The tech and business of music have evolved together, creating an enormous industry. We learn how recording technology, radio and more have shaped business.
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welcome to textile production from heart, radio he there and welcome to textile buying your host Jotham Strickland, I'm an executive researcher, thy heart radio and how the tax area I thought it might be.
a good idea to do
one or two about the music industry because
howdy industry works as a business
Is really tightly tide
to technology. In fact, music itself is tightly died too
technology it is. The product of technology,
most cases I mean you can you can saying, and I guess that's a good argument to make her- that
some kind of music that doesn't involve technology, but most music does and the evolution of tech,
as really affected music in Newgate,
ways from the ability to record it too
new ways to create different kinds of musical, sounds and
all sorts of ways to experiment with record.
eng and music production
and distribution. Even that here we have to
all that into account. It's not just the tag. It's not just the business.
Air tightly integrated as over from the top
used to record music to the Tec, used to play it back to the
radio broadcasts too
streaming over the internet. We can really see
hell. Technology has shaped both art and business this by them.
Hey. This whole idea of me doing these episodes, which has taken me a long time to work on because there's just so much to cover it, was really prompt
did by the recent news that fan
of certain artists on death row. Music label were upset to discover
that's some of their favourite albums and songs were
disappearing from the very.
Popular music streaming services out there- and this coincides with some
dogs announcement that he wants to turn
death row records which he purchased not that long ago,
The first major music label in the metal, verse and
I get an enough t- music label pretty extreme. But let's dial back the clock
little bit before the early nineteen. Hundreds musicians really only had the option of making a living off their music a couple of different ways. They could,
play live venues and take a share of the box office, or they could
in themselves a wealthy or generous patron, whether that was
civic person, or maybe a government or whatever or
like you compose music, and they could then
it onto sheet music and print sheet music and sell that make money that way, but the
emergence of recorded media,
predated radio broadcasting that
the change everything in nice
Therefore, the Victor talking machine company, which made phonographs also died
business of producing music, because
If you don't have anything to play on your talking machine, why would anyone by one now in the early days, recording equipment was exceedingly scarce? Essentially the companies that possessed,
recording equipment were the same ones that were producing the play back equipment. They
in the business of doing both and then
From the very beginning, you had gatekeepers in the recorded music industry
where no such things as independent labels in the earliest days. Just the larger fund
wrath and gramophone companies, and so right from the start. We had a precedent
in which a few powerful companies determined what music would get recorded so
at that point musicians had an opportunity to make money off recordings. They could also
count on these companies to market music to a wider audience obeyed reach people there
Otherwise they never would have been able to.
people would be able to listen and enjoy their music and pay for it. More importantly, that other
these musicians would never have encountered, and the company would only make money if people were buying
the recordings, so we quickly establish this relationship.
the musicians. Creed,
the music and the
courting company did pretty much everything else from committing music.
physical recording to marketing the music to sail
and distribution of that music now,
praetor AWOL aid
U a l, the company
an acronym that stands for artists without a label
I do know for deal that Victor talking, machine company dead would give an artist
four thousand dollars for a single song and a cut of up to twenty six to forty percent of each
which is incredibly generous
and I'm imagining that four thousand dollars has
I've been adjusted for inflation because otherwise
talking about more than a hundred thirty thousand dollars for a single song and there's just no way that that's true.
Tat. I find the four thousand dollars thing hard to believe honestly, consider
the time period. The end again, it would
before thousand dollars in nineteen o four dollars, but the equivalent of four thousand dollars today. But let's just assume that its
accurate and that a well adjusted for inflation, the victor,
talking machine company was one of three major companies in the industry in those early early days, the other two worthy Colombia Phonograph Company, and then you had these
Most a Edison company and all three
These companies were making phonographs or phonograph like devices and
so they all had a vested interest in making sure that there was content to play on those devices they all
oh each wanted to dominate the industry they wanted to.
the big player, so they without each attempted
exclusive deals with specific musicians and orchestras
And early on, you had competing formats in India.
Record industry. So early early on, you had wax cylinders which not only didn't provide the best
quality, but they would also where down on repeated playback schools. They had a wax coding and playing them Woodstock.
to damage the coding. So after
a few dozen plays. It would
It really diminish quality, so
when the industry move from waxed, cylinders, two flat record desks, which were
it from hard material like Sheliach. It would be quite some time before the industry removed a vinyl.
