ContentSphere - Music & Media in an Online Culture

Finally. Editing of videos, compiling all material and statements took more time than expected. But it’s - almost - done.

Unfortunately, most statements are available in German only. Yet some of the sessions were held in English.

I’m still missing the sessions on collection societies and DIY marketing, the latter featuring Amanda Palmer and Georgia Wonder. Though one video I’m sure you will enjoy: Amanda Palmer live at Münze Berlin (almost 80 minutes).

Right now, the documentation on Vimeo lists 59 videos. This includes statements from participants right after panels they were involved in as well as full videos of some sessions. Much thanks to the guys from PeopleZapping as well as to Jens Best who was heavily involved into editing the videos. Btw, these videos are the result from our webcasts - please don’t expect HD material shot with the best and most expensive equipment you can find at Amsterdam’s IBC.

Also, you might browse the Flickr group mainly featuring pictures by Robert Eysoldt, Karola Riegler, Sim Sullen and Gaga Nielsen. The type of copyright licence depends on the photographer and the picture.

The concept was to create an event for the creative people. For consumers. For social media geeks. For IT people. For anyone whose interested in discussing the changes in music and culture. It was intended to be a convention for anyone to collectively work on the current situation - all2gethernow.

The first installment of all2gethernow aimed at finding first steps towards solutions - we didn’t expect Harry Potter to attend and make Lord “Where’s the artist’s money?” Voldemort go KA-BOOM. Also, confrontation gets no one nowhere. Starting out, it’s great to get people from different sides talking to each other. To motivate. To initiate. To help people participate.

But, no matter what, a2n will be compared to Popkomm.

Continue reading "all2gethernow at Berlin - a Review (albeit from..." »

The number of exhibitors was said to be low. Due to online piracy.

This is what Dieter Gorny, CEO of German Body of Music Industry (BVMI) told the public when Popkomm (founded by Gorny), Germany’s most important and one of Europe’s largest music business conferences was cancelled on 19 June.

Then, Jana Herwig, addressing Berlin’s music scene blogged from Vienna: “Can’t you do anything about it and make it happen yourself, bottom-up style? #unkomm”. She coined the hash tag paving the way. By 7 July at the founding meeting, all2gethernow was born.

It took us little more than 10 weeks to prepare for an event including festival, barcamp and conference on exactly the same date Popkomm 2009 should’ve been taking place. There’s two camp days packed with about 50 sessions and the conference presenting 12+ speaker slots.

Not everyone was able to fit an appearance into his personal schedule that quickly.

Nevertheless, all2gethernow amongst others features

• Melvin Benn (Director of Festivals // Mean Fiddler)
  
• Amke Block (CEO // Audiomagnet)
  
• Julie Borchard-Young (“The Metropolitan Opera Live in HD”)
  
• Andrew Dubber (NewMusicStrategies.com)
  
• Jim Griffin (Choruss)
  
• Paul Keller (Project Lead // Creative Commons Netherlands)
  
• Laurent Kratz (CEO/CoFounder // Jamendo)
  
• Gerd Leonhard (MediaFuturist.com)
  
• Alexander Ljung (CEO/CoFounder // SoundCloud)
  
• Tim Renner (CEO // MotorEntertainment)
  
• Kilian Steiner (Director/Legal Advisor // GEMA)
  
• Wim Wenders

This event has no budget but great sponsors. Anyone of us is in it for the matter.

all2gethernow - a new music and culture convention.

[Deutsche Version] Andrew Dubber just recently pitched a topic to Popkomm - "Music As Culture". If you read the outline of this hopefully upcoming speech at New Music Strategies, you might recognise a bit of Lawrence Lessig's "Free Culture".

Dubber is absolutely right in labeling it "important" and "urgent".

We've seen the USA extending copyright terms, and European countries suggesting to do so. Just yesterday, the European parliament in a first reading voted in favour of a prolongation by extending the copyright term from 50 to 70 years. I mentioned it before - this definitely does harm to culture. Strict legislation and overly harsh fines result in a "permission culture", as Lessig puts it.

Internet Means Creativity

Point is, we must embrace the very fact that culture lives within the internet. The web advances culture. These are the new tools. As often, lobbyism for the old paradigm tries to build shrines for technologies while understanding and sensibly implementing the new would yield better results and stimulate the market. Actually, the market, which means culture, right now is strangled. And it's not The Pirate Bay that does. It is the collective understanding of today's society of terms as "intellectual property", "piracy", and "lost sales".

Continue reading "Popkomm's arising: Dubber - Music, Culture, and..." »

[Deutsche Version] Yeah, I know. It is from 2007. BUT - do yourself a favour and read it.

Andrew Dubber is known for being a lecturer, a music industries consultant doing un-consultancies, an entertaining blogger, and a trustworthy man true to his principles. Some of these are "only free music gets it started", "free music is no strategy", "DRMs are not useful" and most all - helping independent musicians to thrive by mastering new media technology.

It is a great book - motivating, advising, and entertaining at the same time. You're in the music biz? Read it. Get a grip of the changes the market is going through right now. Take your advantages out of it. More than ever, you can do it now. You're not into music at all? Read it anyway. It's uplifting and truely helpful.

And on top, now there's even a German translation to it. I've liked the book so much - I just translated it. Also, there are translations to Spanish and Chinese. Well, these I didn't translate, to be honest. Fellow translators Ismael Valladolid Torres and Tze-Ern Liew did a perfect job on these.

See also the all new page on ebooks...

Three weeks ago, Andrew Dubber once again tackled the question of "Why give music away for free?" on his blog. He earned more than 140 comments. That is a lot. It stirred up the a lively argument between the contributors on more than just one level. Take your time - it is an excellent read.

Here is the comment I added. I left it unedited which means there are a few referers to other people's comments. Hope you don't mind. If you like, add your two cents by adding a comment right here (or over there).

Nothing is predictable

So what remains to be a constant in music business? There’s the product, which includes performance & composition. It’s the artists, or more generally speaking, the creative bunch (whomever that will include on the technical side). On the other side of the story we’ve got the consumer. Then there’s kind of a middleware - let’s call it the platform of distribution, no matter how many third party companies are involved (if any). There are rules and a technological as well as a economical framework to deal with the product. This includes licensing & copyright law. Anybody involved intends to get their share of money. Expect for the consumer, who’s trying to pay as less as possible. IF he’s doing so.

So everything remains more or less? No, for heaven’s sake - again I’m with Andrew. If anything’s predictable, it’s a multi-dimensional complexity which arises of any constant being altered by a multitude of parameters: technology, globalization, ubiquity, The Long Tail, individual production etc.

Upside down

What’s changing in music (or media) business? Basically, anybody’s role will change - that’s quite easy to see. It’s not only the labels. And it will not change somewhere in the future, it’s already in the making. Be open minded and keep up a good amount of analytical awareness. Your tasks have changed.

Complexity arises from multiple forms of the product’s carrier (media, format, resolution, options). More complexity arises from options in the choice of distribution channels (online, offline, label, portal, aggregator, selling by yourself). Even more complexity arises when it comes to choose whether to add added value (ltd editions etc - see Tom Robinson and Julian). If that’s not enough, you can define the pricing model and strategy as an artist yourself (depends on way of distribution of course).

Continue reading "Dubber on Music for Free" »