awjoe wrote: ↑Thu Dec 22, 2022 6:52 pm
Yes, but how many people - what percentage - were really into it and sought it out as the main activity? See, I'm wondering if the age of the 78, 45, and 33 1/3 rpm were an anomaly?
I suspect that in this, not much has changed in the human condition. When the minstrel turned up at the inn he or she knew that some people would hang on every word and note, having been counting the days since they last heard music; some would listen along happily enough but forget about it when they got home; some would be there for the dancing tunes and talk loudly through their beer during the quiet ones; and some would sit at the back wondering what the fuss was about.
With all points of the spectrum in between depending on the performer, the mood of the audience, the weather, the state of the harvest etc. etc. etc.
But I'd be surprised if those fundamental ratios had changed much over time.
* If you were king or high nobility, you could afford hired musicians.
* If you were gentry, it was more DIY - after dinner you got your daughters to perform on the household keyboard.
* If you were poor or agricultural, you were mostly out of luck except for hymns on Sunday. Or maybe there were occasional fiddle parties at someone's house.
So for most people most of the time, music was a special event. And really appreciated, I bet.
By contrast, music nowadays is common as dirt. Which reduces its specialness, which reduces its perceived value. So, do people who stream it value it less and listen less closely than earlier generations with their record and CD collections?
Nah, I'm no wiser - I have no idea.
Edit: Missed your recent post, Drew. I think you've sketched it out about right.
We seem to be forgetting 'folk music', particularly WRT to folk dance music which has existed since somebody discovered that banging rocks together made a compelling noise?
I suspect that in this, not much has changed in the human condition. When the minstrel turned up at the inn he or she knew that some people would hang on every word and note, having been counting the days since they last heard music; some would listen along happily enough but forget about it when they got home; some would be there for the dancing tunes and talk loudly through their beer during the quiet ones; and some would sit at the back wondering what the fuss was about.
You forgot the other category of punters, the ones that would dismissively say, you should have been here last week, ‘Bubonic and the plague’ were much better than this lot.
I thought I had when I mentioned minstrels, anyway that’s what I meant.
In this context I think they were the 'pros', folk music was what the 'amateurs' played and sang and danced to when left to their own devices. CC and others are much better qualified to make the definition though...
In this context I think they were the 'pros', folk music was what the 'amateurs' played and sang and danced to when left to their own devices. CC and others are much better qualified to make the definition though...
Now you’ve gone and done it, at least you didn’t mention banjos.
Did you hear the one about the banjo player who...
Actually I think I'll leave it there as I've just bought a banjo
For those who haven't attempted it, as a guitar player trying to play bluegrass banjo is a complete mind f*ck, the thumb is the problem, on guitar it does as it's told but on 5 string banjo it simply won't behave
In the long run I'm not sure how sustainable the current model of effectively being able to get every song ever recorded for all but free (you know. it's the cost of a couple of Lattes and a biscotti for Spotify or Apple Music) really is.
Yes the amount of money involved is staggering. Spotify generated over 9.5 BILLION dollars in 2021, but it's never posted a profit in its corporate history.
Apple Music 2021 revenue was $7.7B but they are part of the much bigger Apple Services division with a 2021 revenue of $68.4B (Which includes Apple TV, and App revenue plus others I probably missed). And I could not find any numbers as to how profitable (or not) the music segment is, I suspect that given Spotify's bigger customer base it's probably similar.
While you can still buy and download stuff from Apple, they actually hide that pretty well from the average user, it's a different app even.
I consider myself a pretty serious music lover, I listen to stuff on an expensive hifi, I set aside time to do so. But I'm now streaming pretty much everything too, because it's so convenient (and now it's lossless there isn't a quality penalty either). Where bands are putting stuff up only on bandcamp, I'll happily still pay to get it, if it's something I want to hear. But my days of buying a stack of CDs or even downloads every year have gone.
But I wonder, how long will it be before the business model has to change again to make the delivery mechanism a business that actually makes money?
But you can't get every song ever recorded on any of the streaming services. There's lots missing and not all of it is obscure stuff on indie labels or well-known artists that have flounced off.
A few years ago I decided to re-rip all my CDs as 16bit 44.1kHz AIFFs, but first I thought I'd just check how many of them were available to stream instead. It turns out that about a third of my collection was not available, and although my tastes are quite eclectic their are not wilfully obscure.
AFAICS the two biggest problem categories are foreign in artists who's music is not available to listeners outside of their "home territory" and unsuccessful bands who were signed to major labels in the 70s and 80s...
Frack me sideways! Of the top 5 artists, I've only heard of 2: Ed Sheeran and La Grande.
Mind you, I reckon Ed Sheeran gets so many streams because of all those copyright lawyers checking for "plagiarism".
I'm not bitter! No, I just wish he'd stop recording...immediately...and forever.
BigRedX wrote: ↑Fri Dec 23, 2022 10:18 am
But you can't get every song ever recorded on any of the streaming services. There's lots missing and not all of it is obscure stuff on indie labels or well-known artists that have flounced off.
