Re: [microsound] nin

[Andras Hargitai <andras.hargitai@xxxxxxxxx>]

hi,

i might pop in to this dialogue with a kind of "off-the-track" thought, but
the fact keeps on bugging me that these bands like NIN, Radiohead and the
like who are now so eager to give their music away for free/optional
formats/ways - which is something I really find valuable - had become
so-called "famous" by the major labels they used to be at. what do you think
about this? i am really interested. thanks.

andrás

2008/5/7 Ken Restivo <ken@xxxxxxxxxxx>:

> On Tue, May 06, 2008 at 07:15:10PM -0400, Paulo Mouat wrote:
> > How about the free marketing and exposure to potential new users that
> > otherwise would never try NIN out? It seems that the virtual release
> > in no way affected the real release of NIN's previous album (much to
> > the contrary, it seems) so the question really is why not?
> >
>
> I've been lurking on this list for a while, but I have been researching
> and thinking about this particular issue a lot and I figured now's a good
> time to jump in.
>
> I went to that link, which requires a *working* email address in order to
> download the album. And this seemed meaningful to me-- and a very smart
> thing to do.
>
> Back during the dot-com boom, I spent my days as a marketing puke,
> managing a direct mail team at a major network-technology corporation. Our
> goal was the acquisition and maintenance of a database of current and
> potential customers, and harvesting it for picking up sales leads. Our main
> tool in this effort was giving away "FREE!!!" stuff in order to obtain
> people's emails, phone numbers, and mailing addresses. We discovered that
> "FREE CD!!" was the most effective way to get people to respond to our
> nefarious mailings, and we built up a respectable database using targetted
> offers like that.
>
> I suspect that Mr. Reznor might be building a fan database. These email
> addresses he's collecting could be very useful for sending offers of
> hard-copy CD's for sale, concert tickets, T-shirts, and the like.
>
> Although I'd guess that's perhaps secondary to the more obvious
> motivations mentioned here already, such as the normal human urge to show
> off and have your music heard by others, and to maintain total creative
> control over it, coupled with the fact that major label artists are already
> accustomed to seeing little to no profit from CD sales in the first place
> anyway.
>
> -ken
>
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