MusicTank

INTRO:  Illegally downloaded any music recently?  Given that nearly two thirds of all internet traffic is made up of P2P activity these days, if you haven't, then most young people you know are.  Since Napster first reared its head in the late nineties, the recorded music business has tried in vain to put the genie back in the bottle.  The result - some pr blunders and an estimated 20:1 illegal/legal download rate.

For music fans it’s been a golden age where hard to find and out of print releases have been readily available alongside the latest hits of the day, but with no way of monetising these streams the record labels have been forced to watch their profits dwindle while the world’s been moving online.

The UK government has taken notice and is overseeing a three-pronged initiative aimed at educating and developing awareness, dealing with the most serious infringers and facilitating legitimate offerings. 

This series will focus on that third prong: effective legitimate alternatives.  Over the course of the four events we will review what people want, where technology is heading, what the most plausible new models are and how they might be licensed.

TOPIC:  'SQUARING THE CIRCLE'

The grand finale of the series cuts to the main issue to surface throughout this discussion strand: does the future of digital music sales lie in licensing proprietary music services or with open systems that somehow utilise P2P?

While open models will no doubt prove the most compelling to music fans (who’ve arguably already made their choice about how they wish to access music), some rights holders are understandably wary about cannibalising sales from their core digital revenue stream – iTunes.  And in moving slowly towards subscription models, their financials are still firmly embedded in à la carte downloads.

With some arguing that for young people, P2P has already cannibalised their potential purchases of downloads, a bit of nervousness about displacing some of the more mature music buyers is surely understandable.  What needs to be done to resolve this dichotomy?

And which ever way it might be resolved, how, practically, might ISP-based music services co-exist in a way that preserves value for music and avoids ISPs being traded against one another in a race to amass a terabyte of music as quickly and cheaply as possible?

SPEAKERS:

SERIES TOPICS: LET'S SELL RECORDED MUSIC!

21 Oct: Part 1-  'HERE WE ARE NOW, ENTERTAIN US'
What music consumers actually want and how this tallies with the status quo and raft of new services in various stages of development or launch.    Outline summary is now available (MusicTank members should log-in to access the full event transcript and podcast).

04 Nov: Part 2 - 'WE HAVE THE TECHNOLOGY, WHAT'S THE SOLUTION?'
The second in a four-part series, this panel will look at what is becoming technically feasible and what might be the best blue-sky model for the UK,  while considering the needs and perspective of ISPs and mobile platforms.  Outline summary is now available (MusicTank members should log-in to access the full event transcript and podcast).

18 Nov: Part 3 - 'COALITION OF THE BILLING'
This session considers what might be the best way to license these new services and whether or not a collective approach is indeed desirable or plausible?

02 Dec: Part 4 - 'SQUARING THE CIRCLE'
The grand finale of the series cuts to the main issue to surface throughout this discussion strand: at the heart of the future of digital music sales, does the future lie in licensing proprietary, closed music services or open systems that somehow utilise P2P?