radiohead had the internets a buzz with the whole "pay whatever" theory for _in rainbows_. sadly (and almost predictably) it didnt turn out to their favor. a study done by comScore Inc said that 62% of people that downloaded the album did so for free, and the remaining 38% averaged at about 6 bucks. YEOWZA.
Posted on 11/06/2007
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My Trusted MOGs
I have long been waiting, as with others I'm sure, to find out how this experiment went...thanks for digging it up.
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no prob!
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Those are rather depressing numbers, but as you stated predictable - guess they are fortunate that 38% even bothered paying. Great song selection!
My Trusted MOGs
Hmm. How many downloads where there? 38% is still not bad if you had several million downloads at $6 and at least Radiohead controlled most of it. I know some people still downloaded it from Torrent. My view on the whole thing is that it was a success.
My Trusted MOGs
You should read this.
http://mog.com/Sam_The_Artist/blog_post/123005
My Trusted MOGs
davesonic: I think you meant this
http://mog.com/Alien8n/blog_post/123038
You may also find these an interesting read for my take on the background to this story. http://mog.com/Alien8n/blog_post/108647 http://mog.com/Alien8n/blog_post/110402 http://mog.com/Alien8n/blog_post/112784
My Trusted MOGs
My answer and how this is a great success so far
http://mog.com/Wanbli/blog_post/123015
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D'oh !!!
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crawl: sad thing is, i didnt even buy in rainbows. my friend sent me "videotape" in an email... but i love it.
dave: im still wondering how much of it actually _went_ to radiohead. im sure there is so much money changing going on that were not aware of
alien: 16 P for an album! i had no idea it cost so much in the UK! that is a shame.
wanbli: thats a good post, but like you, I would like to see the REAL numbers. lol.
My Trusted MOGs
you all are missing the point. it's NOT about record sales. They will make a fortune touring because they have a great record here. THAT'S where the profits come from.
The other thing is , even if that small amount paid only 5 bucks....that means well over 400, 000 people paid that much and they get every cent of it. Do the math. they MAY have gotten two cents per song via a label. Did they succeed? You bet they did.
My Trusted MOGs
I'm in the CapnBozo camp. If you were to compare these numbers with the amount of money directly from sales that Radiohead would have seen from a label-released record, they certainly turned a profit.
It's the middlemen who lost money, and, of course the labels that survive off of album sales.
My Trusted MOGs
im sure they made a killing with concert sales, but i keep thinking, what if everyone that downloaded it _paid just a little_ instead of nothing. do you think it would be drastically different?
My Trusted MOGs
I don't think it would be. Part of the reason that records cost so much is because of all the middle men involved in the process. Remove the middlemen and the cost plummets, lowering the standard to qualify as a success when measured on a percent scale.
Half of an album's cost usually goes to the store selling it. And next to nothing typically goes to the band.
This type of promotion, the fact that we're talking about this, is a sign of the success. The talk has been thrown around about the new middle class musician that this type of delivery could create.
My Trusted MOGs
A lot of the reasons why the big labels held their monopoly for so long are disappearing. There's really too much to add to a comment, so I'll post up what I think as a proper post. Part 4 of Who Owns Music coming up I think :)