But even when they went to discs the other flat disk format,
competing record disk sizes and playback speeds of the play back speeds
range from sixty rotation
per minute
two more than a hundred thirty rotations per minute and the play back. Speed
affected a lot of other stuff from
much audio. You can commit to a record to
the actual playback quality of the music. So, generally speaking, the faster the opium
here. The European, in other words in the early days, the better the sound.
Quality typically was right, like if you were playing
back. The record at a hundred thirty r, p M the club
was better than a record that would play back at sixty RPF. However, it also means
it takes much less time for a style is to go there,
the groove of record weather
recording or playing it back, which means you can
we fit a smaller amount.
Of audio per side of a disk. Then you could, if you're doing it's more slowly, so there were tradeoffs. You know
the aim, and, of course, if you played the desk at the wrong speed like if you had a sixty army
M record but you're playing it back at a hundred thirty IBM. Everything would be super fast twice more than twice as fast as what supposed to be, and so be. It would sound like the Chipmunks guy
into the coffee again
The early days of the recording industry were really a bed messy.
I'm sure you're all familiar with various format. Wars. I did an episode about format wars. Last week you know it's easy.
for consumers to hit limitations due to buying into a specific format over and others a you know you by the Out of Europe,
the Victor talking machine phonograph, then you might
not be able to play anything from any of the other companies. So
the gramophones photographs in turn. Tables were pretty expensive in the early days most folks. If they could even afford one would have to make a choice regarding what
format they would buy into
now eventually the industry would gravity
toward standardization, and you would have three speeds that were
really treaty
As far as the standards you had, seventy eight IBM forty five
IBM and thirty three
but our p m with forty five.
Thirty three ultimately dominating the space, seventy eight kind of faded away, but let's
a track a bit to talk about what was going on on the business side and then
in these companies first started getting started. What followed was a pretty easily predictable, predatory era in which these.
agents representing these different companies, like the Victor talking machine company, are Colombia or whatever they would go and scour regions for,
talented musicians who otherwise were unconnected up. If you
watch the movie, oh brother, where art thou they
end of play around with this idea near you. You get that that
statement about a feller who's, paying some
to sing into a can. What
Chemistry was actually going on in the early twentieth century. You had these agents seeking out talent,
and paying them a nominal fee to record a song and further the talent the fee might be considered
right. There might be a few hundred dollars to the tower. That might be an enormous amount of money, but
it's like a one time payment and then the
music company would have the use of that recording for as long as they kept the recording and ass. They could
Some serious money and work
turn on such things-
Then in nineteen o nine, the? U S, government passed a copyright act which would guarantee that writers and publishers of music would get a cut of record deals. However, it left out performers,
So you might wonder why the heck is that. Why would the writer and the publisher get I a guaranteed cut, but the person who performed it doesn't
Well, in the days of orchestral performances,
the chamber music in that kind of thing. The gym
philosophy was that
the bulk of the creative expression didn't come from the performers. Like yes,
you'd have someone who was very skilled, play and they're gonna sound better than someone who doesn't know what they're doing, but if you
Two different people were really scale, be general thought, was it's gonna be exactly the same and that the real creative of dry?
came not from the musicians but from the composer.
The composer would describe in excruciating detail how the music was to be played in the sheet music,
and the musicians, at least according to the philosophy of copyright law.
Just mere vessels dedicated to bringing that music to life by
the composer, was ultimately responsible for the actual work, the creative expression.
So the composer would get the credit and the compensation the? U S, gun
followed that same logic when they created this copyright law in nineteen o nine. The act also cut
but the innovation of recorded sound, which was something that wasn't concerned before ninety nine, because it wasn't really possible- and this would have
an enormous impact on the music business,
ever musician has
getting credit on a song. That musician is eligible for
songwriter royalties for the length of the copyright by the way length of copyright.
Something that continually got longer and longer when
big companies like Disney, would lobby to extend the period of copyright repeatedly so.
while originally the period of copyright would last couple of decades. Now it's like
the lifetime of the artist plus. I forget, like seventy years ago
that, but musicians who only had a musician credit there now
a songwriter they're, just a musician. They would not qualify,
for those self same royalties, which is kind of awkward numb, and that this is it
This continues to be an issue today, and this also
that if you wrote a real Bangor and someone else recorded it like covered it,
then you would be do the royalties from any sales or performances of that version. At least songwriter royalties and by
Norman, says we're really talking about stuff like new radio play or you.
The sin, tv or movies, and things of that nature so be.
The songwriter is a good
way to make money or the long run, because
does the stuff you right as popular they're gonna have
continued pay out for me
Since you are not composers, that was a difference,
or are they? They can't depend upon that same revenue stream for without indefinitely now, technically the copyright
should have curtailed some of the predatory behaviour that I was talking about earlier, but there was an awful
the exploitation of talent in those early days. The
recording industry then hit some really tough times. The nineteen twenty in the nineteen. Thirty is the great depression hit consumers very hard, so became pretty.
so we all play
there's an records, because people just didn't have the disposable income to do that.
And then we get to the evolution of radio and radio broadcasting. So the early days of radio were all
life performances over the air
a really wasn't a thing to play: prerecorded music for the most part, this
partly because the recording technology was such that the quality of
recordings were far inferior to live performances, so
It was considered a pretty big step down to play. A prerecorded
peace over the radio. So the early radio business was just
the phonograph business and that it was dominated by companies that made radios.
At the companies that were making radios were also the companies that owned radio stations. They were
in the business of broadcasting, because just like the phonograph,
a radio, no good to you unless you get something the tune in to rhyme, doesn't make any
since the by radio there
broadcasts in your area, so
The same companies that were making radios were creating the broadcast stations, and some of those stations were also companies that made record players. So you had. You know this. This convergent
of audio technology all coming in. At the same time,.
Explain how that change the music industry further when we come back after this quick break, this episode of text of is brought to you by royal Caribbean accrue sounds good right now. Doesn't it now? Is the time
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I have one you can reach a potential, your dreams, your goals and when
comes to your financial goals. Potential is the rock you can rely on with our knowledgeable financial professionals. We can help you get to new heights plan, invest in sure, retire visit potential, dot, com, Uzi or Rock Prudential Insurance Company of America of Newark New Jersey. This episode is brought to you by square one if your business could sell anywhere at anytime and open to Bora customers all by making one simple choice: running your business with square means being able to sell just as easily whether it's in
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as provided by Middlesex Federal savings. F, a member after I see terms and conditions apply our we left off till he no radio stations will these stations would hire performers to come in and play music live over three of radio
pills eventually began to slow down, largely because the folks who had been interested in radio and who could also afford one had bought one already so,
there. There was a steep rise in radio cells that then plateaus.
the technology hit a really early saturation point and that meant that there needed to be a different source of revenue.
This is where radio broadcasts began to incur
rate advertising in the early days of radio, the really wasn't advertising, but that changed pretty quickly.
In an advertising became the primary way that radio broadcasts stations would generate revenue. Now the can
There were side
listening to music on the radio was free. The radioset themselves were prohibitively expensive for some
And really when I say listening was free, I mean it's free in the way that this pod gas was free and that your Jaso had adds supporting the stuff. But
That was really the only cost of listening. Really, I'm sure sounds
very familiar to everyone out their right and the rate.
but also served as advertising for musicians and songwriters because, of course now we also had the ability to record that music on to physical media
and as recording technology improved, there was a new interest in record players and records, largely driven by teenagers, says
like in the fifties or so
the kids, will hear sign on the radio. They would want to be able to listen to that song whenever they liked,
So they would rush out and buy the record of that artist
and the radio would become a key component in the marketing of music. This would all
so shaped music itself
very early days. The limitations of recording meant you could fit around four minutes of audio on a single physical, cylinder or desk, which meant that you couldn't write me
Zack, though it last longer than that or you had to write music. There could be divided up into four minute chunks, and then you might sell several desks for longer pieces, but it meant that be
sorry to settle on us on a link for music,
of around four minutes per song or less, which is
why, to this day, the way we listen to music, like a lot of our songs, fall into that general range. There was a
technical limitation of the time that created
it cultural standard really for
a standard length of a song. There obviously exceptions to this right.
