Powerful structures for product-driven organisations
We constantly hear about how innovative musicians have become. The labels are wankers, dinosaurs, out of touch, unable to adapt their business model: their days are numbered. Well now it seems that the artists are wankers too. In this article from HBR, we find that the very darlings of the MySpace revolution, Linkin Park - a… Continue reading Linkened In
Most people got to know the inimitable Anthony H Wilson, who died two years ago, by seeing him on Granada TV, or one of the Granada shows that was broadcast outside the Manchester region, like "Other Side of Midnight" or "After Hours". And, a whole generation got know him from the Hacienda or other Factory… Continue reading Eulogies
I don't very often get to start blog posts with 'when I was a lad'. Merciful perhaps. But something caught my eye in the flat today that got me thinking just that. Between the age of maybe 15 and 17, I spent an absolutely indecent amount of time in places like this: (fantastic Vinyl Exchange… Continue reading Thinking inside the box
Inspired again this morning by a Clay Shirky twitter (this microblogging might have legs you know) Dear AAPL, re offer to upgrade to iTunes+ at $0.30 a song: Go fuck yourselves. I took yr stupid DRM off myself, too late to bill me now This reminds me (a) of a great gaping void cartoon: And… Continue reading Indecent pricing
There's an interesting story being reported about a Pennsylvania mother called Stephanie Lenz who received a letter from Universal Music because a clip she uploaded to YouTube had a prince song in the background ('Let's go crazy'). The clip is 29 seconds long, of very poor quality, and the song in the background is barely audible. However… Continue reading Let’s not go crazy
If Radiohead's intention in letting customers choose the price they pay for the band's new album, In Rainbows, was to light up the blogosphere, then it's certainly worked: here, here, here and of course, right here. They were actually beaten to the punch by the Charlatans, who're not messing around with making customers pay 1p for… Continue reading The other side of In Rainbows
Yesterday's keynote from Steve Jobs was, as usual, a great show, full of amazing new products and product innovation. The Nano got even smaller and got video, the shuffle got more memory, the standard iPod got a new name ("classic") and more storage, the iPhone became a lot cheaper, and he launched the new iPod… Continue reading Starbucks in their Ipods
I've talked quite a lot here about the future of music and of record labels' role in it. Well last night I saw that future in action, and it was in the shape of an iconic Minneapolis superstar jumping around like a mad man on stage at the dome. Prince has sold out 21 nights at… Continue reading Shutting the label door
This weekend marks two endings. One very sad and one very happy. In this article, Andrew Orlowski sums up the love/hate relationship Manchester had with Anthony H Wilson, who died this weekend. A founder of the legendary Factory records and TV journalist, I remember vividly the first time I saw Anthony Wilson, on Other Side… Continue reading Making music history
Couple of good quotes / stories I found in a desperate attempt to do some catch-up reading of my Economist stockpile. Strangely enough both items from the same page in the July 7th issue (p. 69). In A change of tune (paywalled), we have Warner Music chairman, Edgar Bronfman saying "The music industry is… Continue reading Music business
Leading product 