Spiel

This was in response to a facebook post about Thom Yorke being pro-piracy. No one read it, so I might as well jam it in here.

The music industry has no one to blame but themselves. Their overhead costs are ridiculous, and any act who signs has to go into debt while the label spends hundreds of thousands recording and promoting. Anyone who is a musician should stay the hell away from the sinking ship that is the major label industry and self-release their material or else sign with an independent label. It doesn't take much money to record an album, hire an independent producer or make a home music video and upload it to youtube. Self-finance tours, and build an audience the old fashioned way. You will never get rich, but if you work hard and your music is worth a damn, you'll love what you do and you might someday make a living at it.

I work in the radio broadcast industry. Our job is to sell airtime, not music. That's why corporate radio has been rigidly tightened into restrictive formats over the past 4 decades. Massive media conglomerates have consolidated ownership of radio stations into very few hands, and those hands are huge multinational corporations that have no interest in promoting artistic achievement. They are in it to make money. There is more good music today than ever before, and yet we have been hearing a progressively narrower variety of voices as independent players in the radio industry are squeezed out. In Canada we have 6 media companies that own over 90 percent of the radio stations in all the major markets.

The record industry's business model is flawed. Only 10 percent of major label acts break even, let alone turn a profit. The tiny minority that does pays for all the rest. I can't think of another business in the world that has a 90 percent failure rate and is still economically feasible.

Piracy is the wrong word for it. It's called sharing. I own thousands of records and download gigabytes of music constantly. And yet I'm among the most voracious consumers of musical product you'll ever meet. What does that say? The media channels are broken, and the internet is letting people get their music heard and find fans.