This week Great Big Sea’s Murray
Foster wrote a post on Facebook about a streaming service. As I don’t use Facebook I will
write a response here. I admire Murray
for speaking out as he often does on social media for a range of causes for
example piracy, violence against women, Toronto politics and now the impact of
streaming services on musicians to make a living.
I don’t know anything about
the streaming service or the history of the blog Murray is referring
too. I do agree with Murray in that the writer has not done enough research on
the actual reality of the average income of a musician or artist. Fans
definitely have to think about how their viewing and purchasing actions affect
creators and their future creations because not all creators are multi-millionaires.
I do think though it is
extremely naïve to trust a streaming service or any kind of business run by
musicians and artists and believe they will do the right thing by others in
their same profession and the customers who support them. Music is big business and musicians, artists
and their business managers and agents won’t let them put their money into any
business where they don’t make a profit.
So okay musicians and artists
may provide a service for a while until people get hooked like all the other
services before them (Facebook, Youtube and Twitter ect) then they will have to
eventually pay their own way. And
it won’t be the musicians and artists who own the service who will be losing money. Then there are
other issues such as will all musicians and artists get a fair go on their
streaming services. Or will they just be
supporting their friends and those who can pay. Like I said I don’t know
anything about streaming services.
All I know is I like to buy
the products I want individually, whether they are hardcopies and/or digital
without advertising. I am not interested in listening to or viewing a whole
bunch of stuff I am not interested in. If I read about music I may be
interested in I visit official sites on YouTube and purchase albums or a couple
of songs digitally. If there is a television show I may be interested in, I
will buy one or two episodes digitally and then perhaps a DVD. I am not
interested in any model of service that involves ‘free with advertising’.
YouTube is an example of a free service that got it’s customers hooked and
then loaded up on massive amounts of advertising. YouTube frustrates the hell out of
me as a consumer.
I didn’t see any facilities
for sharing the article in Gawker other than on Facebook so I copied it out
below.
From Murray Foster’s Facebook
page… there is a fabulous discussion attached for those interested.
“Lots of backlash to the new Tidal streaming service,
such as the Gawker article below. I think this is a terrible article. Yes,
there are rich musicians in the world, but that doesn't mean that they and
EVERY OTHER MUSICIAN aren't being ripped off by current streaming rates. The
survival of the profession of 'musician' depends upon people paying for
streamed music (as opposed to the current 'free with ads' model) and for the
negotiation of different royalty rates than currently exist. I trust Tidal more
than the other streaming sites because it's owned by musicians. This article
focuses (very immaturely I think) on the "oh look at these poor little rich
musicians" angle. Gawker should be smarter than this. On a related note,
Tidal needs to work on their messaging.
The World's Most Famous Musicians Just Hosted a Bonkers Press Conference (no
copyright infringement intended)
Only a few minutes ago, the
entire music industry stood on a stage in a collective display of how rich and
out of touch they are. They think you are willing to pay up to double the price
of other streaming music services to pay for their streaming music service,
because they are crazy.
Imagine this: cancelling your
Spotify subscription, and paying $20 for a Tidal subscription instead. It's
more expensive because it's "higher quality" and "artist-owned,"
which is important because Usher, Daft Punk, and Madonna have been living in
wretched penury for far too long, and it's time for people to give back. The
modern-day Our Gang (which counted among its members not only the
aforementioned supernovas, but also Rihanna, Nicki Minaj, Kanye West, Chris
Martin, and Jack White) held a "keynote" to promote Tidal, the
already extant European streaming company Jay Z recently purchased for $56
million because he's bored.
Jay Z and Beyonce (also
present, beaming) dug up an old email thread (SUBJ: SURPRISE BRUNCH PARTY
SATURDAY!), hit reply-all, and look at how many of their family friends turned
out to stand on stage, visibly uncomfortable, and listen to Alicia Keys give an
incoherent speech. At the conclusion of Keys' statement, which merged the
rarely combined traits of being about an app and quoting Nietzsche, the artists
all signed some sort of "declaration" one by one. I don't know what
the document said—it was probably just a blank piece of paper, or perhaps an
original copy of the Declaration of Independence that Deadmau5 received as a
White Elephant gift.
When it came time for Madonna
to sign, she put her whole leg up on the table, as if to say to the world
World, I'm MADONNA and yes I am not too old to move my leg this way. No one is
going to use Tidal. These dummies!
In case you had any lingering
sympathy for the struggling mega-famous recording artist, here's a video they
made to make you hate them:
