I love spotify and am addicted to it, and Daniel is cool, but here is the key question: can the seriously ingrained Egonomics of the music industry really be changed by Daniel Ek? Can artists and technology companies actually cooperate for a win-win-win solution, without resorting to power tactics? Can some kind of ecosystem be build in a space where ego ruled since the days of Elvis ? You tell me.
IMHO, as the image conveys, I don't think Spotify will ultimately be allowed ie licensed to kill the CD or the unit-sale-centric business model of the traditional music industry. Many artists don't agree with this trend and demand more money, now, from Spotify (utter foolishness, of course - talk about killing the golden goose), many publishers and rights societies (such as GEMA) live in a different universe and have nothing better to do than to strangle technology innovators like Spotify and Youtube with last-century licensing provisions, and the telcos don't care enough to get engaged. We'll see.
...The music industry has been waiting more than a decade for Ek. Or more specifically, someone—anyone—who could build something (a) more enticing to consumers than piracy while (b) providing a sustainable revenue model
Attention is the new currency is one of my favorite memes. So: simply tweet about my 2009 book Music 2.0 (even if you already have it, in print or as PDF) and receive the link to the free download. Use this link to PAY WITH A TWEET and spread the word. If you really must get a dead-tree edition, the print version can be ordered via my bookstore at Lulu.com
About Music 2.0 (from the free mobile site): "This book was self-published in 2009 and is an edited collection of my best essays on the future of the music industry, and continues the work I presented in my first book, The Future of Music, co-written with Dave Kusek. It further describes what I think the next generation of music companies will actually look like – hence the term Music 2.0, a description derived from the now increasingly popular “Web 2.0.” I have been writing and blogging about digital music and the next generation of the music industry for almost four years now – in airplanes, taxis, trains, busses, hotel lobbies, conference halls, and at home. In Internet time (and it certainly feels that way to me), this is almost forever! In many ways my message and my opinions may have evolved a bit but the bottom lines and visions have not changed a whole lot.
Looking back at some 1,000 blog posts and over 20 essays it is evident that by far the most often covered subject is indeed what I (and many other people – I make no claim to having invented this moniker!) have come to call Music 2.0, the new principles that define the next iteration of the music business. All of this is also closely connected with a few other terms that I have co-coined and have come to be associated with: Music Like Water (MLW), the Flat Rate for Music, Feels Like Free (FLF), the Usator, Friction is Fiction, and the People Formerly Known As Consumers. In this book, I aim to just fine-tune the best of my writings from the past four years, while not altering the content too much, in order to preserve the timeliness and context of when it was actually written..."
You can also read the book on pretty much any mobile device just by going to MusicFutures.com.
Also, be sure to follow my music-business specific tweets via @music2dot0. To see all my blog posts on the Music 2.0 book (and the topics covered in the book) please go here. For the music-business specific videos, visit my Youtube channel. Slideshows are here.
This is a self-recorded video of my keynote speech on 'TeleMedia Futures: Making the most of the Content Opportunity' at the recent Total Telecom conference in London, Nov 7 / 8, 2011. Apologies for the somewhat less than perfect recording quality (note that the crackling sound that starts at about 2 mins into the video will seize a minute later:). You can download the PDF of my presentation here: Download TeleMedia and Content Gerd Leonhard Total Telecom Public
More presentations (100+) can be viewed and downloaded via Slideshare
Amy-Mae Elliott interviewed my for this nice Mashable piece the other day. Here are some good snippets from me and from others that were interviewed:
Leander Kahney, editor of Cult of Mac and author of The Cult of iPod, sees the iPod’s primary impact in terms of the “connected device. “Gadgets are no longer stand-alone products,” Kahney says, “they connect to a range of software and online services. Think Internet TVs, stereos like Sonos, handheld gaming devices, GPS bike computers, in-car stereos, high-end watches, Internet radios, even printers — the list goes on and on — and the iPod was the first to do that...."
...Wikström says one could argue that iTunes has been more a hindrance to the industry than a help. Despite the billions of sales using the platform, the music industry has still suffered over the past decade. Did the dominant iTunes business model blind the industry to alternatives? “iTunes prolonged the industry’s dependence on the old model, and made them believe that it actually might be possible just to shift from CD to MP3, just as they had done in the past when they moved from vinyl to tape to CD,” says Wikström. “This is just speculation, but perhaps the most important impact on the music industry is that iTunes delayed the shift from a retail model based on control to what we now start to see emerge as various kinds of cloud-based retail models, such as Spotify and its peers.”