A few years ago I decided to re-rip all my CDs as 16bit 44.1kHz AIFFs, but first I thought I'd just check how many of them were available to stream instead. It turns out that about a third of my collection was not available, and although my tastes are quite eclectic their are not wilfully obscure.
AFAICS the two biggest problem categories are foreign in artists who's music is not available to listeners outside of their "home territory" and unsuccessful bands who were signed to major labels in the 70s and 80s...
Yes, I get that. (I was being a bit hyperbolic with my 'every song') I went through the same exercise earlier this year and it was around 20%. And indeed there were some interesting mainstream omissions. But it looks like the percentage is slowly going down. Stuff I identified at the start of the year as needing to be ripped was actually available by the time I got the CDs out of storage in September. But there will always be gaps (if nothing else because the streaming platforms are vying with 'exclusive' content now too, and petulant artists and record company tantrums will always be a thing!)
It's the long term viability of current streaming business model that I'm questioning
MarkOne wrote: ↑Fri Dec 23, 2022 11:56 amBut there will always be gaps (if nothing else because the streaming platforms are vying with 'exclusive' content now too, and petulant artists and record company tantrums will always be a thing!)
It's the long term viability of current streaming business model that I'm questioning
IMO the "exclusivity" factor will end up being streaming's downfall. Listeners want everything in one easy to use location. I certainly do, and I also want to be able to create playlists (the modern equivalent of the mix tape) where I can include all the songs I want and not find gaps because those tracks are only on another service. And I certainly won't pay for any service that can't provide every single song that I might want to listen to. So I can't see any point in paying for Spotify Premium. Instead I'll put up with the occasional ad (none of which are ever for anything I'm remotely interested in) and save my money.
In that respect Apple Music comes out slightly ahead at the moment as it allows you to add the contents of your iTunes library to your streaming options, although the process does take a long time if you have a large library with lots of tracks that aren't already available on the service, and also appears to have issues if you are on the family plan with the iTunes library tracks not being available to other users.
But I also agree that streaming currently has no long-term sustainability business wise and with 100,000 new tracks being added every day their data/bandwidth/energy requirements are only going to go up. Is their paying user base increasing by the required amount?
I think technically Spotify has had one profitable quarter, I expect it to shift into profit as it moves more into podcasting and self-produced content - where it doesn't have to shell out the same amount to music labels.
In 2021 it make £39m loss of £9.6bn revenue. That's not a long way off.
IMO the "exclusivity" factor will end up being streaming's downfall. Listeners want everything in one easy to use location.
Totally agree with you on this. The place I feel this the most is in every television station and movie studio setting up their own streaming service, but I don't doubt it's just a matter of time before more people start feeling it in music streaming as well. I can remember back when Prince was still with us that he only allowed his music to be streamed on Tidal and that became the one and only reason I used them.
At this point I just use YouTube Music as part of my YouTube Premium subscription. There's very, very little I can't find there, and as an added bonus I get to watch YouTube without any ads
Personally I don't listen to music much on Spotify, for me usually new music is being discovered on Soundcloud, YouTube or Bandcamp.
However I have most of my self released albums available on streaming platforms, and so far I have made more £££ on Spotify than anywhere else. Somehow one of my tracks got picked up and now must have been more that 150k streams so far. No promotion, no major label, hardcore DIY work
Well, I was quite happy with Prime Music and its subset of content but then some genius decided to make the whole shebang available which sounds great but you can't now listen to an album in the correct track order. Everything's randomly shuffled. So I cancelled my Prime subscription and now I spend the money on Spotify Premium and Jeff's just gonna have to wait one more nanosecond to earn his next billion.
But I also agree that streaming currently has no long-term sustainability business wise and with 100,000 new tracks being added every day their data/bandwidth/energy requirements are only going to go up. Is their paying user base increasing by the required amount?
It’s insignificant compared to YouTube, video requires a lot more space and everyone seems to be uploading hours of content each day. I don’t know how YouTube keeps up.
The streaming services will continue to scam investors while making a hash of royalty payment schemes until the energy to run all those server farms gets too expensive. Which won't be long now.
MOF wrote: ↑Mon Jan 23, 2023 10:24 pmIt’s insignificant compared to YouTube, video requires a lot more space and everyone seems to be uploading hours of content each day. I don’t know how YouTube keeps up.
YouTube like most other streaming services is being propped up by the more profitable parts of the company - in this case Google.
Spotify which only does streaming is back to cutting costs in the form of laying off employees, I see. Enjoy the service while it lasts.
BigRedX wrote: ↑Wed Dec 21, 2022 9:35 am
I thought Taylor Swift had pulled all her music from Spotify? Has she made up with them?
I also thought she'd decided to not-ify and pull her music from there. That said my only interest in her is her music and not the dilly dallyings of her comings and goings, I leave that to the sycophants. I can't understand why bother with spotify anyway, everything if free o YouTube
You forgot the other category of punters, the ones that would dismissively say, you should have been here last week, ‘Bubonic and the plague’ were much better than this lot.
