Letters to the Editor
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I'll be buying it -- and .mp3s be damned, I still love CDs
Until they make hard drives that are semi-permanent, I see no reason NOT to buy the CD of a band's album or other audio recording that you love. And even if they make terabyte-sized hard drives that are guaranteed never to crash, there's still something to be said for owning the CD: It has all the names of the artists, the places it was recorded, the thank-yous, sometimes the lyrics, and best of all, the ALBUM COVER ART. Young people who only use .mp3s have no idea what they're missing in the album covers! The artwork of album designers Hipgnosis or 23 Envelope, for example, is as good or better than most of the stuff that you'll see in any modern-art gallery.
I'll download .mp3s to get a taste of a new artist I've heard about, but if I really love the music, there's no substitute for buying the CD.
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Define semi-permanent
Hard drives ARE semi-permanent. Just like CDs are. Neither will last forever. . . and the average lifespan of a cd is a lot less than you think is.
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CDs
My entire CD collection now resides in a very heavy box in my closet. I haven't purchased a CD in two years. If I must have a hard copy of something, I prefer it be vinyl.
My principle beef with CDs are the prices. I think the industry should drop prices on ALL CDS to under $6. As I see it, today CDs are like bottled water: Consume the contents and throw away the container.
I'm surprised eco-conscious artists like Radiohead don't embrace downloading as the environmentally sound alternative to wasteful plastic.
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I paid nothing for In Rainbows download
Because I will always buy albums on CD. Downloads are ok for singles, live music or to sample new stuff, but I find the idea of my music collection sitting on my hard drive very boring. I'm a tactile person; I love the packaging, the lyrics and the whole idea of the album being more like a physical object as opposed to some faceless folder on my screen. And some of the packaging is just a real pleasure to have as a work of art.
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Of course they did
They overestimated their own brilliance and thought that every slacker with a handful of Paxil and Adderal would flock to pay money for yet another 'product'. Wow were they wrong. I know their fans and no one I know paid a cent for it. Bad move, Thom.
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It's good to hear
Yorke saying that. Every time I hear that crap about how CD's are "over" and there's no future for music except on the internet, I think it's got to be some techie saying it. MOST people still don't have computers, and it's just arrogance to think that because one can afford these gadgets, that means everybody can afford them!
That's bullshit now and it'll be bullshit for a long time to come. I'm glad to hear somebody finally calling it out.
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@ "Nulla Sallus"
Of course they did
They overestimated their own brilliance and thought that every slacker with a handful of Paxil and Adderal would flock to pay money for yet another 'product'. Wow were they wrong. I know their fans and no one I know paid a cent for it. Bad move, Thom.
Gee, don't I feel dumb having ordered the deluxe discbox and getting the 10/10 download as a "preview" of sorts. Also, I suspect those "fans" you know, if they did indeed stiff the band on the download, will be out buying the CD. And no, I'm not under the influence of Paxil or Adderal, thankyouveddymuch.
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If you don't maybe you should.
It can't be that millions of people are wrong and you alone are right.
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@Nulla Sallus
Gotta chime in on this tripe. I'm a huge Radiohead fan, have crossed state lines to see shows (they don't play Arizona), not on any drugs, and I paid $10 to download the album. Why? Because that's about what I think I should be paying for a CD that's quality. Everyone I know that got it paid at least $5 for it. But what irks about this is that no one ever talks about the math.
First off, if the 1.2 million downloads is right, and they released it through a label, they'd get about $1 a CD, or $1.2mm. Now, if only 10% of the people that downloaded it paid what I did, they get $1.2mm. Anything above that is gravy. So who cares if half the people didn't pay for it? They still come out ahead dollar wise, and more importantly, we get to the next part of the math.
Most bands don't make their money on album sales, they make it on touring. You think that those 600,000 people who didn't pay for a download aren't going to see the tour? At $40 a ticket that's $24mm in gross revenue. In all the talk about the music industry you rarely hear about touring, and that's because the labels don't typically handle that so they don't get a big piece.
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@Nulla Sallus
I may be wrong about the facts, but this is my understanding of some of the relevant facts:
1) Radiohead was not under contract with a record company.
2) Radiohead is an established act with a more or less solid fanbase.
3) The members of Radiohead have made enough money already that they could live comfortably -- maybe not Paris Hilton comfortable, but above average comfortable -- without ever selling another cd or going on tour ever again.
Given all that, why not see how the market would determine the value of your product? Even if the band grossed less money, but didn't have share the profit with a record company, maybe they still come out okay. Yes, of course many people are cheap -- but if more people see Radiohead in concert as a result, then the band will still make money. Moreover, if some of those people decide to buy tshirts, tote bags, stickers, posters etc at the concert, then Radiohead will make lots of money. In short, unless you're driving an Italian sportscar from your flat in London to your country estate, maybe you should cut back on the gloating.
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Well then they should tinker with their live shows and how those are marketed
They clearly threw out this album under the guise of truly hoping their fans would be 'nice' and pay them a reasonable price. But that's a silly thing to assume. Everyone knows that given the option people will pay zero. You don't need to test that. On the other hand with concert tickets at some venues going for $300 bucks perhaps they're just squeezing the balloon the same as everyone else and now it's come back to bite them.
Perhaps they should take a page from Phish - charge a lot less for tickets and market the produced CD's of their live shows for substantially more than the usual retail price of a CD. The reverse of that is counterintuitive and nonsensical. And that's why they backed off and marketed a CD version of the same product.
Well that or the fact that record companies own most of the live venues now so they can force the 'artists' to comply with just about any back end distribution deal they like.