July, 23, 2001 archives

the premiere of abc's new show alias (you know, the one with the commercial that makes the show look like run lola run: the series by using music from the movie and having a red-headed female protagonist running around) is going to run commercial-free in "a first for ABC". uh, not if you count the premiere of gideon's crossing last year.

alanis morissette apparently chastised the music industry for dropping the ball on online music. (to put it nicely.) the quote from gerry kearby is pretty telling: "the real issue is around price." translation: the record labels have to figure out how they can raise prices again with the introduction of this new delivery model, like they did with compact discs (which are cheaper to make, and more widely made, than tapes, yet still cost more).

jake thinks that what is wrong with the music industry is the focus on one-hit wonders, but i suspect that sells short the history of the music industry, which is positively littered with the corpses of one-hit wonders. (the focus on selling albums and not singles is a relatively recent phenomenon unto itself. maybe the problem is the focus on selling higher-margin albums instead of singles?) jake's critique just rings with the sound of "i don't like the music those crazy kids are listening to these days," which i don't swallow. i think the problem with the music industry is fundamentally a business one (a focus on maintaining the margins to the detriment of revenues), not artistic.

stick figure fighting movies are even cooler when you get to play!

here's some more from salon about payola in the radio business, this time discussing how things are done in the "urban radio" market.