Idolator

i always thought nin kind of sucked anyway.

Wow! If I read correctly, this item is snarky about five distinct people or groups of people in the space of two paragraphs:

1. People who still buy CDs
2. Trent Reznor
3. People who still buy vinyl
4. People who don't think they should pay for music
5. People who still like Nine Inch Nails

Interesting that apparently the entire US run of The Slip will be limited to 200k -- that's what Year Zero sold in its first week alone, and you'd think that Reznor might want to prove, like Radiohead did, that he can sell as many copies of the album he already gave away online as he did of his last major label retail-only release.

we can all agree that arrington is kind of a dink, yes?

ok more than kind of.

So, as I understand it, this is what will happen to the biz.

1/ As reproduction costs are (next to) nothing and everybody has the technology to copy and pass on music, the prices will drop to (nearly) zero. Box-sets and special editions are beyond people's reach to duplicate, so as long as there is a demand, there will be an industry catering to it. However, mainstream regular releases will have no monetary value. This is already happening.

2/ Now, how is an artist supposed to recoup their setup costs? This is bugging me. So they're supposed to tour, and the tours are expected to reap enough profits not only to make the tours themselves economically viable but to also to cover studio bills, mixing bills, engineers' fees and so on. Isn't this a bit -- unfair?

3/ Artistic cost?. When we consider free music distribution, we're only thinking of the final product, the tracks themselves. How is an artist repaid for his effort, putting his life into the music and so on? Touring, again? Isn't this even more -- unfair?

I'm a big champion of free distribution, indeed I see no other way it can go unless there is a forced capping of markets, but these issues have (only very recently) started being somewhat bothersome.

I've never thought of it this way before, and neither do I think major labels these days are the best way to go either for the customer or for the musician, but suddenly the entire idea of art seems to be way devalued.

In thinking of free distribution, we're viewing the music purely as a commodity. This does not seem right.

Thinking about it further, it seems to me that while times are better than ever for the inspired hobbyist, it's the dark ages for anybody who has aspirations of being a professional full-time musician.

There are two things in this regard.

1/ Inspired hobbyists are the best thing to have happened to music. Plummeting recording and distribution costs have ensured that anybody with a good idea and a soundcard can have an album out. Freed from the constraints of sellability and acceptability, there is more eccentricity floating around, which often enough translates to more exciting, more interesting music. Old Captain Beefheart would have been proud.

2/ I think us in the free distribution brigade tend to damn professional musicians easily and often. Part of the problem is the immense success achieved by a handful of bands in the last five decades or so. A lot of people, myself included, would like to put an end to this age of giants and kinds and usher in a more democratic era. The superstars exist at the expense of smaller musicians, thanks mostly to aggressive label-level marketing of a few artists. A world with a bigger musical middle class (as it were) seems welcome.

Free distribution will mark the end of professionalism as I see it, and tainted though the concept of professionalism seems these days -- those hacks working for money and not for love -- I don't think amateurs, however creative, can contribute to the world wide progress of an artform.

The fact that it is even less possible to support yourself playing music these days will scare talent away. The fact that people shall not be able to pursue making music full-time -- concentrating, instead, on their day jobs, or setting up tours or printing T-shirts to cover studio costs -- will mark the start of a global sluggishness.

While the edges will advance faster and further than before, the great big ever-mutating juggernaut will now begin to atrophy.

@angshu: well once peak oil really kicks in and we're all busy rioting for foot and killing one another for half-litres of gasoline like mad max, the whole "making music" thing will seem like a quaint pastime of yesteryear anyway. i advise you to stock up on 30.06 ammo and power bars while there's still time.

"You'll also be able to hear this ProTools epic on vinyl, the amount of copies of which will only be limited by those who think this rather digital recording is best heard in a pure analog state."

*snort*

It's alright though. I'd bet money no one is buying the vinyl to actually play it anyway. Of course, those that do are going to be insufferable pricks about how the warm analog sound of the vinyl (on their shitty $99 turntable) just blows the CD away.

Clevertrousers -- Ammo is so 2007.

I have a life-size replica of Tarkus in the yard to take on the apocalypse single-handed.

I have a big yard.

I'll buy it because I'm one of the eccentric people that loves owning a physical copy of things, if only for the pure tactile wonder of it all.... plus I have like all my NIN albums in a kickass row on my shelves....

The NIN 'Still' boxset is still a perfect example of how awesome physical media can get.

As far as artists or people able to make their music much easier and much more professional, I'm constantly finding new, unsigned bands or musciscians that make phenomenal stuff for me to discover and buy, so its not all doom and gloom.... lots of people are taking the Trent route and just releasing it for free anyways.

by limited edition techcruch meant the sort of limited runs that radiohead did with "in rainbows" (that post was in response to the debut of the album) not a 200k run that is so high it's not really much of a limited edition. this cd/dvd package is not a true limited edition in the normal sense, nor is it merchandise. it's a music cd, plain and simple.

@coolfer: I dunno, each disc is numbered, and Al says they sold that many copies of Year Zero in one week, so it sounds like a limited run to me (not that he might not change their mind if it sells out). If it was a music cd, plain and simple, it wouldn't have a sales cap.