You have the raw bones, where a four minutes,
long would be an epic, and then you have the late meat loaf, where a format zone would be the
getting of his fourteen minutes long hit. So there are exceptions but gently
making like this is what we,
talk about how technology shaped music. This is kind of what I'm talking about the limitation
I've only being able to record a few
minutes of audio per side is what shaped modern music
and four songs to be the link that they are now as record.
Technics techniques actually evolved. It became possible to record more content per se.
The other record, so the
a limitation of four minutes per side grand
the faded away. This would end up
giving birth to the album. Because, while you could
for a very long piece of music per
side, and there were people who did it, especially for things like classical music of you.
Could also use this to create a collection of songs.
however, while that was going on, radio was sweet things back to the early days of recording, because you had the new musical entity of the radio single coming out around this time
no was nineteen. Forty nine, when RCA Victor introduce the forty five
If our pm seven edge record now these
records because of their size, the seven inch size and there are rpm
We need a forty five revolutions per minute. They could only
hold a few minutes, a music per side, just like the early records of the era, and
several things. All kind of happened to make the forty five really popular one,
was that you got a lot of record players that could actually accommodate forty fives. They were less expensive
and the larger thirty three in a third albums. They also happen to come out just but
or the Rock n roll music
Revolution happened,
and all of that came together to completely reshape the music industry, and
That's really where we started, seeing the the focus on singles.
To the point where you've got some folks who bemoan that where it was,
potentially something that limited the music industry.
Became a common practice
record, a musician or bans really popular song as the aid side of
forty five single and then
use the other side, the bees side to include a lesser known peace from that ban? So sometimes you might get a demo version of a song which is kind of cool.
you get a song that wasn't included on the full album. That featured the ace
single that was really cool is like the only way you could get. Those songs
luckily the forty five would have the same songs that were getting widespread radio play on the east side. So
Again, the radio acted as Canada, commercial for the music. The aid side was the product.
The beside with some bonus material.
the recording industry evolved certain companies.
Solid, dated purchasing up smaller musical,
Those RCA Victor was one of those with RCA being fame.
for making radios and broadcast stations Victor being famous for phonographs. Then
the to merge together. Some other really big. Recording companies shut down the Thomas Edison company dissolved its wreck, recording division back and nineteen twenty nine. That was your
the great depression, so that you know I was kind of
coinciding with the time where people just didn't, have the money to purchase that kind of stuff, the birds
in film industry also got into the music industry,
There were some smaller independent labels that were establishing themselves around this time, as well, so stern get really interesting.
by the nineteen sixty. However, the bigger labels were gobbling up all the smaller ones, because there's always a bigger fish, so CBS, which started off as a network of radio broadcasts
stations acquired Colombia records which again was one of the big
three early early on the also acquired
the American Record Corporation
Warner. Brothers ended up purchasing, ABC Records and also had Warner records,
and the company bought seven arts and reprise
then Atlantic then Electra records labels. So
You had these big companies getting bigger massive corpse
corporations a reshaping how the music biz worked really fortifying themselves now, for decades,
Musicians were pretty much limited by either the huge conglomerates or they can
work with a few smaller independent labels. If they wanted to record their music recording require
specialized equipment, mixing expertise, dedicated space
it required the ability to actually create a master recording and then to duplicate that master recording onto copies. So I just
The practical foremost musicians to do all of this themselves remember this is in the days of physical media. By there is
digital approach. Here you could not have a file representing a song, so
you, you really did need to lean on actual organ,
stations to do this because they had the capital to get all this equipment and expertise together.
Didn't you actually had the process of taking recording and mass producing copies of it for sale? Again,
Well beyond the reach for individual performers, then you
the marketing and distribution side like actually promoting the matter.
Bill and getting the material out two points of sale. Another big limiting factor most people would not be able do that on their own, so the sin
the relationship between musicians and record labels, really solidified in this era of an eye,
You say symbiotic, but depending upon the
position you might hear it was more. Parasitic
the record labels had allow the power, and unless you reached a particularly high level
the fame. You probably didn't have a lotta leverage to land yourself, a really lucrative deal.
Now, one way you could make money is to perform at live, shows. Typically, artists get a cut of the gate, that is the box office or ticket sales.
