By James Pew

Three Essential Concepts

1. The Long Tail

2. 1,000 True Fans

3. The Eight Generative Values Better Than Free

The Long Tail

“The potential aggregate size of the many small markets, may someday rival that of the existing large markets” – Chris Anderson

By selling less of more. By selling millions of different niche products. This is the Long Tail theory in a nutshell.

HMV sells a lot of mainstream music at their retail locations. These mainstream titles are what make up the “Head of the Demand Curve.” At the head a massive amount of revenue is generated from a relatively small number of titles. After the Head – the Long Tail. Which is made up of all the non-mainstream niche titles. In the Long Tail a massive amount of revenue is generated from fewer sales of more titles.

There are millions of indie bands in the long tail.

HMV doesn’t have the physical space to stock the CDs of every indie band in North America. But an online retailer is not limited by physical warehouse space. The theory of the Long Tail is that the sum of all the revenue generated from sales of the Long Tail niche products is greater than the sum of all the sales of mainstream products at the head of the demand curve.

How people can discover long tail music

Whether its iTunes or Amazon, Last FM, Pandora, Mufin, or many of the others – the new way to discover music is through the recommendation engines built into those platforms. These are the pieces of software that tell you after you buy the newest Smashing Pumpkins record that you may also like the new record from band X.

Mainstream titles can be used as meta information for your music. If you think fans of the Smashing Pumpkins would like your music too. Then start telling that to people. Just as important tell that to search engines. A simple example is the list of influences on your bands myspace page. The bands you list there should be bands that have a similar vibe to your music, and that you can realistically see their fans being your fans. There is a lot more to this than just myspace influences. The idea is to build a connection between your band and the Smashing Pumpkins. Someone searching for content on the Pumpkins therefore may stumble across you.

One of the coolest emerging cultural practices of today is intelligent and/or social recommendation of music. The process begins with the aggregation of the mass of content – filter and categorization of it – then making it available to the public.

Once the content is aggregated and sorted out – an infinite amount of new variables can be added to the recommendation equation. Getting customer feedback and keeping track of who is buying what, enables a digital music delivery platform to know that people who like Motown recordings also like Amy Winehouse. So when you buy the new Amy Winehouse record you also get a recommendation of a Motown record with the old school vibe that Amy Winehouse emulates in her music. Amazon & Itunes use a social “wisdom of the crowd” approach to recommendation.

Two examples of systems that go beyond “wisdom of the crowd” social recommending are Mufin & Pandora – Mufin uses 40 different sonic characteristics, like tempo, sound density, harmony, instrumentation, etc. But not genre. To recommend songs to you based on your sonic preferences.

And Pandora, which has been shut down in Countries outside the US due to copyright licensing issues. Pandora’s algorithm uses the classification system of the Music Genome Project to recommend music based on your preferences.

The Music Genome Project represents a given song based on a vector of attributes. Similar to a strand of DNA, where each attribute is a gene that is rated on scale between 1 & 5. Every song has a unique genome.

Rock and Pop music have 150 genes. A few examples are Gender of lead vocalist, level of distorted guitar, the type of backing vocals, etc.

Here are a few other idioms of music. World music has 300-500 genes. Jazz has 400 genes. Hip Hop has 350 genes.

If you like the genome or sound of a particular rock song – Pandora’s algorithm, using a distance function, will recommend other similar song genomes. Or songs that have similar sonic attributes.

My last Studio Manifesto post, In Defense Of Lessig, has a video of Pandora founder Tim Westergen embedded. Check it out for a detailed description of Pandora and the Music Genome Project.

Keven Kelley Quote

The long tail is famously good news for two classes of people; a few
lucky aggregator’s, such as Amazon and Netflix, and 6 billion
consumers. Of those two, I think consumers earn the greater reward from
the wealth hidden in infinite niches.

This is why the new music business is being described as a pull market. Because consumers are reaching through the Long Tail and pulling what they want, as opposed to buying up mainstream titles pushed on them.

So if consumers are starting to buy niche long tail products. How good is this for indie musicians? How do you get your music included in the mass of content being filtered and ranked by computers. And ultimately being recommended to those most likely to like it?

Kevin Kelley asks:

Other than aim for a blockbuster hit, what can an artist do to escape the long tail?

His solution:

1,000 True Fans

A True Fan is defined as someone who will purchase anything and everything you produce. They will spend an average annual amount of $100 on things you offer them (CDs, show tickets, merch, etc.). That’s 100,000 in revenue a year. After expenses you take home approx. $30,000 per year. Not the best. Most people make more than that. But your living your dream. And you have momentum toward something bigger.

The idea is you don’t need to be a mega star. You don’t have to have a million fans. A thousand fans is attainable.

Another brilliant Kevin Kellyism

Eight Generative Values Better Than Free

The traditional mainstream music business will not die, despite the long tail – instead it will adapt to broadband culture. It will co-exist with new models that exploit the long tail. The mainstream music industry will have a smaller slice of the pie as it competes for “ear time,” or the attention of the masses.

