins), but you can't turn it into a product.

Why not?

playing fast and loose with formal definitions here, but basically because services, by their very nature, are scarce goods -- you are paying for someone's time. once you productize/automate that, it becomes non-scarce and the marginal cost falls through the floor.

so, like the whole ideas and sharing flames analogy.

now, note, this does not pertain to products that perform services. that's a whole 'nuther ball of wax. but, in our example, that'd be like cloning the musician rather than the music.

This simply does not apply to music, where each producer has the monopoly on their music. Only once you take piracy into account does that change. But then your thesis also changes from "you can't get people to pay for recorded music" to "you can't get people to pay for recorded music because it so happens they can steal it", which are two different things altogether.

> this does not pertain to products that perform services.

This is exactly what a recording does, though -- it automates a performance.

no.

the music recording is the manifestation of the performance/service. so, not viable as a product.

cd players perform the service of playing the music. (aka automates the performance) totally viable as a product.

think of it like a many-to-one relationship. the "one" is what can be productized. the "many" cannot. scarcity is key for what can be economically considered product-viable.

You notice this in musical traditions too. For a long time, putting your own spin on someone else's tune was considered paying homage, not theft. (You were paying respects, not royalties)

For the entire history of civilization prior to the 20th century, the tech industry as it's now constituted didn't exist. Computation was a service, not a product, if you will. That doesn't mean the recent state of affairs is an anomaly that needs to be corrected against (though we might turn out to be bad enough at managing our resources that'll happen to some degree).

You're not really talking about a return, though. Under a true return to the previous state, there would be no piracy for the same reason there was no music piracy before recorded music: no recordings to pirate.

What you're talking about instead is still having music be a product, but just one that you expect should apparently always be given away for free.

Personally, I don't see why music can't be both a product and a service that people support by purchase. Piracy (particularly individual piracy) probably should be handled more like the article describes, but that doesn't mean the new norm should be completely free when it comes to recordings.

Should we just quit computers because for the entire history of mankind, aside from the last 60 years or so, nobody could become rich from them?

I believe the point is that artists have been making (music|sculpture|paintings|dances) for thousands of years. The great majority who've made money have done so only because of industry changes within the last 100 years.

Artists are unlikely to quit making art even in the absence of direct economic benefit to doing so. We'd lose some great art; we won't lose all of it.

None of our jobs existed 100 years ago forcing our historical counterparts to design, create and make in other mediums and for (much) lesser reward, or just get other jobs.

But I sure am glad only musicians are asked to forfeit the benefits those 100 years brought us all.

I'm likely missing your point. "Only musicians are asked?" Several fields are having their creation, promotion and distribution status quo challenged. I work for an outfit who made their money in traditional print publishing. No one's asked them, but the expectation is there's more forfiture of previous benefits to come.

To sustain a business, we'll need to figure out new services and revenue streams to take place of at least some of what's been going away for some time.

Those fields became obsolete - that's very different to what the internet has done to music.

The internet did nothing to music itself. It made something to the business of music. And, as you said, rendered some of it obsolete.

> I doubt that their experience will translate very well into the long tail of musicians.

Oh I'm sure it does. I certainly wouldn't know as many bands as I know today without piracy - and this translates very much into buying CDs and going to shows, though I can't afford to buy every CD from every band I like.

For smaller bands, getting known is the most important. It's what gets them bigger gigs, better labels, better production, better press coverage, better invitations to festivals, better endorsement deals... There's a very strong analogy with start ups there : focus on growth, take VC money, and you'll get the conversion rate sorted out when you're bigger.

This is true.

But now how does a smaller band sustain themselves if they don't want to sign with a major label? It now almost forces them to if they ever want to make a living in music.

> focus on growth, take VC money, and you'll get the conversion rate sorted out when you're bigger.

Not in the lean-startup movement!

I doubt it moved the needle at all. I think their reaction was, "We know they like us enough to steal the music, so let's give them something they can't rip off." I don't think it improved store sales.

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