And they might also set up merchandise or merch tables. They typically get most
that as well, you have to pay out. The people who are
the tables
but otherwise that's that's cash in the pockets of the performers. This pathetic
her approach also requires a lot of investment anyway, because you gotta get book right, you have to drafting
establish a relationship with the venue and get an agreement to perform at a certain date and
arrive at the deal. The divide like how much of the time
sales goes to the venue versus the the band and then once you
today about bigger venues than you also are usually talking about a booking agent, someone who is just specifically focused on getting that stuff sewn up, because that
by itself as a full time. Gig our know how many of you out there have jobs
sir activities that involve having to schedule stuff with other people but you'd if you'd,
had to do it. You know that there is an enormous amount of time committed to getting that
just imagine doing that for a big band, that's travelling, say across the United States and in establishing venues
they're gonna performs perform, knowing that the really big ones typically get gum
that's pretty early, so you have to plan this out,
more than a year in advance. In some cases,.
And, of course, over the last two years, the live performance industry took an an enormously heavy hit. Tons of venues were shut down during the pandemic for months at a time so
For about a year. The revenue stream was essentially gone, and even after that it was the owl,
It was all dependent upon where you were and says
vast majority of musicians make their living by playing live. Shows things got really tough for musicians now, of course,
record contracts earn, musicians money too? It's not like they're recording for free the big,
way to earn money through records is through royalties. Now this gets pretty complicated
particularly since there are different kinds of royalties
yo I mention their songwriter royalties, for example, but there are lots of different types of royalties
Now, what royalty is? Essentially it's a payment made to the rights owner of a particular work for the license. Use of that work. The licensed use can include all sorts of stuff
include radio air play. It can include the you
the music and television or movies Aiken include recording. It can include streaming
with artists who have signed when labels we're talking about a percentage of the fee. The gets paid to the label in return for the use of that music. So.
In other words, the way this works as whomever
once the music, whether it's a person walking into an old school record store or now the person who is trying to do
I'll be the soundtrack to the next couldn't turn Tino movie. They go,
the record label they pay for the
so that music on the record,
label takes a cut of this and then a percentage of that
amount. There was paid to the record label, then gets paid out to the rights holder or artist.
But it doesn't really get a simple is usually artists get what's called an advance this
The sum of money that Spain, the artist upon some deliverable, for example,
they can be when an artist signs a contract or completes an album recording. Then the artist gets a pay out, but that pale
is actually counted against future royalties.
and royalties are percentage of each individual sale. So before east are earning lots of royalties. You first have to recoup
money that the label spent on you with. The advance
this is way easier to understand. If we actually use a hypothetical example, so let's say
they're. My band Johnny in the Tec heads
they ten thousand dollar advance on our new album,
so that ten grand is ours to keep. Unless we ve done. Some
really silly like signed a contract that requires us to pay back in advance if we dont recoup the expense, no
should ever agree to do that. The reason,
it's good to get a lawyer to look over contracts before you sign them,
say, our royalty payments is a nickel per unit solved, so five cents. Every time they sell a unit
It doesn't matter to me what the unit is in this case, this just a hypothetical ex example. Now
We don't actually earn any royalties until we ve recouped the amount of money the label spent on us in its advance. That means working
the paying off that ten thousand dollars one nickel. At a time
It means we would have had two hundred thousand units sold before we started earning royalties and we would start
royalties starting with copied,
two hundred thousand and one so ones
advances, recouped. The royalty checks can start coming in
Also, ten grand is a lot of money, but your usually tell you about splitting that with a bunch of different people, there's the band,
have a manager there's a producer.
that, usually you have to pay the producers royalty out of your own royalties and, of course,
about payments they dont have tax with holdings, so them
is that you really need to be holding onto that cash because you're going to be spending some of that to pay taxes, because nothing was withheld, so you're going to owe it at the end of the year.
That ten, grand or whatever gets well down pretty quickly. So that's one of the really big reasons that a lot of bans go.
Tours and do lots of live shows the albums can get fan
fans come to the shows and that's where the musicians really typically earn a lot of cash plus, of course they can connect with their fan base.
