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Nails Tapping into Radiohead Model for Music Distribution
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by biverson | March 4, 2008 at 06:41 am
1334 views | 4 Recommendations | 2 comments
As Radiohead went, so goes Nine Inch Nails. And NIN is going one better, by allowing users to mashup their tracks, at least for non-commercial use. Out in the world there is a ten year-old nascent musician who will mess around with computers, music, and mashups, post his or her music on the web, or facebook, myspace, bebo it, or share it any other way, without the threat of legal action. The child's creativity, and creativity for the Rest of Us is well-served by this move. Right now, that musician who is going to blow us away in 2020 with some new kind of music, is enabled, rather than shackled. Minds are freer. This is good.
The short version: NIN's new album is available for download for a variety of prices and in various formats from their website or amazon.com with the additional perk that if you download it and mix it using the cc (creative commons) license, you can use it noncommercially. Read more from the NYTimes (registration may be required or try bugmenot.com
The band decided to offer the music with a Creative Commons license, a new type of intellectual-property copyright. It allows creators to reserve certain rights and, in effect, authorize various unpaid uses of their products. In this instance the band is allowing virtually any noncommercial use of its music. The band is also testing a tiered pricing system that could add a new wrinkle to the conventional wisdom on how to attract fans in the music business, in which a slump in sales has prompted Wal-Mart and other retailers to pressure record companies to cut their wholesale prices
One really good idea here is that someone like me who hasn't listened to NIN in years can download the first nine tracks for FREE and decide if I want to shell out the $5 or $10 for all the songs and/or a physical embodiment of the music on CD.
Interested? Check out the ways to order and pay (or not pay) for Ghosts.
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Most RecentMost Recommended Comments (2)
at 07:27 on March 4th, 2008
biverson, i think the Radiohead model was more advanced as an economic experiment in that it tested the premise that consumers naturally attribute inherit value to products and are willing to pay for them even if they don't have to. The NIN endevour seems more like a gimmick or PR stunt, I mean when was the last time anyone talked about NIN...1998?
at 08:05 on March 4th, 2008
I have to agree with Mr. Nadel. Radiohead's model was an experiment that tested whether consumers really are capitalist pawns going for the cheapest bargain or whether people will actually pay (gasp) for good art.