Internet and the music industry
 

how do you think the internet has effected the music industry? Also do you think it will get better with time?

the internet made music better / thread

How do you think it has made it better and do you mean for the listener or for the artists?

To a degree it has devalued music.

Pre-internet you bloody treasured a brand new album and played it non-stop for the first week or so.

These days folks download multiple albums per day and may take weeks to even play it for the first time.

Must admit that on the plus side it's so much easier to gain exposure to a wider breadth of musical styles.

Hi there,

Well opinions tends to be differ, but I think internet made it easier for us to choose a music that we can't find it easily on local market.While shopping for these type of music, the extent to which music is available over the internet is enormous and you only have to do a simple search to discover a whole new world of tunes you never even dreamed existed. For appreciating individual’s passion towards music there are some good online sites like musicgallery.com, musicforte.com and many more that provide you with the best experience and large collections of songs too.

You would have to define the question a little more. It has made music easier to obtain and definitely more diverse for the consumer. I would also argue that the internet has provide the indie labels and unsigned artists to get their work out to larger audiences. Anything that undermines the top four major labels is a fantastic thing. Laws are going to start to limit piracy, which should help the industry prosper. I'd love to hear other opinions about it.

I honestly think that whilst the internet has made music more accessible (with regards to being able to watch and be aware of bands from all over the world, regardless of whether they are on a major label or not), I agree with some of the comments that it has devalued music somewhat, and would go a step further and say it has hurt the industry more than it's helped it.

I feel this is because the market has become more saturated - it's almost like there is too much music now (if that's possible!) & the major labels are aware that there are so many acts/bands to choose from so in some ways abuse the situation. Due to the whole situation with illegal downloading of music which is partly a result of music being available on the internet, that has kind of killed the major labels. As a result, they are reluctant to invest time & perhaps more significantly money into talented artists/bands/writers & instead rely heavily on TV shows such as BGT/AGT & X Factor who are sure bets to sell records, at least in the short term. I feel what this means is that we are seeing a time where artists have no longevity, because as soon as an act loses there popularity they simply get dropped from the label (because there are plenty of others to choose from!), by which time the next set of semi finalists/finalists from BGT/X Factor are ready to be marketed & the whole process repeats itself.

As a Singer/Songwriter myself however, it would be hypocritical of me to say that it is all bad - obviously I upload videos to YouTube, promote my music in blogs, on social networking sites etc, so obviously from a promotion/marketing point of view the internet has opened all sorts of gateways to getting my music heard as an independent artist.

However, on the whole I believe that less people are buying records because they can hear it online for free & less people are going out and watching live music because they can watch it online for free - so all in all, surely there's no positive the internet can bring that can outweigh the negatives of less people buying & watching live music.

Totally agree with those who say that the internet has been a net negative for music, not a good thing imho that just anyone can be an "artist" now. Most wannabe's can't hack it and there's too much noise, not enough signal...

When iTunes appeared on the music scene I began using it to explore the world of music - and I discovered a lot of good stuff which I had not been aware of before. For example - The Queers and The Pet Shop Boys. As well as good covers of Beatles, Madonna and ABBA classic songs by obscure bands.

i think that the music industry is not necessarily better, it's just different. it has definitely made becoming a musician more accessible to anyone, which means a lot of talented people are have the spotlight, but so do not-so talented people, y'know? it's a double-edged sword