Review Of The Free Music Debate
Inspired by the coming release of Chris Andersen's book Free: The Future of a Radical Price
, we've been exploring the importance of free music. There is no debating that free is here, but the discussion as to how to use free music, even how to monetize it, has just begun.
Last week's posts sparked a lively debate among readers and in other publications. Ex-Coolfer blogger Glenn Peoples, now at Billboard, wrote an extensive essay "The Free Debate" noting that, "as companies search for new ways to monetize recorded music, expect free music to be a common theme" and went on to quote several of the "Free Thinkers" who graciously wrote essays on Hypebot last week. I'd like to thank each of those contributors and Hypebot's smart and opinionated readers for adding to this important discussion. Take a minute to read any that you missed.
- Kyle Bylin: FREE!: The Kind of Music Nobody Wants To Own
- Virgil Dikerson:"You Can Always Go Back To School"
- Kevin Kelly: "Sell things that can't be copied."
- FREE THINKERS – The Industry Talks About Free
- Greg Scholl of The Orchard
- Bruce Warila of Music Xray
- Chris Vinson of Bandzoogle
- Bruce Iglauer of Aligator Records
- Jim Mahoney of The A2IM
- Robb McDaniels of INgrooves
- Jeff Price of Tunecore
- Susan Ferris of Long Curve Records
- Kevin Arnold of IODA
Nice list of articles debating the “Free Music” topic. I don’t see the big problem with giving away free music. I am a musician and I enjoy making as much music as possible. I now can use some tracks that may not make it to an album and use them for marketing.
Im also seeing some rap artists doing interesting things with free music. One rapper made a free song every week for several months. He even called out all DJ’s to use his music, mix it how they like and he would do a free Drop or message for their mixtape. He used his free music as a way to push the DJ movement to spin his music in clubs and redistribute it to their fans. Talk about Viral.
I think its going to be interesting….