last.fm streams full albums, pays artists

[idleberg]

"We will be paying artists directly.We already have licenses with the various royalty collection societies, but now unsigned artists can put their music on Last.fm and be paid directly for every song played. This helps to level the playing-field—now you can make music, upload it to Last.fm and earn money for each play. If you make music, you can sign up to participate for free."

blog.last.fm/2008/01/23/free-the-music

[Mass Defect]

There are extracts here
http://ad-supported-music.blogspot.com/2008/01/acting-like-major-ioda-scolds-imeem-and.html

I understand it was largely an attack on imeem for signing sweetheart deals with Sony/BMG/Universal/EMI/Warner and then only offering indie labels 50% of advertising. But at the same time I think IODA is unfairly picking imeem to make an example of;
the biggest site playing indie music is myspace, and myspace has never wanted to pay any of the artists, but when universal records asked them to stop playing all music from universal artists they were quick to cut a special deal there. So if IODA was sticking to the principles outlined in their letter they would be leaning on myspace.com, but imeem is smaller and easier to push around.

50% of revenue going to the artist is a damn sight better than 100% going to newscorp. but then again I'm so down on myspace and imeem looks like the best bet to beat them, so I'm a little bit. biased

[Michael Cassidy]

Talkin about returns, these % are very deceptive. Its difficult to work out what you are getting 50% of. Many service are like this. For example take the latest release on coopr8.

Speaker Quake by Modaji on Altered Vibes

On the Coopr8 Store the price is £6.99 and the return for the label =£6.08

On eMusic a subscription service that let users download mp3 give you 30 download for 8.99 so the price is £2.70 and the return for the label =£1.08 (on average eMusic pay 40% to labels)

On junodownload price is £6.99 and the return for the label =£3.50

The difference from a labels point of view is amazing...

[idleberg]

but you can't really compare that, i guess. last.fm is more like radio-airplay, not about owning the music.

sorry for not further contributing to this discussing. not making music myself, but i thought the link could be interesting to some of you guys ;)

[Zane Tate]

Well it's definitely been of interest! And I agree with you - I think it's like internet radio catching up with traditional radio by paying royalties...

[Michael Cassidy]

it's an interesting point internet radio like terrestrial radio has traditionally been linear and not interactive, that is they play one tune after another start to finish without any interaction from the listener. This made listening to a radio show completely different from listening to you record collection where the listener constantly interacts with the medium to select the music. Its the semiotics of this interaction that makes owning music so compelling.

Thats the key difference between radio and hifi listening.

What last FM are proposing is that the listener should be able to select what they listen to, build play lists search for track and so on.

In principle i cannot see how this is different than hifi listening, OK the music is streamed and you don't own a copy, but in a predominantly wifi connect world which is what is on the horizon service like this essentially replace the need to own you own copy. All you need is an xml list of the tracks and their URLs on the internet and you could be listening to streamed music at the quality you used to from CD from an extrapolation of a service like lastFM.

Given this assumption the price comparisons from the point of a label is relevant. The only difference we are dealing here with a per Listen price rather than a per download ownership price.

I cant remember how many time I've listened to Love Supreme for example but lets say I have had it on my turntable 1000 times since i bought it in 1987. at 1p a listen that £10

Actually i have never thought about this PER LISTEN pricing model before. How much do you think a listen is worth. How much would you pay to listen to a track once?

[Michael Cassidy]

http://digitalmedia.strategyeye.com/

LastFM have just announced a deal with PPL (UK) and so it seems the going rate for a listen is

£ 0.0773 = £1 for every 129 listens (streams)

But you can only listen 3 times before you are directed to amazon to buy the tune

[bopstar]

actually its up to you the artist to decide which store u get linked to. listening to bopstar on last.fm will lead you to shop.coopr8.net, not amazon

[JaWar]

I've heard a lot about last.fm at various music conferences in the U.S. You all have done a great job of getting the word out about your site to the right people to make your marketing viral. Would you mind sharing one or more trade secrets on what last.fm did to bring awareness to the site? Thank you in advance.

As a motivational speaker/author/business consultant I speak on personal achievement, monetizing (make money online) your web presence and the music business. I look forward to speaking and consulting opportunities. I may be reached at GOJAWAR.COM