Posts tagged john gruber
Obsession Times Voice
Jun 14th
I didn’t write much (outside of twitter) about SxSW 2009. In part that was because life rushed off in other directions immediately afterwards, and in part there wasn’t much that really inspired me to write. There were numerous good sessions at the conference, but far too many “social media consultants” talking without real experience and far too much focus on “monetising.” Many of us with a longer view of the web and/or more of a technical bent expressed considerable frustration with such sessions and the voting process that had allowed them to dominate the programme.
One session I wish I had made it to was Merlin Mann and John Gruber’s. For months now I’ve had Gruber’s subsequent write-up open in my newsreader awaiting a link from this blog. In it he deftly sums up what so many of the panels seemed to miss, that the starting point for a successful blogging (and, I’d say, most any) venture has to be passion (obsession), and a next step has to be craft. The rest may follow, but it needs those starting points:
What’s so great, so amazing, about this racket is that it doesn’t have to be that way. You can obsess over your work, build an audience based on deep mutual respect, and eventually opportunities to earn money from it will present themselves. I don’t know how it works, I only know that it does.
Total Music
Oct 14th
John Gruber comments in his usual incisive way on the claims that Universal Music are looking to start their own subscription service called Total Music. For a variety of reasons, not only the technical and financial ones that John details, the plan seems like the flailing about we’ve become used to hearing from an industry staring into an abyss and refusing to acknowledge the numerous bridges all around.
The original Business Week piece contains an amusing quote from Irving Azoff, who says:
Doug is doing the right thing taking on Steve Jobs,” says ex-MCA Records Chairman Irving Azoff, whose Azoff Music Management Group represents the Eagles, Journey, Christina Aguilera, and others. “The artists are behind him.
Sure, the Eagles, Journey and Christina Aguilera may be behind such a plan, and they may sell a lot of records, but they’re hardly a representative sample. Most likely they were picked because they’re the lowest common denominator for the Business Week readership but even if you add in a few of their peers, the vast majority of artists are going to be opposed to such an offering because it will either lock them out entirely or require them to sign the sorts of horrific deals major labels are known for.
Even if the major labels do get such a programme to market (about which I’m sceptical) and become uncharacteristically inclusive and giving, they’ve shown over the past few years that they are less and less capable of breaking new acts beyond one-hit-wonders. A subscription service might make that easier as less commitment is required to check out new acts, but that’s not much of a long-term strategy.
Music as a commodity may work that way, but artists need commitment from fans and support structure in order to attain longevity. A subscription service from the major labels would make it easier for us all to have a “free” supply of wallpaper music for background listening, but a more fundamental change of approach is needed from the major labels if they actually want to build up artists who might in the long-term bring them more profits. If the labels won’t do it under their own power, other people will step up who can help artists get the funding to do it themselves.