Rolling Stone Says It Is The End Of Owning Music

[TubeLover]

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/owning-music-buying-vinyl-cds-downloads-streaming-w521504?utm_source=rsnewsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=daily&utm_campaign=061618_12

 

 

I don't agree with most of their points here, at least I hope I'm not wrong. If cd's truly do disappear, and downloads go the same way, our ability to listen to older, end especially new artists will be crippled. Many fine niche, or beginning artists have only the cd as a format to get their music out. If they aren't already proven, neither Tidal or anyone else is picking them up to stream and the hi rez online sites have no interest in little known artists (excepting the audiophile sites that record their own artists). 

 

Secondly, tThey are placing far too much importance on the temporary vinyl resurgence which is almost entirely the result of a fad. Millennials are playing the vastly overpriced vinyl discs on $100-150.00 "record players" which are not only horrifyingly bad, as far as sound, but also reduce the records to a non hi-fi format by eating away at vinyl grooves over a short number of plays. My niece has twice called me to ask whats wrong with her unit, as all the older records she has don't sound the same. Duh!  And the truly sad part is that the people purchasing and using these junk players aren't even bright enough to realize that if the device you are playing something on only costs as much as about five new vinyl records something is seriously out of whack. There is still perhaps ten percent of the market that consists of vinyl based audiophiles that actually care about the format, beyond the 90% of Millennials who seem to relatively care less about much of anything, but they are in no way responsible for the vinyl surge. And, on top of all of the above, the supposedly exploding market for vinyl is still generating what is, in fact, a very small segment of music sold overall.  

 

"

Vinyl LP sales accounted for 14 percent of all physical album sales in 2017, The Beatles' "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" top selling vinyl LP. Once again, yearly vinyl album sales have hit another Nielsen Music-era record high, as the configuration sold 14.32 million (up 9 percent) in 2017.Jan 3, 2018

U.S. Vinyl Album Sales Hit Nielsen Music-Era Record High in 2017 ...

https://www.billboard.com/.../us-vinyl-album-sales-nielsen-music-record-hig

 

Lets face it, 14% of a market for physical format sales, which they claim is completely dying is beyond insignificant.

 

Am I concerned about losing the ability to have the means to listen to new, and niche artists long term, certainly. I just pray that dire situation isn't here yet. Add in that Tidal's days would seem to be numbered, and there is absolutely no competitor with a comparable music library out there and maybe they are right, the end could be near. Lets hope not.

 

JC

[TubeLover]

6 hours ago, ddetaey said:

If I (try to) understand the Qobuz offering, it is all about download sales.

With their Sublime offerings, they offer steep discounts on hirez downloads, with prices cheaper than the regular redbook downloads.

So they are trying to make buying hirez so attractive, that a lot of people will do so .

In fact, if one is into hirez downloads, one can 'earn back' the sublime subscription when buying +/- 30 hirez downloads in 1 year.

So I am not really afraid downloads will go away soon.

Ad for CD's, it's not so difficult/costly for an artist to have a limited number of Cd's produced. In fact, having only a limited number available could maybe help them for greater visibilty, if prople would like to buy them even at higher prices.

Dirk

 

 

 

Good points Dirk, but the issue for much of the market is that while Qobuz's library is great for classical music buffs, its very lacking in rock, and many other key formats.

 

JC