1. YouTube
2. TV
3. Karaoke Box
4. FM radio
5. Nico Nico Douga
6. Live performances
7. AM Radio
8. Free internet streaming services
9. DVD & Blu-ray disks
10. Free video hosting sites (other than YouTube & Nico Nico)
11. Bars & coffee shops
12. Subscription music channels (MTV, Space Shower etc)
13. Radiko (Radio stations on the net)
14. Subscription internet streaming services
15. VHS
16. Home karaoke
17. Subscription video hosting sites
18. Subscription radio services (USEN, Stardigio etc)
19. Karaoke classes
20. Other
The Japan Record Association claims the survey shows that sales of recorded music are under pressure mainly from YouTube and Nico Nico Douga. Another part of the survey looks at free music download habits:
Those who do download music for free in Japan do it more from YouTube and Nico Nico than p2p sites or other PC and keitai music sites.
The full 44 page report is available in a Japanese PDF here
For anyone interested in where the music business is going, the recent MIDEM industry conference in Cannes threw up some interesting conversations and speeches. Some of these video clips are lengthy, and will take a while to load; if you aren't that interested, them maybe just check out the first 15 minute clip for a taste.
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The guy above talks about the cloud. This next conversation is good, not least because Thomas Hesse of Sony gets narky about the locker business model.
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Here's promoter Harvey Goldsmith telling the music business to stop screwing consumers:
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Some new music entrepreneurs feel they can handle the business better than the old legacy companies:
Ta for this Mulboyne....Man, Sir Howard certianly hasn't cleared out all the deadwood at Sony...Yeah, itunes is so f-ing hard to use...and loading music onto an ipod or an USB stick to plug into your TV or car requires a grad level education...Digital music didn't end up on PCs by accident....it ended up there because it was the cheapest and most flexible platform to get it and then distribute it within one's own media collection.
And I love how they keep talking about the cloud in regards to phones and then completely ignore the data transmission levels involved with that kind of service and how apparently that's not going to be an issue anyone, least of all the cellphone service providers. Currently only about 20-25% of the US population has a smartphone and already data networks are struggling to keep up...as smartphone penetration increases, the odds are very good that most, if not all the network providers, will move to some form of tiered data usage plans and the currently commonplace mass market 'all you can eat' data plans will disappear or become extremely expensive. So folks will have to pay for both the service and the data transmission costs, which is going to make that kind of service a bit pricey.
Nor are memory prices going to soar in the future...In regards to phones and storage space for music, 8gbs is probably a little too small for significant number of folks, 16gb is likely enough for most and 32gb is overkill for most (that is likely around 15-17 days worth of continuous, non-repeating music). In the US, currently a SD micro 32gb card runs around $75-90..in two years, it will likely be half that...with storage levels like that, folks aren't going to need to stream stuff at all...they can just carry everything with them right on their phone.
The Enrichment Center reminds you that the weighted companion cube will never threaten to stab you and, in fact, cannot speak.
Kuang_Grade wrote:with storage levels like that, folks aren't going to need to stream stuff at all...they can just carry everything with them right on their phone.
Just because they'll be able to doesn't mean they will. Your average person doesn't want to download 15 days of continuous music. They know what genres they like and would rather tune into stations that play music they're into without having to choose which songs to actually download. I guess if they come up with cheap blocks of music you can buy (i.e. 8 gigs of classic rock for X dollars) it might work to have everything off line.
Faith is believing what you know ain't so. -- Mark Twain
One of the main companies being discussed at MIDEM was SoundCloud (Wiki description here). These days, I find a lot of new music through their service rather than through YouTube, Pandora or a service like Spotify. There's a short interview with one of the creators below:
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I thought the speaker in the first video had it right. Insofar as MP3s have replaced CDs and vinyl, they've destroyed the revenue model of the music business and don't look like generating new income across the board anytime soon. Also, we don't know how young music fans, who don't even think of music in terms of albums and CDS, let alone consider buying them, will include music in their lives.
I'm one of those older listeners who still values ownership. I'm sure that is a function of age but it's also due to scepticism about the reliability and robustness of the cloud. I'm happy to take advantage of the cloud for some services, such as Spotify and lockers, but I don't trust it enough to give up ownership. If the cloud goes down, access becomes restricted or prices become prohibitive, I like to know I've still got the music I paid for.