Its a bit quiet on the news front so I thought we could debate some of the issues surrounding the music scene and how it affects artists and consumers.
http://techdirt.com/articles/20060428/036245.shtmlthe Allman Brothers Band and Cheap Trick claim that their label, Sony Music, isn't paying them what they're owed in royalties for songs bought on iTunes. They're getting 4.5 cents, rather than the 30 cents they believe they're owed.
The folks at the label claim it's in the classification that gets the smallest amount, while the bands claim it's in the one that gets the largest.
However, what could make it interesting is if the bands prevail (which is probably unlikely). Plenty of other musicians would quickly line up for their missing royalties as well -- and it could take a bit of a dent out of the recording industry's digital profits while increasing their ignored demands for higher download prices. Either way, it's yet more evidence that the recording industry's and the musicians' interests are quite often not aligned.
These are the places any new UK artists should head to to aviod getting shafted by the recording industry ( a few US links would help folks
)
http://www.computermusic.co.uk/tutorial/ripoff/1.aspand here
www.musiciansunion.org.uk.
Anyone thinking of dealing with the music industry is urged not to jump in with demos etc before checking their rights will not be stolen by these often selfish companies.
In the UK they are currently fighting the artists over legal download revenues, the record companies say that the artist deserves around 4.7 pence from each download and the labels get 10 times that much, for doing what you ask ?
The industry should not be about winners and losers it should be about something positive for all concerned whether on a large scale or small scale, its not hard to promote the best talent but that should not be at the expense of talent that has not yet found its market place or artistic "sound", artists are folks who want others to enjoy their music and dont mind getting paid by popularity, but unfair practices by the industry such as paying for radio airplay often turns that on its head.
Anyway I hope those of you who are interested read the sites listed and learn a little about how to get rich and the rest of us will do as we always do and purchase stuff we like as we always have done, p2p is after all a great way to sample music, many new artists have made use of this to gain a market for themselves and I hope many more will.
