Thursday February 16, 2012

JAPAN NEWS AND DISCUSSION

Warner CEO sees e-book `fracas' as helping music

Technology Feb. 10, 2010 - 06:16AM JST ( 3 )

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ScroteFeb. 10, 2010 - 12:34PM JST

To me, the value of an electronic file, and a file which is encrypted and has usage restrictions applied on it in particular, is close to zero. These "content creators" will have a hard job persuading me otherwise.
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pamelotFeb. 10, 2010 - 04:00PM JST

" Fracas " is a most excellent perfume from Robert Piguet. That's about all that comes to mind, after this article...
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acubedFeb. 10, 2010 - 06:58PM JST

Music and book publishers are still convinced that they are producing and selling Rolls-Royce cars when, in reality, their product has become as commoditised as a hamburger. The pricing they are setting is predicated on the idea that they sell an individuated premium product, when what they are selling is, for most people, background (particularly music) not foreground.In addition, the old argument over the price of CDs and books, which they claimed were set at the prices they were due to production, storage, distribution, wholesaler and retailer costs and profits. With electronic files there is no storage, minimal distribution costs and no wholesaler. Why haven't prices come down? Because the publishers believe that they're selling a Rolls-Royce for which they can charge what they like, rather than a hamburger which has a very slim profit margin. The fact that authors/musicians still only see a tiny proportion of this same (or higher) selling price despite lower distribution costs provides an emotional justification to "consumers" for sharing on unauthorised networks. provide access at a subscription rate, on easy-to-use (i.e. not rstricted to a single OS or platform) or at a very low price (10c per file) and you'll find that most people will pay for the access. Simple economics that the publishers are completely blind to. Then you cut the ridiculous costs of advertising, executives pay, "fruit'n'flowers" and return to your core business of identifying and developing talent, and providing polishing services (copy-editing, mixing etc) on top.