Downloading Vs. Buying used

stormjh · 02-23-2010, 04:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shake

OH yeah, I know. I've worked in record stores the majority of my teenage and adult life. I remeber a time when they were tyring to get us to PAY to play an artists music in the store!

Surely you need some kind of licence to do that anyway, we have the PRS in the UK.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRS_for_Music

Shake · 02-23-2010, 06:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Neapolitan

The latter, "downloading an album from a torrent site etc. (again, no money)," is seen by both the artist and the industry as an infridgement of copyright laws.

But you would think that in their opinion, ebay and pawn shops would be "worse" because someone is still making a profit, and the band/management/label aren't seeing any of it. Whereas with a torrent, no one is making a profit.

Neapolitan · 02-23-2010, 11:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by lucifer_sam

No, you're not. That's the point.

Which point I made two that you highlighted, making a copy of it for personal use, which I did heard you could do. Or was it lending a CD to a friend, which I never heard a person could not do.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shake

But you would think that in their opinion, ebay and pawn shops would be "worse" because someone is still making a profit, and the band/management/label aren't seeing any of it. Whereas with a torrent, no one is making a profit.

Pawn Shops
Say you buy a CD for $15, you don't want it, so you sell it to the Pawn Shop they give $5 and turn around and sell it for $10. You lost $10, the Pawn shop made a $5 profit and the person saved $5, out of the $10 there's $5 that reimburses you for the original purchase, so in an indirect way that $5 goes to the buyer to the pawn shop to you to the store to the company that issued the CD - if you follow the money trail. With eBay and companies that sell through Amazon make even bigger profits then some pawn shops. Amazon is weird because they might sell a CD from say LoveShackCDs for $100 where you can get the same CD as Bob'sBookStore for $3 - plus shipping and handleling & maybe even tax. If you bought from Amazon you would understand.

Torrents
But with the torrents you can't say no one stands to make a profit, I think Apple is making a profit selling iPods.

DeadShotKeen · 02-24-2010, 04:35 PM

To be honest I'd never considered that when I buy a 2nd hand LP/CD I'm not giving any royalties to the artist so this is an interesting point. Like an earlier poster said though you're often helping keep a 2nd hand record store in business, which in itself is great for music and therefore artists.

The whole "downloading damages the record industry" thing is a nonsense anyway. I've read enough reports now that back up my own instinct, namely that music lovers generally still spend the same as they did pre-torrents but continue to consume beyond that amount for free. This extra consumption thus fuels the "habit" and those acts become part of future spending, whether that be the next LP, a gig, T-shirt, whatever. The only people who now purely leech off torrents are those who spent next to bugger all in the first place anyway. Slightly off-topic there, admittedly.

Loose_control · 02-25-2010, 01:54 AM

I like buying cd's because I like the art and stuff but to tell you the truth I look at it for about a week put the cd on itunes and the cd goes back on the self. MP3 are great but if you meet a stranger you can give them a website to go to or a cd. If I had to choose I say a CD. I DJ to and I love digging thru old records and to tell you the truth I get the same feeling when I find a record store with used Cd's. Unless you can see every time a song gets played piracy and resale of used cd's are always going to be an issue. I'll always buy Cd's and buy legal downloads. I'm going to do my part to keep the music industry healthy

Shake · 02-25-2010, 10:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DeadShotKeen

To be honest I'd never considered that when I buy a 2nd hand LP/CD I'm not giving any royalties to the artist so this is an interesting point. Like an earlier poster said though you're often helping keep a 2nd hand record store in business, which in itself is great for music and therefore artists.

The whole "downloading damages the record industry" thing is a nonsense anyway. I've read enough reports now that back up my own instinct, namely that music lovers generally still spend the same as they did pre-torrents but continue to consume beyond that amount for free. This extra consumption thus fuels the "habit" and those acts become part of future spending, whether that be the next LP, a gig, T-shirt, whatever. The only people who now purely leech off torrents are those who spent next to bugger all in the first place anyway. Slightly off-topic there, admittedly.

