I
shall be looking at the music industry with Sony Music Entertainment (SonyME) and Finders Keepers Records. I will argue that global institutions dominate the music industry but smaller companies often can cater to Niche audiences more successfully as they often understand their audience better than large global institutions. I will be examine how models of production, distribution and consumption have changed from the past to the present and the implications of future developments. I will argue that technological convergence has had a massive effect on the music industry and how illegal downloading has meant that sales in the music industry has dropped. However,the growing boom in DIY 'Remix' Culture' (Web 2.0/Sound-Cloud) brought about by cheap digital technology has meant that the music industry is moving swiftly in a direction that has seen some roles become redundant.
; I will be looking at the global institution that dominates the UK market. It is a large multinational global corporation, which is part of an oligopoly. There are four major labels that dominate the music industry – EMI, Universal and Warner with SongME being the 2nd largest music corporation (22% Share). They are a castle industry and a conglomerate with other business holding in Electronics, Films and Finance with Music being one of their largest areas. They are an example of a converged mutli-national media institution because they control not only the music production but make the technology – mobile phones, MP3 players an Blu-Ray discs (this is vertical integration). The audiences they appeal to have a broad commercial appeal – they target their audience’s by the use of subsidiary labels – three of the largest are RCA, Columbia and EPIC Records. Secondary research I did showed that each subsidiary ha a target audience – EPIC Record artists appeals to an older audience with artists like Michael Jackson, Columbia Records appeal to a younger rock audience and have artist like Kings of Leon and Kassabian, where RCA appeals to a young R&B/Urban audience with artists like Shakira and Beyonce.
; I will be looking at the global institution that dominates the UK market. It is a large multinational global corporation, which is part of an oligopoly. There are four major labels that dominate the music industry – EMI, Universal and Warner with SongME being the 2nd largest music corporation (22% Share). They are a castle industry and a conglomerate with other business holding in Electronics, Films and Finance with Music being one of their largest areas. They are an example of a converged mutli-national media institution because they control not only the music production but make the technology – mobile phones, MP3 players an Blu-Ray discs (this is vertical integration). The audiences they appeal to have a broad commercial appeal – they target their audience’s by the use of subsidiary labels – three of the largest are RCA, Columbia and EPIC Records. Secondary research I did showed that each subsidiary ha a target audience – EPIC Record artists appeals to an older audience with artists like Michael Jackson, Columbia Records appeal to a younger rock audience and have artist like Kings of Leon and Kassabian, where RCA appeals to a young R&B/Urban audience with artists like Shakira and Beyonce.
They
successfully use Synergy to cross promote their different services – an example
of synergy is Foo Fighters on RCA being used on Guitar Hero – a video game
designed for the Sony PlayStation. They also use Sony artists in mainstream
films made by Sony pictures such as Will Smith – a Columbia records artist,
being used on the ‘Men In Black’ soundtrack. All of these artists have a board
commercial appeal for a wide audience. In the past SonyME have merged with
other subsidiary labels by buying them out (Which is Horizontal Integration).
SonyME own hundreds of subsidiary labels however they have had recently been
sued by many labels and have had to consolidate their music labels into just
RCA Records. Globally the Sony Corporation is losing a lot of money and this
partly is due to the effects of illegal downloading. SonyME are looking to the
future and have recently struck deals with many new web 2.0 web companies such
as Youtube and Vevo which allows audience to watch SonyME musicians online. The
Sony Qriocity Film and Music on demand is a new service, which allows audiences
to access Sony Music and films through an online shop (Many music high street
shops have closed) similar to the Apple product iTunes to maximise its profits
as CD and DVD sales are rapidly declining in demand. The music industry has
changed dramatically with the rise of cheap digital technology and smaller
record labels can reduce costs by using the internet to target their audiences,
Sony still are the cutting edge technology manufacturers of which had in the
previous decades popular products such as the Sony Walkman, Discman and PlayStation
made their reputation. However, technology convergence has meant that the
multi-functionality of mobile phones has become a huge growth market and SonyME
are well placed to use Synergy of their music artists and
knowledge of the music industry to push their music onto the audience of both
the target audience of the songs and the products which they produce.
