Music Business Blog by Jason Feinberg

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Please hop on over to the PBS Mediashift Blog and read my new post, “What Will Record Labels Look Like in the Future?”

A choice excerpt:

This addresses the core problem. Labels’ traditional revenue streams are drying up and no business can flourish without sustainable income. A remapping of revenue sources is inevitable and has already been put into practice by many labels via so-called “360 deals.” Pulling from tour revenues seems to be a logical progression, especially since the new paradigm for many labels is that records exist to promote the tour, rather than the opposite which was true for decades.

To this point, Scott Perry adds, “The bank is broken, and until investing in an artist’s career is proven to be a profitable endeavor, it will be difficult for any artist to find a benefactor to fund the labor necessary to push an artist beyond their sphere of friends and into a larger network.”

Read more at http://www.pbs.org/mediashift/2009/08/what-will-record-labels-look-like-in-the-future230.html

Interesting post with a REAL interesting graphic…

Long tail distribution can be found in many things on the internet, it is especially useful in understanding the economics of abundance. However using it to understand fans can be incredibly useful.

The Pareto Principle states that you will earn “80% of your sales from 20% of your clients”. This fits into the long tail distribution of fans, as it allows you to identify the core audience you should focus on.

read more and see graphic at…

http://www.theindiedigest.com/article/what-you-need-know-about-long-tail-fans

Great read, and a very interesting picture of the demise of the almost-giant…

“We were claiming super-unique user growth while we knew we were just getting users to bounce off our site. Our approach was not far from hiring Internet users in India to click on our home page.”

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-10303994-93.html?tag=mncol;txt

Been seeing this floating around for a day or two, a MUST SEE.

http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/2009/the-death-of-the-music-industry/

some new some old, all interesting

http://mashable.com/2009/08/02/customize-youtube-channel/
http://www.artistdata.com/us/casestudy
http://neich.in/2009/07/01/direct-to-fan-marketing-music-advocacy
http://www.audiblehype.com/diy/entry/10_highly_effective_ways_to_market_like_an_asshole/
http://blogs.openforum.com/2009/07/08/5-things-small-businesses-can-learn-from-big-business-social-media-campaigns/
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1773988/how_to_use_facebook_insights_for_your.html?cat=15
http://zanesafrit.typepad.com/zane_safrit/2009/04/please-dont-evangelize-our-products.html
http://www.clickz.com/3624847
http://www.wilsonweb.com/wmt5/viral-principles.htm
http://forum.nin.com/bb/read.php?30,767183
http://deepdivemarketing.com/2009/07/20/the-new-music-business-model-imogen-heap/