That's exactly right. When companies say they lost X number of dollars from downloads, that's based on the assumption that every single person who downloaded it would have bought it anyway.

That's obviously not the case. I use torrents merely as a preview. If I like the album, I'll buy it. If not, then too bad, but I delete the music.

And if you look at the number of people who are in college/young kids etc who simply don't have the money, then the record companies can't possibly count that as "lost income" because these people don't have the money to buy albums in the first place.

Petula07 · 02-25-2010, 11:07 AM

Well, I guess internet and mp3 culture isn't only bad thing for artists...
I can say about me that with internet I found many many artists. Probably without internet (and downloading or uploading) I wouldn't find them because they aren't in Tv, radio or magazines.
Internet makes you more free - you can find and listen to everything what you want - it can be music from your country, Africa, Iceland - whatever.
Youtube is also good thing - it showed me some artists and it help me with my decision if I want to listen to (or buy) some music or not.
I know, downloading and Youtube stuff is illegal... but... I guess thanks to these things lot of bands find some new fans.

It depends on people...
Always there are people who steal music or who don't buy music. But it was possible before internet too - I think lot of people share/shared music between friends and for example only 20 % of children bought it. At least czech teenagers before internet era was like this. One kid bought album and 20 others kids had it from this person.
People who trully love music probably still buy CDs. It's just different and for me better feeling to listen to music from CD, to have it with nice cover in my hands.
Of course everybody is downloading sometimes but without downloading I wouldn't find what I love now. And I support my favourite musicians so I buy albums... But some of them I wouldn't know without internet and downloading

sidewinder · 02-25-2010, 11:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shake

And if you look at the number of people who are in college/young kids etc who simply don't have the money, then the record companies can't possibly count that as "lost income" because these people don't have the money to buy albums in the first place.

Just to play devil's advocate, we broke college kids back in the day did find ways to buy music back in the day. We just didn't consume it to the extent that kids today do. Sure, some would steal CDs from the shops, many would borrow or get copies from friends, but I think it's fair to say that everyone spent some amount of money on CDs/vinyl/tapes back in the day. Today, there are kids that spend absolutely zero dollars on music because they were brought up on MP3s. Sad but true.

In general though, I do believe that being able to preview music does help some bands get the exposure they deserve, and helps weed out some of the garbage (hopefully contributing to the death of some top-40 garbage artists that big labels love to push), and that real music fans will still spend money on music despite their ability to get it for free.

Urban Hat€monger ? · 02-25-2010, 12:12 PM

Here's a novel idea for record companies if they want to make money.

Stop releasing so many crappy albums.

You know what I would be interested in seeing statistics for?

Loss of revenue from illiegal downloading vs Loss of revenue from people downloading one or two songs legally from I-Tunes rather than a full album.

Violent & Funky · 02-25-2010, 12:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Urban Hatemonger

Here's a novel idea for record companies if they want to make money.

Stop releasing so many crappy albums.

You know what I would be interested in seeing statistics for?

Loss of revenue from illiegal downloading vs Loss of revenue from people downloading one or two songs legally from I-Tunes rather than a full album.

A lot of artists are pulling their music off of iTunes; it boosts their album sales:

Quote:

Avoiding iTunes runs against the conventional logic of the music industry, where it's now taken as an article of faith that digital downloads will eventually replace CDs. But there is growing discomfort with the dominant role iTunes already plays: The store sells 90% or more of digital downloads in the U.S., according to people in the music industry. At the start of this year, iTunes become the largest retailer of music in the U.S., surpassing Wal-Mart Stores Inc., according to research firm NPD Group Inc.

Label executives, managers and artists chafe against the iTunes policy that prevents them from selling an album only. ITunes, with few exceptions, requires that songs be made available separately. Consumers strongly prefer that, though Apple also typically offers a special price for buyers who purchase all the songs on an album.