Finders Keepers Records are a small industry run by three people in Manchester who do everything themselves, where as a major label would have many different departments. They cater to a Niche Market that Sony ME cant not reach with their mainstream artist. They are a re-issue label who release obscure film soundtrack music, and other types of world music. Their audience is 'DJ's, record collectors and music producers' and they often only release records in small batches of 200-300 by mail order through their websites shop. They rely on word of mouth and reviews in music magazines to reach their audience. Finders keepers could not motivated like SonyME and their running costs unlike SonyME are small. Finders Keepers also have subsidiary label to cater for different audiences - 'Twisted Nerve' is a subsidiary for local Manchester bands that they promote. Finder Keepers licensee old records and often re-design the artwork which is done in house. They know their audience prefers physical Vinyl records/CD's with detailed sleeve notes rather than downloads. They will also work with independent record shops and other online retailers like BoomKat. Technological convergence effects them less but illegal downloading has had an impact on their small sales.
The UK music industry is dominated by the 4 companies EMI, Universal, Warner and. This means that the majority of artists in the UK Music Market are on these record labels and have a standardized format of which will make the artists affective and make the label money in the music industry. Therefore, as a result the music genres of artists has a framework of which will make the artist make sales an SonyME d be successful for the record label. Thedor Adorno in the 1930's predicted that Jazz music was becoming 'standardized' the same is true of the artists that SonyME work with as they are only interested in commercial artists. This means that the popular music industry is watered down of creativity and innovation. Niche Markets are often not catered for by SonyME but by the independent record labels such as Finders Keepers Records. Independent record labels are successful as major label but due to the size of the corporation being not as large with artists, sales and employment is means that on the scale they are proportionally successful with the amount of revenue received by sales. But, using independent labels to build a stronger fan base to expand into the market such as Soulja Boy who made 'Crank That' from the independent label Mr. Coolipark, the song made Number 1 in the US BillBoard Hot 100 and Rap songs with Number 2 in the UK and New Zealand music Charts. This shows that independent record label artists can become very popular and be in the Singles Charts in a range of countries. Independent record labels offer Niche Market items with music being aimed at DJ's, Record collectors and music producers which are only released in small batches of 200-300. In the past big record labels would act as 'gatekeepers' and only permit access to the music industry of commercial artists. However, due to audiences becoming more active they produce music and share globally often building an audience and bypassing major record labels all together. and
Finders Keepers Records are a small industry run by three people in Manchester who do everything themselves, where as a major label would have many different departments. They cater to a Niche Market that Sony ME cant not reach with their mainstream artist. They are a re-issue label who release obscure film soundtrack music, and other types of world music. Their audience is 'DJ's, record collectors and music producers' and they often only release records in small batches of 200-300 by mail order through their websites shop. They rely on word of mouth and reviews in music magazines to reach their audience. Finders keepers could not motivated like SonyME and their running costs unlike SonyME are small. Finders Keepers also have subsidiary label to cater for different audiences - 'Twisted Nerve' is a subsidiary for local Manchester bands that they promote. Finder Keepers licensee old records and often re-design the artwork which is done in house. They know their audience prefers physical Vinyl records/CD's with detailed sleeve notes rather than downloads. They will also work with independent record shops and other online retailers like BoomKat. Technological convergence effects them less but illegal downloading has had an impact on their small sales.
The UK music industry is dominated by the 4 companies EMI, Universal, Warner and. This means that the majority of artists in the UK Music Market are on these record labels and have a standardized format of which will make the artists affective and make the label money in the music industry. Therefore, as a result the music genres of artists has a framework of which will make the artist make sales an SonyME d be successful for the record label. Thedor Adorno in the 1930's predicted that Jazz music was becoming 'standardized' the same is true of the artists that SonyME work with as they are only interested in commercial artists. This means that the popular music industry is watered down of creativity and innovation. Niche Markets are often not catered for by SonyME but by the independent record labels such as Finders Keepers Records. Independent record labels are successful as major label but due to the size of the corporation being not as large with artists, sales and employment is means that on the scale they are proportionally successful with the amount of revenue received by sales. But, using independent labels to build a stronger fan base to expand into the market such as Soulja Boy who made 'Crank That' from the independent label Mr. Coolipark, the song made Number 1 in the US BillBoard Hot 100 and Rap songs with Number 2 in the UK and New Zealand music Charts. This shows that independent record label artists can become very popular and be in the Singles Charts in a range of countries. Independent record labels offer Niche Market items with music being aimed at DJ's, Record collectors and music producers which are only released in small batches of 200-300. In the past big record labels would act as 'gatekeepers' and only permit access to the music industry of commercial artists. However, due to audiences becoming more active they produce music and share globally often building an audience and bypassing major record labels all together. and
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