Futurist Gerd Leonhard, author of The Future of Content and co-author of The Future of Music: Manifesto for the Digital Music Revolution also sees iTunes playing a part in the decline of the music industry. “The genius of the iPod was (and still is, with the iPhone) that, while the music industry actually believed that it had found a good (i.e., closed and controlled) way to extract money from otherwise freeloading consumers, the iTunes/iPod/iPhone ecosystem became the dominant hardware solution for the consumption of free music.” |itunes / control image added by Gerd, source unknown |
Today is a very big day for me. My new Kindle book "The Future of Content" just went online at Amazon, and is already gaining a lot of traction. You can view a very short video greeting about the book on my GerdTube channel (Youtube:)
Of course I would be very happy if you would consider buying the book for yourself (only $3.90, Kindle-only) but beyond that it would be really great if you could help me spread the word via rating and / or 'liking' the book on the Amazon.com page, tweeting about it or just forwarding this mail to some friends that may be interested.
This review is from: The Future of Content (Kindle Edition)
"I challenge you to expand your brain and read this book. What Gerd Leonhard is always doing is informing the global brain (or the collective brain) in ways that help us all get where we're trying to go. He builds the buildings in front of us.
This collection points toward several compelling answers for content creators. As a writer who is already swimming in the changing currents of "content," I found it intensely informative. Leonhard shores up my courage to continue embracing a digital world without DRM, and ebook prices "for the masses." He makes the all-important concept of curation crystal clear. If you are providing any kind of content in print or on the web, it's relevant. If you want to stay on the front edge of content creation and publishing, it's basic. I'm making this book mandatory reading for my epublishing circles"
ABOUT "THE FUTURE OF CONTENT" Futurist Gerd Leonhard has been writing about the future of content i.e. music, film, TV, books, newspapers, games etc, since 1998. He has published 4 books on this topic, 2 of them on music (The Future of Music, with David Kusek, and Music 2.0). For the past 10 years Leonhard has been deeply involved with many clients in various sectors of the content industry, in something like 17 countries, and it’s been a great experience, he says. “I have learned a lot, I have listened a lot, I have talked even more (most likely:) and I think I have grown to really understand the issues that face the content industries - and the creators, themselves - in the switch from physical to digital media.”
This Kindle book is a highly curated collection of the most important essays and blog posts Leonhard has written on this topic, and even though some of it was written as far back as 2007 - “I believe it still holds water years later. I have tried to only include the pieces that have real teeth. Please note that the original date of each piece is shown here in order to allow for contextual orientation.” Leonhard’s intent to publish this via the amazing Amazon Kindle platform, exclusively, and at a very low price, is to make these ideas and concepts as widely available as possible while still trying to be an example of what digital, paperless distribution can look like, going forward.
Here are both parts (90 minutes plus 35 minutes) of my keynote speech on The Future of Content at Colombia 3.0 October 7 2011 see http://www.colombiatrespuntocero.com
The panel discussion afterwards can be viewed here, as well (all in Spanish). Note: even though I am actually presenting in English the overdup is Spanish and very much in the foreground. I will try and get an English version, as well - stay tuned.
El suizo GerlLeonhard, líder futurólogo experto en modelos de comercio electrónico, medios de comunicación e innovación fue el encargado del cierre de la Primera Cumbre Nacional de Contenidos Digitales, Colombia 3.0, realizada por el Ministerio TIC entre el 5 y el 8 de octubre. Después de cuatro días de análisis en los que se reunieron emprendedores, inversionistas, animadores, desarrolladores de aplicación y representantes de la industria de los contenidos digitales del mundo terminó Colombia 3.0. En la cumbre participaron 30 conferencistas nacionales y 50 internacionales, quienes se reunieron en 14 eventos simultáneos.Las distintas actividades y conferencias fueron seguidas en línea en 23 ciudades del país y 15 países. De igual manera se tuvo la participación de Siggraph, una asociación mundial de animación gráfica y técnicas interactivas, espacio en que 19 expertos en animación compartieron sus experiencias exitosas en las firmas más importantes del mundo de esta industria. Bogotá 7 de octubre de 2011.En su intervención GerlLeonhard, realizó un detallado análisis de los cambios que han sufrido los medios tradicionales al migrar a los medios sociales como Facebook, Twitter y otras redes sociales. Además,Leonhard anotó que en la actualidad se vive una cultura de la banda ancha y son los “prosumidores”, consumidores activos, los que producen contenidos digitales.
Mencionó el experto suizo que el mundo digital está regido por la relevancia y no solamente por la distribución, según Leonhard, los contenidos digitales deben ser depurados antes de ser distribuidos a los distintos públicos y subrayó que la nueva economía digital que se está viviendo en la actualidad debe iniciarse desde Internet y especialmente desde los dispositivos móviles. Anotó también Leonhard, que el usuario es quien genera los contenidos digitales en la actualidad através de distintos dispositivos móviles. En su intervención, señaló además que la tendencia actual se desarrolla a través de lo móvil, lo social y lo local. Ademásindicó, en este sentido,que para el 2015se esperaque 7.1 trillones de dispositivos móviles sean usados en el mundo.