In most cases, the record labels going to keep around eighty five percent or more of the revenue from albums and songs sold with the artist getting the rest in royalties again, once the advances recouped
in return, the record label handles all the distribution and marketing for the musicians, and that's the big tradeoff
I will we come back- we'll talk about how the music industry has changed even more in more recent years.
This episode of text of has brought to you by royal Caribbean accrue sounds good right now. Doesn't it now is the time to make the most
your vacation and a royal caribbean group gives you the chance to have an experience, unlike any other choose from over two hundred. Seventy destinations, including Alaska, Europe, the Caribbean and even perfect day, island royal, Caribbeans own private, get away
in the Bahamas go on an adventure aboard some of the world's biggest ships
boy, live entertainment, world class, dining and amazing activities. Try shipboard skydiving with ice.
I take a thrill ride on a water slide or try serving on the flow writer weather
your bonding with friends or gathering the family to make lifelong memories. Royal, caribbean crews isn't just taking a vacation, it's taking vacation for all its
worse. You've waited long enough. It's time to rise to the vacation, come seek. The royal Caribbean learn more at royal, caribbean dot com fortune, favors the bold, the strong
the brave for your business to break out of anything holding you back. You need business checking as brave as you are
introducing Novo business, checking its powerfully simple, giving you all the features you need an unlikely, traditional banking,
idle Novo, has no minimum balances, no transaction limits and no hidden fees instead of a one size fits all approach. Novo is customize to your business, to save you time and free up cash flow with seamless integration to stripe shop. If I click books online- and
or sign up for Novo for free and joined the community of over one hundred. Fifty thousand fearless small businesses who found the customizable business
decking solution that admires their bravery. Sign up for your free business, checking account right now at Novo dot C, o slash tech, stuff, plus text of listeners, get access to over five thousand dollars in perks and discounts. Go to n, o v, o dot c, o slash tech stuff to sign up for free, Novo, DOT C, o slash tech, Stuff Novo Platform incorporated is a fintech, not a bank banking services.
provided by Middlesex Federal savings. F, a member empty icy terms and conditions apply. Prudential knows the importance of having a rock in your life. Every
needs a rock, a rock
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simple so with the rise of the internet. A lot of new ways to earn money have emerged for musicians,
musicians can make use of tools like band camp or patriarch. They can sell
is it directly to their fans or invite their fans to help support their work.
A patriot.
Be done in a way where people are subscribing monthly to an artist.
They drank it, be done so that every time something new is released, then the supporters can paid have access to that thing, so
it creates a more direct pathway between artist, an audience and by
This is a lot of the other stuff that you would typically have to go through. Music
You can also try to bank role a recording by law.
She got crowd funding campaigns or something like Kickstarter. Randy go go
The proliferation of digital recording equipment and software has
We open up the opportunity for musicians to take on a lot of the traditional recording work themselves. So, in other words
The things that were limiting factors back in the early days, the fact that only these big companies had access to recording equipment- that's no longer the case,
right. You can go out and buy them fairly.
decent recording equipment for not that much money. None the grand scheme of things a minute it still is gonna cost you probably a few thousand.
Dollars which don't get me wrong. That's allied, but its peanuts compared to what it was back in the old days,
where there just wasn't that option. So you
can do a lot of this stuff yourself, although it does still require expertise and skill in you know executing it, and that goes from everything from the the playing of the music to the recording process through the mixing process. All of that requires a lot of work.
It's not like it's blooded blame, but it's a lot:
what more within reach than it used to be, but the two
biology that really has dramatically disrupted the music industry over the last decade or so is definitely streaming. So, let's talk about what streaming actually is
Please it's accessing media in real time, although we could pick some nets with that definition and the use of the phrase real time, but it gets across the meaning.
So instead of downloading a song to a device use, some sort of service could be an app. May
your browser based service, too
Listen to music streaming from a web server somewhere out. There.
To your local device and your device,
receives the music in the form of digital data set pretty much like
the other data that would be sent across a computer network, so it's kind of like radio
Whereas on demand- and it's not you
traditional over the air, radio broadcasts and standards using
essentially zeros and ones coming from a server to your device.