In this new music economy attention is the new money. In the past business models focused only on the pursuit of the type of sale which closed with a cash transaction.

In a broadband world, to capture attention, is to make a sale. Once this attention capturing sale is closed. The opportunity to make money on the up sell is presented.

Kevin Kelleys Eight Generatives Better than Free is where the Upsell lives. Money can be made from these generative values.

Quoting Kevin Kelley

a generative thing can not be copied, cloned, faked, replicated, counterfeited, or reproduced. It is generated uniquely, in place, over time. In the digital arena, generative qualities add value to free copies, and therefore are something that can be sold.”

I’m going to paraphrase Kevin’s Eight Generative Values better than free. I do recommend everyone read Kevin’s original post Better than free.

Immediacy

Sooner or later you can find a free copy of whatever you want, but getting access to a copy the moment something is released is worth something.

Buying a ticket to see a film, that will eventually be available free, upon its cinematic release is another example of willingness to pay for Immediacy.

Immediacy is a relative term, which is why it is generative. It has to fit with the product and the audience.

Personalization

One example given is Aspirin tailored to your DNA.

Imagine a DVD with the audio mastered based on the acoustic characteristics of your entertainment room. Maybe your entertainment space is small and square, and therefore acts as a bass trap. A technician can analyzes the rooms acoustic response. An audio mastering engineer can then use this information to remaster the music (sound) on the DVD for an optimal audio experience in your specific space. They can even factor in your personal preferences to the equation. If you tell them you like lots of fat bass then that’s what they will give you.

The possibilities for musicians to capitalize on personalization are limited only by our imaginations.

Interpretation

A software may be free, but it costs to get a person on the phone to give you technical support.

An artist may give copies of her music for free, but later sell a book or a documentary about how that music was made. Interviews with the band, the engineers in the studio, the fans at the shows. If you make a great product core fans will want to delve deep into and dissect it.

What about the value given to your music when a new producer re-interprets or remixes it. There is value behind your interpretation and anyone else who re-interprets and adds something new to the mix.

Consider making the stems of your recordings available for people to remix. You can release them under a Creative Commons license, which will give free access to the content for people to create derivative works, but if you choose, not allow any commercial uses. The idea being you are the creator of the source content and therefore must always be attributed as the original creator. If someone wants to make money off a derivative of your content they must ask your permission, and if you give it, cut you in to the deal.

Authenticity

The seal of authenticity is worth something. You can get boot legged of pirated copies of almost anything. But getting access to the presentation of the content that is inline with how the artist intended you to get access, ensures that your experience with the content will not be tainted, or incomplete, or sound or look like crap.

Accessibility

Because you need to organize and take care of things, ownership often sucks. Many people prefer to have others tend to their “possessions” by subscribing to them. Paying ACME Digital Music Service to play any musical tune in the world, when and where we want it, as well as any movie, photo, book or blog post. Acme backs everything up, pays the creators, and delivers us our desires. We can sip it from our phones, iPods, laptops, etc. The fact that most of this material will be available free, if we want to tend it, back it up, keep adding to it, and organize it, will be less and less appealing as time goes on.

The models like ACME that cut the creators in are the way of the future. And good for artists.

Embodiment

At its core the digital copy is without a body. You can take a free copy of a work and throw it on a screen. But perhaps you’d like to see it in hi-res on a huge 3D screen?

PDFs are fine for delivering the information, but having a copy of a book in your hands, looking at the artwork on the cover, feeling the grain of the papers between your fingers is sometimes worth the price.

And nothing gets embodied as much as music in a live performance, with band standing in front of you. The music is free; the bodily performance expensive.

Patronage

Fans like to reward artists, musicians, authors and the like with the tokens of their appreciation, because it allows them to connect. But they will only pay if it is very easy to do, a reasonable amount, and they feel certain the money will directly benefit the creators.

RadioHead “In Rainbows” – at one point the average was $5 per download. People chose to pay what was offered to them free.

Find Ability

When there are millions of books, millions of songs, millions of films, millions of applications, millions of everything requesting our attention — and most of it free — being found is valuable. Being free does not automatically equate to being found. Making yourself findable, at least in the online world, requires search engine optimization and search engine marketing.

The basic formula is find yourself a 1,000 true fans by first capturing their attention for long enough that they decide they like you. Then once you have established this artist to fan relationship upsell them on generative values.

What we haven’t really discussed is what you do to stay connected and build on relationships. You have to keep those 1,000 fans interested in you by keeping them updated with the interesting things you are doing. Many will want to live vicariously through you. Give them something extraordinary to live.

You will also need to put forth an effort to connect with new fans, and build beyond your base of 1,000.