I am delighted to be involved with PressPausePlay, a movie about digital creativity, funded and promoted by Ericsson, featuring people such as Hank Shocklee, Seth Godin, ZeFrank, Sean Parker, Larry Lessig and Mike Mesnick. And it's finally out and available! Here is what it's all about:
"The digital revolution of the last decade has unleashed creativity and talent in an unprecedented way, with unlimited opportunities. But does democratized culture mean better art or is true talent instead drowned out? This is the question addressed by PressPausePlay, a documentary film containing interviews with some of the world's most influential creators of the digital era"
From the blog: "we have had so many people ask "Where can we see your film?" and this week we are very happy to say our digital distribution has begun! PressPausePlay is now available online in many countries around the world, with more coming soon. You can now find PressPausePlay on iTunes US, iTunes Canada and iTunes UK. You can also purchase PressPausePlay on Amazon.com, Walmart.com, Vudu.com, CinemaNow.com, Xbox, and Playstation. Or put us on your Netflix cue where we will be coming soon..."
According to leading music futurist Gerd Leonhard, such diverse approaches are just the start of the “complete fragmentation of the music format”. With the convergence of audio, video, graphics and gaming via the net, he predicts the album will soon be eclipsed by the music ‘experience’, embodied in any combination of apps, interactive videos, augmented reality apps or a 3D television concert using interactive controllers like Microsoft’s Kinect. “We’re going back to the understanding that playing music is about an experience, not about a download for the cheapest possible price,” he explains. ”With apps and websites and 3D, I’m given an interface which makes it easier to immerse myself in the experience… You can’t copy that. If you can get immersion from your fans, you have their wallet.”
MIDEM just published an exclusive video with me: check it out below. "In this exclusive video post for MIDEMBlog, media futurist & CEO of The Futures Agency cites Guy Kawasaki's notion that we should be "bakers, not eaters," or contributors to an "ecosystem", i.e. a collaborative economy, as opposed to an each-to-his-own "ego system". Food for thought!
The video covers just about all angles of the music industry and provides a great overview of everything that's wrong (and could be righted, I guess) in digital music, and Michael sure has all the right answers to some pretty tough questions. In fact, for most of it, I couldn't have said it better myself:). Check it out. Michael and me do have a few things in common, as far as the message goes, I guess...
It was a pleasure to give a talk for my alma mater, Berklee College of Music, in Nashville (TN) yesterday, on the topic of monetizing music in a networked society (see the Facebook page). You can now browse the entire thing via Slideshare, below, or download the low-res PDF directly from here. Provided under creative commons attribution non-commercial license, as usual. Feel free to share and re-use.
This is a good one - loads of information in here, and pretty well recorded. More details and PDF with all slides, here. Enjoy and spread the word. Subscribe to my video RSS feed, here, if you want (download all videos directly to iTunes, watch on your iPod etc).
Digital music sales in the U.S. grow a paltry 1% from 2009 to 2010 - while just about everyone is getting wired, mobile and social, the recorded music industry can't even manage more than stagnation. Control still matters more than money, I guess (ask Spotify). Summary of Nielsen music sals report here.
It was a great pleasure to be back at the annual Noorderslagt / Eurosonic Event and Conference in Groningen (NL) and present a 60 minute talk on Context, Copyright and the Future of Music, in addition to hosting and moderating a panel called "Is Copyright the Devil" (whew... juicy headline...). I really tried to dig in even deeper as usual, and describe a plausible way forward for the music industry. Hopefully I succeeded... you be the judge of that.
After my talk, I had a spirited panel / conversation with Hans Bousie (copyright expert and cutting-edge Dutch lawyer) and Arda Gerkens (former Dutch parliament member for the Socialist Party) and really enjoyed it (and hopefully, so did the audience, see the tweets).
In my preso, I touched on quite a few topics including the Networked Society, the future of copyright, the need for a public digital music license, the shift from copy to access, and the new revenue streams for musicians, artists and composers. Check out the slideshow, below, or download the low-res PDF from here: Gerd Leonhard Context Groningen Music 2.0 LOW RES 6 MB PDF
Keynote Speaker, Think-Tank Leader, Futurist, Author & Strategist, Idea Curator, some say Iconoclast | Heretic, CEO TheFuturesAgency, Visiting Prof FDC Brazil, Green Futurist
Recent Comments