The music business is having interesting times. After reviewing the wrenching changes imposed on business models by recent technological innovation, Mike Ragogna concludes:
Regardless of the problems, there are growing opportunities to solidly integrate music into the culture. There is a lot of incredible music being created, and more of it now than ever before, so the state of the art remains in good shape (though I guess this is where “taste” come in). But the reality is Tower’s gone, Virgin’s shrinking and yet another distributor is going the way of the “78” (you know, great-grandpa’s records?) and we’ve got to deal with it. Maybe it’ll take a little more than an hour, but this battleship can be turned around. With a little luck, the music business will get past this current set of challenges and put the focus back on the business of music.
May it be so. I think we aren’t putting the genie back in the bottle, though. The stranglehold by a few large suppliers is broken, and that is going to have more and more effect on the actual music itself. I think we already see plenty of micro-markets that were unthinkable 10 years ago, and I think things are going to move farther in that direction.
Which, basically, I like. On the one hand, it means there may be fewer “superstars”, carefully groomed by essentially non-musical people, just because they can be sold to a certain demographic. On the other, I think it opens up more opportunities for basic, solid musicians to make a living without having the choice between lightning striking or abject poverty.
