One is all about control, stamping things out, and shutting things down. The other thrives on organic growth, emotional connections, and word-of-mouth. Yet Big Machine Records puts anti-piracy on the same level as marketing in its releases, as evidenced by a recent campaign for Taylor Swift's Speak Now.
The anti-piracy policing starts pre-release. "Stopping pre-release leaks is as crucial as anything else we do to help make a new album a success, which is why we were so pleased with the way the leaks of Speak Now were contained," Big Machine international director of marketing Brad Turcotte said, part of a recently-distributed IFPI report. Turcotte is referring to Swift's highly-successful, 2010 release, whose anti-piracy response looked like this (graph supplied by the IFPI):
As the chart shows, Big Machine not only spent considerable effort stamping out pre-release leaks, they also maintained night-and-day diligence on every pirated copy after the release date. Most were taken down immediately, a response that requires huge resource allocations.
Those resources included the IFPI, which was a serious anti-piracy partner. "IFPI's team identified and removed the majority of the 6,500 illegal [pre-release] copies within hours of the links being found, ensuring the internet was not swamped with illegal copies of the hotly anticipated title," the trade group described. "The album went on to become the first million-selling title in the US in the first week of release since Lil Wayne's Tha Carter III in 2008."
That proves the point - at least for the IFPI and Big Machine.
Comments Closed
@BigChampagne Tuesday, August 02, 2011
BigChampagne.com
Incorrect. Easily disproved.
Seth Keller Tuesday, August 02, 2011
Love to see the real stats from Big Champagne. is it possible to post a summary?
Visitor Tuesday, August 02, 2011
http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/correlation.png
Visitor Tuesday, August 02, 2011
Good for Big Machine but the problem could more easily be solved by having ISPs police for violators. ISPs prefer not to get involved because piracy leads to more bandwith usage thus more revenues for ISPs.
/yv
Jim Johesen Tuesday, August 02, 2011
Big Machine is right, but the music business has the wrong strategy.
It starts with DRM. Books, video, tv, film all have it.
Does the music world think they are smarter than everyone else in showbiz?
Put DRM back on, continue to fight piracy... then, digital will thrive and be huge.
Michael Anderson Tuesday, August 02, 2011
Exactly! Because piracy isn't an issue for games, books, etc ... and piracy wasn't an issue for music when everything had DRM! Oh ... wait ...
Taylor Tuesday, August 09, 2011
Jim, you are sadly misguided (or uninformed) about DRM as it relates to music. It has never and will never work - the data backs it up on every front.
And to top it off, it hinders and hurts the music listening and sharing experience....not really something you want when trying to break a new artist.
State the obvious Tuesday, August 02, 2011
Minimizing piracy leads to more profits. Why has it taken so long to figure this out?
Lewis Black Wednesday, August 03, 2011
Why has it taken so long?
Cause the music industry is stupid and listens to tech companies.
LB
Visitor Wednesday, August 10, 2011
http://bit.ly/p1DEym
@brianoneal Tuesday, August 02, 2011
brianoneal
What?!
George Friday, August 05, 2011
It's true the powerful message of the technocrats, the iron, plastic, silicon and steel guys is that "tech" is god and content is used to feed it. "DON'T STOP INNOVATION" when, in fact, "innovation" is virtually never impeded by figuring out how to stop thievery.
In fact it was Steve Jobs betrayal of the music industry that was the most blatent example of the feckless content creators buying into pure propaganda, "You Don't Need DRM!" which was only a calculated move on Apple's part to sell more iPods, (at the time), Jobs knowing that the tons of pirated MP3s needed a home, and he was going to provide. Even today, something like 3/4ths of all music on his products is pirated, why give that market driver up? thought Jobs and his accountants. So, no more DRM it was! Foolish, foolish, foolish. And, for any retort that this is not true, look at the revenues' trajectory for folks that create the art of music, it's a plane without fuel, spiraling down with an the occasional tiny updraft. "Oh, but the music isn't any good any more!" Forrester research says that the consumption (not purchase) of music has increased and amazing three-fold since 1998. "Oh, but music is over priced", how do you find the right price for a download when standing next to that download music store (online or not) is another store called "pirated/free"? By it's nature a Book is DRM'd, by it's nature sitting in a movie theatre watching a new release is DRM'd, by it's nature a live music festival is DRM'd. Until music is DRM'd again, it will be taken, and that is killing it.
Free Sunday, August 07, 2011
I guess they misunderstood what a "free market economy" is. Oh well its only fair now that we all get our music playing devices for free, after all they were happy to impose this concept on the music creators.
Taylor Tuesday, August 09, 2011
I worry that campaigns like this and the resulting ballyhoo will only re-start the falacy that "someone who downloaded music for free would have purchased it anyway." There may be SOME gains, yes, but it's not a 1-to-1 conversion.
Detail Wednesday, August 10, 2011
You are right.
What the artists are concerned about is the people who would of paid for the music but decided it was easier to download or stream it for free because they can.
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