Some artists see their albums as one piece of work, and don't want them dismantled. Their handlers believe they can make more by selling complete albums for $10 to $15 than by selling individual songs.

"In so many ways it's turned our business back into a singles business," says Ken Levitan, Kid Rock's manager. Mr. Levitan says the rise of iTunes is far from being a boon to the industry; instead, he calls it "part of the death knell of the music business."

More Artists Steer Clear of iTunes - WSJ.com

02-25-2010, 11:07 AM	#17 (permalink)
Petula07 ♫ Music 'n' Sun ♫ Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: Prague Posts: 388	Well, I guess internet and mp3 culture isn't only bad thing for artists... I can say about me that with internet I found many many artists. Probably without internet (and downloading or uploading) I wouldn't find them because they aren't in Tv, radio or magazines. Internet makes you more free - you can find and listen to everything what you want - it can be music from your country, Africa, Iceland - whatever. Youtube is also good thing - it showed me some artists and it help me with my decision if I want to listen to (or buy) some music or not. I know, downloading and Youtube stuff is illegal... but... I guess thanks to these things lot of bands find some new fans. It depends on people... Always there are people who steal music or who don't buy music. But it was possible before internet too - I think lot of people share/shared music between friends and for example only 20 % of children bought it. At least czech teenagers before internet era was like this. One kid bought album and 20 others kids had it from this person. People who trully love music probably still buy CDs. It's just different and for me better feeling to listen to music from CD, to have it with nice cover in my hands. Of course everybody is downloading sometimes but without downloading I wouldn't find what I love now. And I support my favourite musicians so I buy albums... But some of them I wouldn't know without internet and downloading __________________ *Take whatever comes to you 'cause time flies...* ♫ ♫ Some Song ♫ ♫ Last.fm ♫ ♫ Some Song ♫ ♫

02-25-2010, 12:12 PM	#19 (permalink)
Urban Hat€monger ? The Sexual Intellectual Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Somewhere cooler than you Posts: 18,605	Here's a novel idea for record companies if they want to make money. Stop releasing so many crappy albums. You know what I would be interested in seeing statistics for? Loss of revenue from illiegal downloading vs Loss of revenue from people downloading one or two songs legally from I-Tunes rather than a full album. __________________ Urb's RYM Stuff Most people sell their soul to the devil, but the devil sells his soul to Nick Cave.

02-24-2010, 04:35 PM	#14 (permalink)
DeadShotKeen Music Addict Join Date: Feb 2010 Location: Manchester, UK Posts: 79	To be honest I'd never considered that when I buy a 2nd hand LP/CD I'm not giving any royalties to the artist so this is an interesting point. Like an earlier poster said though you're often helping keep a 2nd hand record store in business, which in itself is great for music and therefore artists. The whole "downloading damages the record industry" thing is a nonsense anyway. I've read enough reports now that back up my own instinct, namely that music lovers generally still spend the same as they did pre-torrents but continue to consume beyond that amount for free. This extra consumption thus fuels the "habit" and those acts become part of future spending, whether that be the next LP, a gig, T-shirt, whatever. The only people who now purely leech off torrents are those who spent next to bugger all in the first place anyway. Slightly off-topic there, admittedly.

02-25-2010, 01:54 AM	#15 (permalink)
Loose_control Groupie Join Date: Feb 2010 Location: Im in LA trick Posts: 19	I like buying cd's because I like the art and stuff but to tell you the truth I look at it for about a week put the cd on itunes and the cd goes back on the self. MP3 are great but if you meet a stranger you can give them a website to go to or a cd. If I had to choose I say a CD. I DJ to and I love digging thru old records and to tell you the truth I get the same feeling when I find a record store with used Cd's. Unless you can see every time a song gets played piracy and resale of used cd's are always going to be an issue. I'll always buy Cd's and buy legal downloads. I'm going to do my part to keep the music industry healthy