Music in the Mobile Area

Music in the Mobile Area

As I former licensing manager for one of the biggest mobile content provider in the world I have my own views into the industry.

In the old days, artists would have to travel from town to town to sing, then came the records which brought in the companies, managers well, a whole industry was born. From the very beginning the music industry had close ties with the Media, Advertising and the TV. The model was great, scout for new talents, develop the current talents, launch records, advertise, shows, radio, TV and of course make money. This continued even when the Television set was launch, CD-Player (which brought in more money in the digitalizing of the old catalogues) and of course with the Internet. But things changed here and for the first time they could see a future where people would no longer need to buy records, CDs, they would just go online and buy it, digitally. When you’re leading you should set an example, this didn’t occur. The change came from the consumer, MP3 and Napster, sharing music and ultimately from the artists, by going directly to their fan’s online and selling the music without the industry, AKA, the Labels. Soon the “cat was out of the bag” and the labels were having difficulties controlling their own market, sales were coming down, the fan’s turned to the internet to get the latest songs and the artists would connect directly. Worse, new talent was being born and they didn’t needed the big labels to get known and to get thousands of fans, and of course, make money.

They reacted the worse way, copyright laws, closing sites and going against the consumers. I’m saying the worst way because they didn’t present a solution to the problem, they just wanted to protect their turf, logical thinking. But in doing this they sifted even more away from the fans and from the solution. This happen, I think, because in most cases the upper management were from the old school and tried to solve things their way.

Then in the early 2000 the mobile industry was born, and even at the beginning, the labels where suspected. I would be also, but the mobile industry was to become their biggest partner.

It started with polytones (do you still remember them?) and then with the Truetones, coming to the Realtones, and going to the ringbacktones and finally, the videotones. By the way, all this and the wallpapers, videos, applications and games.  The first negotiations between the two industries made all parties understand the future and the potentialities. Why? Because for the mobile industry to sell they would have to pay the labels for each sale, for the first time they would earn money out of the digital domain, which was out of their control. Here even the Author Societies won, because in some agreement we would have to pay the original rights.

The mobile industry acted like a fresh of breath air to the labels and for the first time I could see I way we could work together in a way everyone won. The labels would have meeting and tell us who was “hot”, the new launches with dates and countries and we from our side would help they in promotion and buzz and sell in the internet and mobiles. They didn’t understand how we work, they saw results, not just in numbers but in the promotion and new ideas we brought to the table. They would cover the TV, Radio, Magazines, Internet, all the movers and shakers of the industry, and we would reinforce this by investing in Ads in TV, Magazines, Mobiles and Internet. Most of the times we would have more money to invest then them.

The biggest problems were the contracts, from a licensing perspective it’s nice to have all your doors “covered”, unfortunately this meant 40 to 100 page licensing deals, some had… well let just say, if you made a mistake you might awake the other day in a very dark place. Most of the deals were pay-per-shot or a percentage of our profit, normally 50/50 (in my dreams), normally 70/30 (70 to the label). And also, the time it took to close each contract… months! One took me a year to close, from the first contact to the signing of the contract by both parties. Others, hours or days, I work fast, it’s how we worked and how the mobile industry is paced, fast. It has to be now or in a minute it won’t matter.

After we learn from our partners we started to get contacted by smaller labels and also by band them self’s. This presented us with an opportunity of doing our selves the work of a label, It worked to, but it’s not our core business and we weren’t set up to do it.

So what happen to the music and the artist? They now have more and more opportunities to break into the market, they have countless online music shops to sell their music and countless other site to promote their band and music’s. They know that the big numbers are in concerts so they go out on turn, leave the sales to the internet, labels and the mobile area.

I know there is something missing here… The solution to the problem! Well I can only give my advice!

The current model for selling music online isn’t the last model. The future will pass for us, the consumer, to pay a monthly fee and we can download and hear every music we want. This solves our part, the consumer, but it created a lot a problems that need to tackled with. All the companies involved will have to have a standard reporting system so that everyone has one language. Without this delays, suspicions and not being able to react on-time, will consume the model for the industry. Also the industry must comprehend that the world is global, and they cannot say that a music will be launched on the X day in this country and then on another day in another country, this will only help people from seeking the music elsewhere.  People don’t need CDs, the music is digital and travels everywhere at the speed of light. So launching worldwide and not letting anyone overturn them is key!

Yes there are other models but I would like to hear from you know. Tell me what you think about this model and of course, other models.