There are a lot of places where we could start our story about streaming,
sample way back in eighteen, ninety three, when pretty much most, the population really didn't
stand. What the heck the internet was you
the internet underground music archive- or I? U am aim. This was created by some students at the University of California.
The crews. Are they launched an organization to give independent artists away to get their music to fans? So
and like if you didn't, have a deal with a big record label that could distribute and print and market your music.
This was away where you can bypass all that.
This was one of those very early demonstrations of how the internet can't democratize content distribution,
bypass the traditional model, which has massive
media companies yield being the gatekeepers, which you might guess, the massive media companies weren't super crazy about this idea and you'd be right because it turns out, if a thumb,
yeah, if you end up accumulating a lot of power, you're not great,
the about giving that up now I find
the eye. You may story really impressive, because this was before the mp3 format had really taken off.
Mp3 is a type of art
your file, where you're using compression to reduce the file size,
not audio compression but file size compression. Two different things here:
although there can be audio compression as part of it, because the way and be three works is that at least philosophically the way it works,
is that there is there a lot of things and sound that humans cannot directly perceive our ability to hear
has limitations, and so the philosophy
he behind him be three: is that you drop any sounds that humor,
It would not be able to hear anyway, and then you can reduce the file size.
Why I'm oversimplifying? But that's generally, the thought process bind and be. Three is a psycho acoustic approach to figuring out what
information is most necessary so that you keep that and you get rid of everything else.
Anyway, because the three had not really become a big deal
got a ninety. Ninety three, the files were often formats like wave or a I e, F, F and theirs.
Be much much much bigger than M p three files, and you have to keep in mind that this was also back in the day when folks were using dial up internet. You know it was pretty limited bandwidth heck. Just
getting an image to load, could take the better part of a minute. So this was not streaming. This was not,
the days of streaming, this was all about downloading files. Naked take
a really long time to download a single file, but this was a stepping stone toward street
another really big. Stepping stone was the development of Napster
in fact, a later service with the name of Napster, would become a streaming music service. But the original ink,
donation of Napster was not streaming. It was a peer to peer file, sharing network that specifically focused on sharing music files. Now by this,
I am by the time Napster came around, which was the late nineties. The M p three format was established.
Which was great because it allowed users to compress audio files down to a fraction of their raw size, not me
much easier to transfer those files over networks. Also, we were starting to get better
connections to the internet. Not everyone had it. I had a dial up internet connection for a really long time, but eventually we got there. Of course, if you really compressed music a lot like
is a very strong, vile compression. You could affect the sound quality to the point where it was noticeable, but deal if you are careful, you can find the right balance between file size reduction and not affecting the quality
too much now, beer to beer systems are not inherently wrong. They're, not
the illegal, but it was
impossible to deny that the majority
the file transfer traffic across Napster was with copyrighted music file.
And that the people who were sharing them didn't have the right to do so so folks, my news, a computer to rip
music files from a cd they put a cd and a cd rom drive the youth programme.
To pull the music off the CD rom DR convert
men to mp3 file formats,
and then store them in a Napster folder and then make them available for other people on the peer to peer network to download those files. Meanwhile, the people,
We're doing this we're also looking for music that was available on other people's machines. Napster
became a haven of music trading and theft, not
I'm cases votes were using it to find songs that you literally could not find in other places like you could not go
by this music because it wasn't available for purchase ass. A thing
a bootleg albums and live recordings that otherwise didn't exist commercially.
Those were getting a lot of trade there too. Now, just because something is not available, commercially doesn't mean that you have the right to whom to seek out recordings of it, but still like you could see why people
If I had rightly they'd literally say like there's no way for me to buy this, and I really want it, I wasn't able to experience it in person. So this is what I am going to do,
I can understand that philosophy. Heck I've done it myself in the best. It's very frustrating experience to bear, but a lot of
so they were using it just to get hold of a song or an album, or even an entire music library without having to pay for it. I'm not saying ever,
What do you use? Napster? Was stealing music left right and centre?
but enough people were to make it a real problem. This happened to coincide with a dip in music sales,
In that sense, the recording industry into a frothy rage? I was gonna.
It is easy, but it was way more than a dizzy. Now
Was that causation or just correlation? I think
a lot of correlation here. I don't think it was pure causation. But again when you ve got,
a multi billion dollar industry and they see a dep they want. Very.
