Now I’m generalizing a bit with my title, but consider it for a moment.

Let’s take the music industry for example. People want a shift in the way they purchase and consume their music.

People have shown an extreme shift towards downloads and streaming, and they want it free.

Now, before I go any more in depth, this IS possible, this can sustain an industry, and it’ll probably improve it in the long run. Ads, etc.

Why don’t they give it to the people? Because it’s change, and it means they won’t make as much money, and because they can fight to keep their ways.

Or at least that’s what they think.

The people have spoken, however, and that ain’t gonna fly.

People are pirating music, and moving from CDs to streaming from YouTube, or other free streaming sites, there’s no stopping them. Yet, the music industry still tries to by suing them, and taking their videos off Youtube, or shortening them.

Is this a way to run a business? To not give the customers what they want, and when they find it somewhere else, and thrive on it, cut it off for them. All because you want to keep your precious CDs around, because they USED to make you too much money, the which you took from the artists who made the music you sold.

Let’s see:

1. Rape your employees (artists) – Check
2. Piss off your customers – Check
3. Cut off customers alternative venues – Check
4. Be way too conservative for a product targeted at young people – Check

What’s that? Your business is down? You’re losing money? Your laying off lots of people, because your absolutely retarded conservative business model isn’t sustainable?

YOU DON’T SAY?!

It doesn’t stop at the music industry, the movie industry is suffering from piracy.

Let’s look into that!

Going to the movies costs roughly about $12 a head.

That means a movie date costs about $30, after concessions [which most people sneak in now, because they're ridiculously expensive.]

Minimum wage where I’m from is about $9.50 an hour, which means someone would have to work for 3 hours to take someone to an hour and a half movie.

That’s value if I’ve ever heard it.

They say that its due to people not going to the movies any more, which they blame on piracy.

I blame it on shitty targeted movies, that aren’t worth watching in the first place, taking over the market. This is due to the fact that movie execs are willing to take the risk on an artsy film, or a film that doesn’t target a specific demographic, no matter how good the script is.

The literature industry seems to have saved the movie industry. Some of the biggest recent movies were based on literature, for example the latest Harry Potter was the biggest budget film of the summer [at $250,000,000], yet the only reason someone invested that money is because the books, and subsequent movies, were a remarkable success.

Bottom line: People aren’t going to pay a huge premium to watch the same movie they’ve seen a thousand times.

Popularity on movie recommendation sites tends to favour movies which were groundbreaking in their time. Movies that moved people, and that left you without any words. There’s not too many of these anymore. These are the movies people are downloading.

There’s plenty of businesses who are being way to conservative for the changing of times, and they’re failing, yet the bigwigs at the top can’t figure out why.

I just hope they go out of business to make way for people who actually know what the customer wants.

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Technorati Tags: Common Sense, Idiots, Movie Industry, Music Industry, Success, Trends, What?

Common Sense · Idiots · Movie Industry · Music Industry · Success · Trends · What?

To be successful in the Music Industry, you have to try.

If you want to make enough money to sustain yourself off of your music, you have to treat it like a full-time job.

These are two major points that people have to realize before they dive head-first into the world of music.

Especially now that people have to find alternate ways to make money with their music, its going to take more effort to find those various paychecks and just like with anything else, its going to take a lot of time.

So let’s start from square one: You need good songs.

Writing is completely personal, but the best way to judge your music is to play it in front of an audience. Watch the reaction, and learn how to read them. If they aren’t moving, that song is going to need some work.

Two: Get your name heard.

Twitter, MySpace, Facebook, Reverb Nation, I could go on for hours naming all the sites you should be on, and updating at least once a day.

People are online, and looking for music. You have to be there for them to find you. And once they do find you, keep updating, you have to keep them interested.

Three: Play everywhere, all the time.

Start in your home city. Note: CITY. If you live in a town, its likely that your career will be short lived. Move to a city, get to know the venues, play at those venues. Even if its for free, or for scraps, its about getting your name, and music, heard.

Four: Networking

Meet other musicians, it always helps to have connections to help you get into that venue to play, or to find a new musician when your bassist quits.

One amazing way of meeting local musicians is to take up a job at a music shop. Yes, these places can be hell for an artist, but you’ll meet quite a few contacts, and it doesn’t hurt that they pay you either.

Five: Communication with fans

This kind of ties into point two, but I can’t stress this enough:

• People expect constant involvement from their artists today, give it to them, or give up.

Updating your Twitter account with, “Just spent $140 on a new bike with a basket, sweet ride!” is a lot easier than trying to gain back all the fans you lost being boring.

And don’t forget to talk to fans after your show. I know, everyone wants to feel like a rockstar by walking off the stage and chugging a beer (or wine, I don’t care something bad-ass), but talking to your fans while they’re still excited will make them tell their friends, and will make them happy.

If you want to be successful you need fans, lots of them, and happy too.

—————————————-

The industry is not a game, and unless you’re extremely lucky, if you’re not giving you’re all, you’re probably not going to get anywhere.

Treat it like you need to, work 8+ hours a day on every aspect of your music, and career, and even more once you start getting attention.

All your favourite bands have paid [and still are paying] their dues, they’ve gotten to the point where they don’t have to work as much, but they still have to work.

Above all, have fun. It can be stressful, and it’ll take over your life, but don’t lose that passion that made you want to start in the first place.

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Technorati Tags: Art, Education, Money, Music, Music Industry, Success

Art · Education · Money · Music · Music Industry · Success