---

The dot Com crash of the 1990s was simply a case of being to early. The internet delivery infrastructure was not capable of delivering on demand quality streaming audio/video content. Most people now have broadband connections. And the wireless communications industry is enormous and it now delivers broadband internet to mobile devices.

Media Futurist Gerd Leonhard predicts that within three years everyone will be connected to the web in some form or another at all times. Then we will be fully immersed in broadband culture. He also believes that music will become similar to a utility, Like electricity or water. You will pay for it. But most likely it will be bundled into a service, and found in places like your cell phone bill.

This gives music the appearance and feel of free. Like when you turn on your tap and water magically flows out. You are not charged at the point of drawing that glass of water. You are charged on your water bill once every four months or so.

Gerd makes a strong case for this when he points to the fact that the broadband communications industry wants this model. Because they know that billions of people will be using their devices and networks to access and share content. The broadband communications industry is many billions of dollars bigger than the music industry. Because of that the Broadband communications industry out muscles the puny music business. The traditional Music Industry has been reluctant, for the past several years, to fully embrace new models. So there is a lot of controversy around it. But not only is this what the Broadband industry wants – its what ordinary people want. Open access to the worlds creative content at a fair price with no restrictions on copying or sharing.

Broadband culture is about sharing, something human culture has long been about. People want to recommend and share creative content with one another. This is a great way for music to circulate and be discovered.

The mainstream music lobby has been pressuring the government to further restrict copyrights by redefining copyright law in a way that undermines the natural cultural practices of sharing and use of music. The result has been a vast criminalization of ordinary citizens.

The RIAA and other music Lobbies proposed copyright reforms, backed by neo-conservatives, extend well beyond the traditional scope of copyright law. The fair use of copyrighted material becomes close to impossible to define. The need for lawyers to sort it out makes it an expense beyond the financial reach of the average citizen. DRM (Digital Rights Management) or digital locks restrict multiple forms of personal use and in many cases invade our privacy rights. Add this to a list of other civil liberties being diminished in this modern age. The public domain is being threaten by aggressive copyright restrictions. And therefore creative culture as we have known it is also being threatened.

The proliferation of social media, User Generated Content, and this mashed up remix culture is evidence that more people are creating and sharing media than ever before. People are communicating in new and creative ways.

The indie musicians, at all points of the long tail will capture much attention. Other forms of amateur user generated content will also capture attention. And mainstream media will share the stage. This means that as an indie artist, you are not only competing with over exposed mainstream acts, you are competing with average citizens who post videos of their kids on youtube. Professional and Amateur content both compete for the sames peoples time and attention.

Anatomy of the Modern Musician is Broadband and Interdisciplinary

A hypothetical scenario.

Imagine you are a member of a heavy metal band that just got a gig opening for Judas Priest!

One small example of what the modern broadband musician would do is ask Judas Priest front man Rob Halfred for a photo, short video, or even an interview for the website. Maybe even streaming live. All using a hand held digital video recording device. Like a cell phone.

The image I have of this modern musician is of a very smart person clearly skilled in their craft. It goes without saying that they are a talented interesting artist. They are living examples of the converging literacies, and interdisciplinary model described in Part 2 of this presentation. This is someone more than a jack of all trades. This is a Renaissance person.

They understand enough about the technology that creates the sound necessary to make their music. And they know how to manipulate that technology to conjure up a desired sound. They are creative with that. This translates to the technology used to reinforce the sound of their live performance. They know how to operate a mixing board. They know how to perform minor repairs and maintenance on their instruments.

They also run their own promotional department, they are their own webmaster, they use digital tools to edit their music, their videos, and photos. They design ad banners for their shows, and web pages, they network and build relationships with fans, friends, and other artists. They understand new and emerging cultural practices like social media. They aim to build community.

What they do best is music. They never lose sight of that while learning all the additional skills they need to sustain their music business. They have lots self-discipline and are always progressing as artists.

They approach things lightly and often with humor. Not everything they try works out – but enough of it does to make it count. When things don’t work out – they learn from the experiment and immediately move on. They have perpetual momentum towards something bigger and better. The speed of that momentum correlates to the size of their ambition.

Closing Statement

Always have a multi-tiered approach to your music business. You must become a bit of a geek to manage your web 2.0 presence. But not so much that you forget how to interact in the real world. Or how to write songs.

Never stop practicing, writing, recording, performing, and promoting.

Good Luck!

Music Presentation at Soundtopia Part 3 by James Pew is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

Technorati Tags: 1000 True Fans, Amazon, Better Than Free, Chris Anderson, creative commons, Gerd leonhard, iTunes, James Pew, Keven Kelley, Last FM, Lawrence Lessig, long tail, Mufin, Music Genome Project, myspace, Pandora, SoundTopia, studio manifesto, Tim Westergren, University of Toronto, web 2.0

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This entry was posted on Sunday, February 15th, 2009 at 11:57 am and is filed under Music Culture, Music Production, Music Promotion, studio 2.0. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.