Vinyl Fremer

Fuzztone- MC, or what quite a few of us call IKE (I know everything) is wrong again along with Fremer. If you are comparing all music purchases, vinyl sales are a pimple on somebody’s butt compared to digital sales. Vinyl sales will do less than $500 million this year, Apple Music alone will do $7 billion. Then add up Amazon, tidal, Spotify, qobuz, pandora, hd tracks, and anybody else that sells digital music, digital sales in 1 year will outsell 20 yeas of vinyl sales. Also, its a fallacy that vinyl is superior to digital. There is high quality music in both formats as well as garbage in both formats.

@pindac,

The problem I find with the current revenue model is that the most popular artists are making more money than ever, but it is very difficult for less popular artists to make a living short of being on the road full time ... though it is a job, so I am not sure how much sympathy I should have. Most of us work a full year.

I don't think the issue is streaming though,  I think the issue is still intellectual property theft, and that includes USED CDs and USED VINYL.

Music is not a necessity, it is a luxury item. If an artist does not want to have their music streamed, legally or more importantly illegally, that should be 100% their choice, and if they want to charge $500 for a CD, that is their choice, just like charging $25,000 for a cable. No one is forced to buy it, and at least for the CD, you know exactly what you are getting.

So, I don't think it is streaming that is killing the small artist, it is people's general willingness and lack of moral consciousness and compass that allows them to steal someone else's work, without a second thought.

audio2design

  I think the issue is still intellectual property theft, and that includes USED CDs and USED VINYL.

Buying used CDs or LPs is not intellectual property theft. That it offends your righteous moral sensibilities does not make it theft.

cleeds,

I find less "moral" issue with records as it would be rare for someone to take a copy of a record and resell it, though lets be honest, that is often the case with CDs, and yes, it is actually illegal to take a copy of the CD and then sell the CD if you don't destroy the copy you made. That is morally and legally theft on the part of the person making the sale or even donating the disk, as that is now illegal copying and distribution.

If you think people being compensated for their work product is "righteous", then ....

  audio2design

... it is actually illegal to take a copy of the CD and then sell the CD if you don't destroy the copy you made

Of course. What I noted was that buying a used CD or LP is not intellectual property theft, which is what you seem to have implied.