Were Major Labels Right To Stay Away From The Cloud … And Should We Too?
David Greenberg, Cyde Smith and I recently shared our thoughts on the launch of cloud music services from Amazon and Google. Today, Robin Davey (@mr_robin_davey), a musician, artist and Head of Music & Film Development at GROWVision Media weighs in.
With the recent launch of Amazon and Google's music in the cloud services, the press embraced the apparent notion that these media conglomerates were showing the Majors Labels the middle finger. Supposedly surging forward without the labels consent and stepping into the next generation of music delivery.
Did anyone stop to think that the Majors lack of involvement might not be so combative? Perhaps they just have no interest in investing the time, money and effort, into something that appears to be an expensive, and unnecessary alternative to iTunes.
Maybe the Majors got it right for a change. They have enough trouble trying to get people to pay for music. Why on earth would they want to be involved with something that charges a fee, not for the music itself, but for the space it occupies. With Sony’s Online Entertainment servers recently being hit by excessive downtime, the timing couldn’t be worse for companies wishing to flaunt the accessibility of cloud based music services.
Both Google and Amazon offer limited free subscriptions, however, anyone considering the investment in time, should also look at services in the past that offered limited free options alongside premium services. Ning – the website/social network service is a prime example. Once it felt it had enough people invested in it’s system, they decided to cut the free service altogether, leaving users with no option but to pay up or get out.
So in theory these cloud base music service are holding your content hostage. At any moment your supposed free storage space, filled with your music that you spent hours to upload, could get an unexpected pricing hike. Without your monetary investment your content is locked away until you agree to pay the ransom. Gives another meaning to the “Amazon Locker” doesn’t it.
When companies get too big they always forget their roots. They forget that when they started they were just a couple of guys in a room with a great idea. That idea grew organically and flourished into something because people embraced it and found they couldn’t do without it.
The next big thing in music delivery and discovery will not be something that the media giants discuss in a boardroom, and in turn throw millions of dollars at. Whenever this happens, the overheads are so vast that in order to make it work, they have to incorporate some sort of pay structure. With music, haven’t we seen time and again, that this simply doesn’t work?
MORE:
- Bruce Houghton: How Google & Amazon Hurt Recorded Music By Launching Cloud Lockers
- Clyde Smith: Music In the Cloud: Battle For The Celestial Jukebox
- David Greenberg: Here We Go Again – The bright new future ahead where we can all share music in the cloud, NOT..
Neither Amazon or Google have a history of the type of bait and switch you talked about. Ning realized that the freemium model doesn’t work, but unlike Amazon and Google, they didn’t have other revenue to support what they were doing. IF they didn’t ditch the free, they would have gone belly up. The comparison is apples to oranges.
I see these locker services as being a good thing for the music industry. Unlike streaming services, it actually makes people want to buy music.
Getting $0.70 or so for a song that is put on a locker service vs. a fraction of a cent per song from streaming sounds a lot better to me.
The music industry needs to be looking at ways to make music more attractive to buy and not stream, especially for artists that do not tour (or bands that are too poor to tour). Lockers may not be the answer, but it’s a step in the right direction.
@Phil Only the Amazon locker offers the ability to buy music, and that is just an extension of their store. However the price points for storage space are ridiculous – Over 5gb and they start charging – smart phones have the ability to hold larger and larger cards. Why pay ridiculous monthly fees when you can easily fit that amount on your phone?
As a model it makes no sense and that’s why in my opinion it is just another Ping and not a potential Spotify.
Even if Google doesn’t let you buy (the labels fault) it’s still about storing purchased music.
Like I said, it may not be the answer, but anything that focuses on purchases rather than streams is in the right direction.
Although, maybe the future is touring, and those who strictly write music will be left out in the cold. Maybe streaming/touring is what will save the music industry.
Time will tell I suppose.
I don’t see how a locker would encourage purchasing from people who aren’t purchasing music already. These lockers–and streaming for that matter–seem like solutions to problems no one really needs solved. Most people have ample space for their music collections on their phones. And honestly, a lot of people are like me in that they have a smart phone but they have a separate mp3 player. The drain rate on your battery leads most people to save their phone usage for more important things like taking photos, using maps, and checking mail.
As for streaming, it’s a non-starter. People like to say they’ll be successful if they operate as music recommendation engines, but once again I don’t think this is an actual problem for most listeners. There are more than enough reputable recommendation sites (just read P4K to get started). It seems that the clamoring is more coming from musicians who want a service that recommends *their* music to people.
@patrick,
I listen to Pandora. It’s OK, but it gets repetitive and doesn’t always play the songs I like, but I don’t have time to put together a playlist of music I own and play it off my hard drive, plus what if I want to listen to that on something that isn’t my computer – no can do.
Don’t focus on the storage aspect, it’s not about that. It’s about the convenience of taking music you own, and obviously like, and streaming that to whatever player/device you want.
That’s how it promotes buying music, it puts the fan back in control of their listening. Again, I’m not saying it’s the answer to making everything all rainbows and puppy dogs. I’m saying that while streaming services don’t support buying, this does.
As for the solving problems that don’t exist – I disagree, for me as the fan, both allow me to listen to music I want, how and where I want to, with ease. It’s lazy proof.
It’s this danger of the unexpected pricing hike – and the necessity to have a smartphone that make the cloud music locker completely unattractive to this CD aficionado.
I agree it is holding your content hostage, and that is exactly why the major labels so badly want it. It is a way to get all you thieves to finally pay for that content!
Down with the cloud. Security, privacy are issues that they cannot and never will address.
Look at Sony.
Streaming music is like mp3 through a sieve. Mp3 is bad enough already.
Excellent article. It basically comes down to whether you want to “rent” music, or “own” it. It’s pretty obvious which choice is the winner for the listener and the musician, and which choice is the winner for the middle-man.