Here's an email I came across that I 99.999% agree with, my comments in []
-----Original Message-----
From: Lefsetz@aol.com
Date: Fri, 18 Jun 2004 05:43:24
To:undisclosed-recipients:;
Subject: Sony-BMG
If what happens to the record business is the same thing that happened to the
radio business, we're F*CKED!
Reports out of Brussels today say that European antitrust regulators are going
to approve the merger of Sony Music and BMG.
Andy Lack and Michael Smellie [CEOs of Sony and BMG] have convinced Mario Monti
[head of the European antitrust commission] and his troops that they need this
merger to SURVIVE! Because of changed business conditions.
What a crock of shit.
Make no mistake. The MAJOR LABELS are responsible for these market conditions.
P2P piracy is a smokescreen. The reason these companies are in trouble is
because of runaway marketing expenses and a lack of avenues to expose their product.
The merger?
That's not going to speak to runaway marketing costs. That's just going to
speak to OVERHEAD! Accounting. It's got NOTHING to do with the music business
per se. Hell, one could save money by having one company do ALL the back room
accounting in America.
As for solving the labels' problems...
They're just gonna work less product. THIS is good for the public? Make no
mistake, the major labels would like to turn the music business into the MOVIE
business. Where there are only a FEW HUNDRED records released a year.
Choose from THAT buddy. What are the odds something new and different is gonna
break from THAT?
You see the majors have rigged the established system. Allowing nobody else in.
If you're an indie you can't get on MTV.
If you're an indie you can't get on radio.
In other words, if you're an indie, you can't be HEARD! And the first step to
selling records is the ability to HEAR them!
THAT'S where the Internet comes in. It levels the playing field.
Suddenly indie product can be HEARD! P2P is a BOON for indie product. Which is
why the major labels are fighting it so hard. Internet RADIO is a boon for
indies, which is why the record labels are for prohibitive license fees.
Do you see the game here?
If the majors were REALLY interested in saving their businesses they'd OPEN UP
THE AVENUES OF EXPOSURE! They wouldn't lobby to MERGE, they'd lobby to break up
radio conglomerates. Repeal the law allowing groups to own so many stations in
so many markets.
They'd ban all forms of indie promotion and payola. Which is just another way
of keeping those who can't pay out of the game. I mean the Montreal Expos can't
compete with Steinbrenner's Yankees and they're IN the major league!!!
The subterfuge is AMAZING! And Mario Monti and his peeps are too ignorant to
see through it, not knowing how business is TRULY done in the music world.
But they were on to something when they talked about tacit collusion re pricing.
Let's see what happens with Apple Computer NOW! Apple BROKE THE LAW! Oh, not
the codified law, the law of a country, but the law of the MUSIC BUSINESS!
You don't testify against your supplier, against the MAN!
The major labels have gone on record that music is undervalued. They're fighting
to RAISE prices online. Now, with a greater concentration of power, they will.
Hell, it sounds like looney-tunes, but it's true.
And doesn't the merger give Sony Connect [the new digital distribution service
from Sony] a leg up? Certainly as it concerns exclusives.
This whole country is fucked up. There's such a concentration of power in the
entertainment world that what's churned out is lowest common denominator crap
made to appeal to the broadest demographic.
EVERYBODY agrees that the seventies were the last great era of film.
Back when the AUTEURS were in power. Before the business stole back control.
And same deal in the MUSIC business. The acts of the seventies made their
records without supervision, delivering finished product. You can't get away
with that today. Even ANDY LACK has got an opinion on the music. THINK about
that. That would be like a guy getting elected President who'd never been
outside the U.S. deciding to attack a foreign country!!
No true artist respects the suit. For these aren't suits like Ahmet,[?] people
who understand and know the music, these are accountants and lawyers and
corporate henchmen just looking for annual, no QUARTERLY, increases in profits.
This is f*cked up.
Allow these companies to merge. Allow Lack and Smellie to break out the
champagne. But DON'T allow these blowhards to suppress the truth with their
chicanery.
Music has never been worse off than today. Because the powers in control of
manufacturing, distribution and control are so few. Yes, the bigger the
company, the more there is at risk, the more they play safe. And the more they
use their muscle to MAINTAIN control.
Thank god it's so easy to MAKE music.
Support alternative distribution and alternative exhibition. Or else we're DOOMED!
Only the indies can save us.
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