A little earlier today I noticed a heated debate today on KVRAudio lamenting the typically high pricing of music-making apps and plugins. The original post wondered why developers don’t drastically lower their prices to be more in line with iPhone apps (which themselves are in line with the lower end of computer software programs.)

That’s an interesting question!

As a musician and producer who uses a lot of computer software to create music, pricing is of a regular concern to me - and probably many of you as well, as for the last ten years, music software has made it very easy to produce pro-grade recordings. Like with the price of high-end photo editing and 3D modeling software, there is virtually no upper limit on that of music production apps. Collections of highly realistic orchestral sounds, typically used by film, TV and video game composers of all kinds, often cost thousands of dollars. The most expensive to date, the complete collection of Vienna Symphonic Library sounds, almost hits the five digit mark (and takes up a good 800 gigs on your hard drive, to boot.)

On the other side of the spectrum, Apple bundles its fairly powerful Garageband software for free with all new Apple computers. If you’re a student or educator and you want to upgrade to the industrial-strength Logic software, which normally lists for a reasonable $500, you can pay as little as $150. There are a number of companies besides Apple offering equally cheap (if not cheaper) programs, and whole websites devoted to freeware apps and plugins that can be just as powerful as commercial products.

There are tens of millions of Americans who have home studios of some kind, from simple eight-tracks with guitars to sophisticated scoring platforms. Would the Apple approach perhaps boost sales and popularity of music products like virtual synthesizers and sequencers, improving the tools of composers and producers the world over? Post your thoughts!

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 11th, 2009 at 1:13 am and is filed under Industry trends. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

In a strange turn of events, popular hip-hop/R&B artist T-Pain is apparently claiming that he deserves royalties anytime another artist uses Auto-Tune in their music. Auto-Tune, a software audio processing effect that “snaps” melodic content such as vocals into perfect pitch, was released in 1997 by Antares Audio Technologies without any involvement from T-Pain. The effect was initially brought into the public consciousness via the 1998 pop hit “Believe” by Cher, which used it extensively in the main vocal melody.

So, considering he was not the first artist to use the effect (by a long shot) and had nothing to do with the design, development or testing of the product in any capacity, where does T-Pain come into all this? In a Chicago Sun Times article about copycat artists, Rap Star P. Diddy noted that, “You have to go to him to get permission, I actually gave him a half a point on my album for showing me certain tricks.”

In an article posted on MTV.com referencing the same arrangement, T-Pain said, “Diddy actually gave me royalties on this album just for using Auto-Tune. He signed the contract and everything. If I can do that with Diddy, somebody else better be signing something.”

Whether or not we’ll actually see T-Pain actively try to collect royalties from other popular artists using the Auto-Tune effect remains to be seen. In all likelihood, both he and P. Diddy were not being entirely serious when discussing the topic, and were merely reacting to the myriad of R&B artists extensively using Auto-Tune. On the other hand, maybe Kanye West should look out.

Audio copycats source of distress for T-Pain [Chicago Sun Times]
T-Pain Says It’s Time ‘For Everybody Else’ To Stop Using Auto-Tune [MTV.com]

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 6th, 2009 at 5:41 pm and is filed under Industry trends. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

At a recent industry panel during the Digital Hollywood Conference in Los Angeles, the head of the RIAA’s technology unit, David Hughes, definitively stated that DRM is still going strong and is poised for a comeback.

Hughes stated that of the “22 ways to sell music… 20 of them still require DRM. Any form of subscription service or limited play-per-view or advertising offer still requires DRM. So DRM is not dead.” He added that “I think there is going to be a shift… I think there will be a movement towards subscription services and they will eventually mean the return of DRM.”

Also at the panel was Fritz Attaway, executive vice president of the Motion Picture Association of America, who agreed with Hughes’ opinion: “We need DRM to show our customers the limits of the license they have entered into with us.”

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This is a stark reality check concerning the views of the people who are generally representing two of the major entertainment industries in America. It is fairly clear at this point, as we have seen with the recent Microsoft DRM server issue, that while things are changing fast in the music industry, some major players are simply refusing to drop the idea of DRM, even if they’ve taken some small steps away from it.

But what was up with that statement by Fritz Attaway? That was one of the least subtle ways I’ve ever heard an entertainment industry executive say “we don’t trust the consumer.” Not exactly how you rally support to your side. A better argument, just throwing this out there, might be that piracy can hurt profits which leads to decreased investment into new releases, and thus piracy eventually hurts the consumer as well.

ps. Sorry for the decreased rate of posting. I’m working on a lot of projects, setting up a music software/sample business, duties at ocremix.org, and moving into a new apartment. If you’re interested in helping write for SoundTempest please shoot me an email!

This entry was posted on Monday, May 12th, 2008 at 11:00 pm and is filed under Industry trends. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

OurStage, a relatively new website centered around user-submitted and ranked music and video content, is now offering over $25,000 per month in prizes as part of its ongoing contest system. The prizes range from cash and gift cards to one-on-one mentoring sessions with established artists and producers, performance opportunities, music gear, distribution deals, and more.

