DISQUS

Jeff Crites · 1 year ago

I have more than a dozen years in the radio industry, and you're spot on. Yes, things have radically changed, especially in terms of how consumers 'discover' new music and artists. In decades past, radio was THE place you heard a new song, as stations were given new releases IN ADVANCE of them hitting store shelves.

DJs would play that cool new song and build excitement for weeks until it could finally be purchased. The music industry and the radio industry had a mutually beneficial relationship, but both are now reeling from the advance of the digital age, expansion of choice, empowerment of consumers, etc ... and both are lashing out at anything and everything that threatens their once dominant business models. (I worked with XM at its launch in 2001, and the Nat'l Assoc of Broadcasters spent all of its time screaming and crying in an attempt to cripple the advance of satellite radio).

I won't go into illegal file sharing and downloads except to say I purchase all of my music. I just don't purchase as much as I used to due to lack of quality.

mathewi · 1 year ago

Thanks for the comment, Jeff. I think you are definitely right about
the "lashing out at anything and everything" part. The industry's
ability to shoot itself in the foot -- not to mention plenty of other
body parts -- while allegedly trying to protect itself is truly
amazing.

Ddonat · 1 year ago

As far as I know the US is an exception to most of the free world where radio does pay royalties to not only the writer but the performer as well.

mathewi · 1 year ago

I'm pretty sure you are right, David -- and I think either you or
someone else who commented the last time I wrote about this topic
mentioned the same thing. I suppose that adds to the music industry's
argument that the U.S. shouldn't be able to get away with this free
ride the radio industry gets, but I still think that argument is more
a sign of desperation than anything else.

John Wilson · 1 year ago

You may think the notion that radio should pay for playing music is crazy, but as mentioned above the US is perhaps the exception. It's been established practice in the UK for many years that radio pays for playing the music, regardless of the benefits the artist enjoys from having their product played to a large audience.

Clearly both sides benefit from the arrangement of music being played on radio [fills airtime with content that listeners want and musicians get their product publicised]- what is at issue is who should be paying who and in what proportion to the overall benefits received.

Big ears · 1 year ago

I've always thought that broadcasting a work over a public resource like the radio bands should be considered an implicit statement that one has released the work from control and constraint. You can't shout something from the mountaintop, and then insist people keep it a secret. If I can observe something from my home, and I didn't ask to, then by crikey, I consider the observation to be entierly mine to do with as I choose. How is it that copyright can make that sort of pragmatic position sound so crazy? It even sounds crazy to me.

BrianZ · 8 months ago

I'm not a radio listener anymore and haven't been since 2000. Because I don't like the fact that the Radio Industry tells the general public what music is cool.

With the change, radio could become more of a national music barometer instead of record label PR teams and industry suits. Also, if you are in NY and you listen to a rock station and then go to L.A and listen to a rock station., you will hear the same music. But now, you could have NY stations playing different things because of the type of music they (NY Stations) value as opposed to LA stations. That might be interesting. It could also make the recording industry accountable for some of the garbage they hype, because the radio stations will say, "What is that crap? I'm not paying for that!" It could be that this change may fix the "Soulja Boy" problem with current radio.

Again, it all goes back to the recording industry shooting themselves in the foot. By charging radio, they lose control of deciding what is hot and what is not. It may not be something they foresee, but it might happen.