How does technological convergence benefit/damage the music industry?

Convergence describes the way in which technology has come together in recent years. This has had a huge impact on the music industry, as more and more opportunities are being made for artists, record labels and producers to promote and distribute music. However, after all this convergence of music being available via new media platforms, there are benefits to this new system, but also some factors that are damaging the industry.

Advantages:

·         The cost of distribution of the music being produced has gone down as the gap between the producer and the audience is now much smaller. The way this has been done is by making the music available in many different formats, the main one being digital, and compatible to many different devices like phones, mp3 players, computers etc. This means that more and more people are now purchasing this digital copy of the music, instead of the physical CD with the single or album from. By doing this, the demand for packaged CD’s have dropped dramatically, saving the labels and producers a lot of money on materials to physically make and package these CD’s.

·         There is now instant access to the music being created by the invention of the download. Not only does this save money, but it also generates more revenue. This happens for a number of reasons. When a song or artist is played on the radio or TV, two forms of convergence, the consumer can instantly go onto their computer or even phone, and purchase this single or album within seconds. This means that people are much less likely to forget who it was they wanted to purchase by the time they are physically in a shop that sells CD’s, as they can instantly purchase it there and then with no interruptions or forgetting what song or album is was that they liked.

·         As well as instant access to the music via download, there is also instant access on just listening and finding new music. The internet plays a big part in this by offering websites and programmes like We7 and Spotify, where you can stream and listen music for free. This makes it quicker than ever for listeners to find and listen to new music, and from here download the track. People can now listen to music from so many more devices, for example people don’t have to carry a boom box round on their shoulder, or wait for a specific song to come on the radio, people can now access these songs straight from their phones, computers and other smart devices like the iPad.

·         By having this instant access, it’s now easier than ever for artists to find opportunities to promote their work. They can create profiles on social networks, giving access to their audience to listen to and sample their music, as well as putting up videos on sites like YouTube for their fans to communicate with them more intimately, and give them a new way of experiencing their music.

·         Artists can also promote their music through other artists, for example having their videos on other artists’ websites and social networks pages. These links can be made by these two or more artists going on tour together, leaving the audience wanting to know more about the other artists, so looking on these sites they can get a direct link to the other artists music.

·         Another form of promotion would be via programmes like Spotify, where artists can create adverts, audio or visual, to be placed on the programme, and to be played in between songs, so try and gain a wider target audience and increase audience awareness.

·         Even though illegal downloading loses the music industry a lot of money, it can also benefit the artist. An example of this is Scouting For Girls, who aren’t too annoyed about illegal downloads, as they claim that this is the way that they gained a large number of their audience, who then went on to attend their gigs, and buy their next album or single. By being able to share the music without having to pay for it every time someone else heard it meant that more and more fans were created for Scouting For Girls, as they didn’t need to pay for the music they were listening to, so weren’t disappointed if they didn’t like it, but were even happier if they liked the music as they found and listened to it without spending any money.

Disadvantages

·         By making the copies of the music as a digital version, it is now easier than ever to copy and distribute this music to other people for free, getting around the boundary of paying. Programmes like Limewire and uTorrent give audiences this access to the music without having to pay for it, as they can easily just search for the song, and download it for free. There are also many websites which offer straight transactions of free downloads like The Pirate Bay and Mp3 Raid. These sites have a search box, and directs the user straight to the music that they want to download for free.

·         With these illegal downloads, the music industry is making less and less money on record sales, and some figures show that they are making just 5% of the revenue that they could be making if illegal downloading didn’t exist.

·         With the huge losses being made, this means that record labels and artists are making less and less money, and therefore have less money to reinvest back into the music, meaning that the quality and quantity of the music is being affected.