The website, which is funded by “enthusiasts and angel investors”, invites musicians and filmmakers to create a profile and upload their music and video content for free. However, where OurStage differs from MySpace and iLike is the aforementioned contest system. Visitors to the site can quickly “Judge” contest entries by listening to or viewing two randomly-selected entries in a pair, then picking which they prefer more, and by how much (or selecting that the entries are just as good.)

This system, according to the site staff, prevents “gaming” - where a popular artist can solicit hundreds or thousands of fans to all vote for a song and propel it to the top of the charts. OurStage’s judging, in comparison, is completely randomized; users cannot choose to vote on a specific song. The code behind the system is also designed to balance the amount of ratings and exposure each entry gets, so that all songs or videos have equal exposure.

As the end of each month draws near, the top contestants from each category (such as “Electronic”, “World”, “Rock”) are brought into the quarterfinals, followed by the semifinals, where a winner for each is established. Then, the finals commence, and two grand prize winners are chosen from the pool of category winners; one for video, and one for music. On the first day of the next month, the process begins again.

Though OurStage is fairly new, it has already established numerous partnerships, such as with the Just Plain Folks Music Organization, John Lennon Songwriting Contest, Virgin Mobile Festival in Canada, and others.

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I hadn’t heard about OurStage until a few weeks ago, when Brian Austin Whitney (founder of Just Plain Folks) contacted me and asked me to do some research on it, along with twenty-nine other individuals. OurStage had approached JPF about the possibility of becoming community partners, but considering the amount of websites in existence that take advantage of musicians, many of us were initially cautious. However, none of us could dig up anything fishy or sketchy. It was a completely legit site that didn’t charge its users a dime.

Not long after I did my research, I uploaded two songs from my 2007 release Antigravity to the electronic category, and encouraged Jillians Goldin, my girlfriend and frequent collaborator, to put up one or two of her tracks as well. We both entered into the February contest, and while it isn’t over, I think we’ve had an interesting experience thus far.

Before I get into that, let me say that I’ve been a user of Garageband.com for over half a year. GB runs on a somewhat similar system; there’s an ongoing contest, you create a profile and upload your music, then people vote on your songs in a randomized system. Songs that rise to the top of the charts have more visibility, and there are prizes for people that move through multiple rounds of judging. As of now, I have songs from Antigravity at #1 in Trance, #2 in Techno, #11 in Techno, and #29 in Electronic, out of hundreds of entries.

The problem with Garageband’s system is that in order to get a song into the whole judging process, you (the artist) must obtain fifteen “review credits”. You can do this by paying a flat fee, or by reviewing fifteen song pairs and giving detailed ratings to each. Your reviews are then, in turn, evaluated by other users to make sure they are legitimate and accurate, which they should be as the system forces you to listen to at least 90 seconds of each songs. The process is exhausting and many reviews turn out fairly glib in the end. However, there is an incentive to write good reviews; high ranked reviewers can win prizes every month, be they artists or not.

OurStage takes a different approach that in many ways works better. You need only listen to 15 seconds of each song in a review pair, and you don’t have to write a text review or evaluate multiple numeric categories. You simply select which song you like better, and by how much. The fact that the artist does not need to pay money or do the equivalent of thirty reviews simply to have their song entered into the contest is another huge plus.

This brings me back to the experiences of Jill and myself. We’ve been watching our songs move through the charts since the beginning of the month, we’ve judged dozens of songs, and browsed through the site documentation. After all that, our shared view is that it’s a great idea for a site that is more evolutionary than revolutionary, building on the idea of free-entry contests judged in a highly democratic fashion. However, we do share three common criticisms…

1. There are not enough categories to properly sort all of the music actually uploaded. The electronic category has ambient and new age songs next to driving techno instrumentals and Madonna-style pop. While over-classification should be avoided, overly broad genre tags create unbalanced competition.

2. Users regularly upload music to the wrong category and there seems to be little reprimand for this. During my time judging the “World” category, over 50% of the songs I judged were completely misplaced, with absolutely no qualities that could possibly merit the “World” label. This wastes the time of the people judging and is irritating to artists competing against these mislabeled songs.

3. There is no actual incentive to judge besides the enjoyment one may get from doing so. Don’t get me wrong; it’s definitely fun to judge. However, I think there should be some sort of additional motivation, even if it’s just the chance at a prize. I believe this has created a serious lack of proper ratings in several categories. It seems like a song can jump 20 or 30 places in just a single vote, as a result.

My song “Warhead” went from 65 or so to 172 in the span of a few hours. Previously it was as high as 29. Songs should not fluctuate this much in such a short period, especially towards the end of a month. For fluctuations to be minimized, more ratings need to be gathered.

Considering OurStage is fairly new, I can understand that all the kinks have not been entirely worked out. I’ve seen staff posting on the Just Plain Folks forums and responding to user feedback, so they’re certainly willing to refine and improve the way they do things. OurStage is still relatively small compared to sites like Garageband or Soundclick, but I’m hopeful that its thoughtful design philosophy and enthusiastic staff will make it a popular hub for music and a great new way for artists to get exposure (and maybe a little money on the side.)

This entry was posted on Monday, February 18th, 2008 at 2:42 am and is filed under Industry trends. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.