Quickly to identify the cause of that dip into eliminated, because you know corporations are all designed to make as much money as they possibly can sell in
case, you had a dip in music sales and
a rise in the use of peer to peer networks, specifically Napster.
and the conclusion was napster- is killing the music industry, so we must now get from orbit because it's the only way to be sure so
the forlorn Napster and a lot of its users were the targets of multiple lawsuits, some of which allege that Napster had caused massive revenue losses. Now I would say that
That is an argument that is impossible to support in any quantifiable way. I mean you could
You could say that, yes, it had to have some sort of impact. I mean it's common sense that folks getting access to music for free is going to hurt music sales, but it's impossible to act.
We put a quantifiable number on that
because you have no way of knowing how many of those folks would have actually bought
An album or a single in the first place
there had been no Napster does,
no way of saying you can't say: oh well, if they haven't stolen this music,
then they would have water logic copy. You don't know that it's possible
they just would have gone without, but it was still
Lenny enough for the music industry to go nuclear on not just Napster, but all the folks who had been using services like Napster
download music illegally
and it was a really really ugly time Napster itself in its original form anyway shut down,
by two thousand and one the bright
Stars burn out the quickest- I guess so
the early two thousands we saw
first emergence of legitimate digital music stores. Nowhere
three could actually purchase a song
and had money would go presumably to the record label. Behind that song
in the early days. Must these were operated by the individual music labels
It would be a little bit later before we would get the Itunes store. The Itunes store
didn't actually launch until two thousand three, and
There is no denying that this was at least in part, a response to the problems that the industry had seen with services like Napster Apple wisdom
again saying you don't want
we'll just stealing your music, but people do what action
the digital copies of your music, how do you manage this? Tell you what let us manage it for you, and this was like a
huge huge step forward.
apple, it would end up being one of their debt
most brilliant ideas they came up with when it comes to ways to make more money
now, initially these
music label stores. They didn't offer any streaming capabilities either customers would go to the stores purchase prices.
Songs or albums
and download those files to their computers or other devices
because in the earliest days were mostly just say about downloading two computers. They way
have to actually use a physical cable to connect something like
M p, three player. You know like
I pod to your computer and you would transfer
music over the cable that way primitive right. He notices
again before you had these devices. The had wifi capability or cellular capability built into them
oh and by the way, to get off on a little bit of a tangent. This was also the time where you learned very quickly. That apple was great at creating a an experience that worked within a specific ecosystem,
if you had a MAC, computer and an ipod- and
used Itunes. It was all pretty seamless
It's easy to do. It was easy to update
your ipod like if you bought new music on Itunes.
Dear computer, you get updates
I bought pretty easily by connecting it to your MAC. If, however,
you own the pc, then he used ideas for pc and you and I bought it- was
nightmare speaking as someone from had that experience, it was terrible
and you learn very quickly that the ecosystem was going to be a big deal in the future
the attack, and that is another one right. The getting caught in a specific ecosystem, where, if you want to
kind of explore beyond it. You end up getting punished for it anyway,
as digital music stores were taking shape. You had a few different groups working on pieces of tact. That collectively would allow for music streaming
That is where we're going to leave off when we,
He come back for our next episode. In this we will start picking up at the birth of musical streaming held that got started.
And then how that in turn had a big impact on the music industry and how people make money.
to explore. Issues like is their money into
you mean you ve probably heard people complain that there
being pennies on the dollar because of streaming.
their revenue, has taken a huge hit in the wake of street.
We're gonna, look at that and see what's going on there, you're gonna, take a look,
at the big streaming services out there and how they are performing
and maybe even start talking about. What's next to me, we ve have seen kind of a resurgence in interest and fiscal media
that's going to be more
of a thing or two,
just a little. You know interesting flash in the pan.
These are things we will talk about in our next episode for now, we're gonna wrap this up
If you have suggestions for topics, I should cover on future episodes a text of please reach out to me that way to do that,
is on Twitter, the Hanover the show is tat stuff page as W.
you again
track star is an Iheart radio production or more podcast. From my heart radio visit the Iheart Radio out Apple podcast, wherever you listen to your favorite jobs.
It.
Transcript generated on 2022-05-02.