"They still buy CDs"

[Chico Man]

A few weeks ago I traveled to Nashville for my cousins wedding. He is a digital media specialist for several top name country singers. we discussed digital delivery of music, and one thing I found remarkable is that for a recent major country album release, 80% of sales were still using traditional CD based media. When I'm in WalMart and Target, I'm always amazed that there is still a section selling CDs and DVDs given how easy it is to find and download just about anything you want on-line. But, it appears as though country music just hasn't made the leap! This is remarkable, especially given the intense profit potential when delivering music digitally.

I recently read here at DU that this election is marking the beginning of the 21st century. Old methodologies for polling, campaigning, and media manipulation are so out dated and we are seeing, before our very eyes, a transition to a true modern era, with twitter, facebook, etc etc.

Let's remember, though, that, 80% of country albums are still being sold via CD! So, here is the conundrum. The southern "Republican states" are still under the spell of the MSM. They are still using land lines, they can be swayed using silly political ads and have simply not discovered the "modern" world. They buy their country music on CD. Why? Maybe there is complacency involved. Change is scary! But, just as the transition from horse and buggy to automobile was inevitable, soon the election industry is going to change. Gallup is stuck in the failed policies of the past. Fox News is serving a latch ditch effort of voter manipulation before media delivery moves digital and on-demand. And eventually the spell will be broken...

[Tommy_Carcetti]

1. I still like buying CDs. And I'm in my early 30s.

Granted, I'll turn around and burn them on to my MP3 player, but there's nothing better than actually buying a CD, unwrapping it and sticking it into your car's CD player to hear your favorite band or artist's new album for the first time. Pointing and clicking just doesn't give me that same sense of excitement.

Plus it's always good to have a master copy in case you lose your MP3 player. Which I have. Twice.

Oh, and I still buy my books in paper form. And I have a landline.

[pintobean]

82. I'm in my 50s and do the same thing.

The sound quality, artwork and flexibility are the reasons, plus the hard copy back-up. I listen to almost all my music in MP3 format. I have no fear of change, I just prefer to have control over what I have. I can choose or change any format or bitrate I want, when I want.
Also, I can often buy a CD cheaper than a download.

[high density]

108. Me too

I have hundreds of CDs... I buy at least a $100 a month in them.

[dipsydoodle]

2. So do I here in the UK

Got a thousand or so. which are mainly jazz. No big deal.

[Fawke Em]

3. Um... shouldn't include all those middle America Republican states in

your assessment.

If you look at any EC map, the red extends out of the South and up and through most of the mid-western states. And, they listen to country music, too.

Nothing wrong with your OP, on the whole, but I'm tired of the Southern states being made the scapegoats when a whole swath of the mid-part of the country is also very red and also very behind the times.

[tledford]

66. Yeah, all those Southern states like Nebraska,

and Idaho, and Wyoming, and Kansas, and South Dakota, and North Dakota, and Montana, and ...

[Chico Man]

68. Good point

My bad.

[Jamastiene]

94. Good point.

I'm glad I'm online. That way I can read about how backasswards I am compared to the entire* rest of the country.

*entire in this case would mean the northeast and the west coast. The rest of the country appears to be pretty doggone red, if you look at the electoral maps.

[Chico Man]

134. Yes

In the Red State / Blue State world, I think Blue States are more sophisticated. That doesn't mean there aren't some wonderful individuals residing in Red States. Sorry if you take offense. I can also find lots of things I find personally insulting on the internet, but I really couldn't care less.

[Puzzledtraveller]

4. I'm 39 and have a huge CD collection, and still buy them

I'd rather have CD than a digital download although I know eventually that option will diminish. I buy music I like because I want to collect it, a tangilbe package is crucial to that, easily deleted and lost downloads are not tantamount to a real music collection even if they are copied onto discs.

[TwilightGardener]

5. I mostly download now, but there is something to be said for CD's--

Apple is a GIANT pain in the ass when it comes to downloading and transferring music (both iTunes and other mp3 files) between iPhones, iPods, and computers. I have songs in my iTunes library that I purchased but can't play or upload--they have an exclamation point in front of them and I can't figure out where the file went. So I just bought something and got nothing--it's lost somewhere. I also have a limit on how much I can transfer onto other devices. Fuck Apple, I hate them. It's nice to physically own music and do what you want with it.

[HipChick]

22. There are alternatives to ITunes..

[TwilightGardener]

51. Yes--but we are already pretty heavily invested in our iTunes library

and we mostly have Apple devices in my family (though we have a regular windows PC). What I'd like is for iTunes to work BETTER, rather than having to abandon it or do an end-run around Apple trying to import and transfer music between computers and devices.

[Politicalboi]

6. A lot of older people have

CD players in their cars, and DVD players play CD's. Us older people are just getting used to all this new stuff. We were the generation of listening to the radio for hours to hear your favorite song and if your lucky, your radio has reel to reel to record it. Hopefully without any outside noise. LOL! I have no idea what Blu-Ray looks like. I've seen those in WalMart, but have no idea what it is, nor do I care because there are still DVD's. And why should I get an iPod when I have CD's? I would think people who listen to country music tend to be older people. I may be wrong, I don't like country music.

In short: You can't teach an old dog new tricks.

[Xithras]

7. My wife still buys a lot of CD's. When I download music for her, she just burns it to CD anyway.

2 reasons... 1) Her car. 2) Her office.

Both of these places have devices capable of playing music. Neither of these places has Internet access, or connectors that will allow an external phone or MP3 player to play through them. Both have CD players.

Personally, I think it's just a time thing. Useable digital audio options have only been around for a few years, and there is a HUGE installed base of music players that can handle CD's but not digital connections. It took nearly a decade for the CD to fully displace the cassette tape, and it will probably take about the same time for digital music to repeat that feat for the CD. Nothing wrong with that. Change takes time.

[WinkyDink]

8. You know what? I'm sick and tired of that cliche "Change is scary." No, it is not. It MIGHT,

however, be unwelcomed. Those are not the same things.

I liked albums, from the cover art to the liner notes to the sound and to the ability to pick up the "needle" and place it anywhere.

Then I liked CD's, from the, ahem, compactness to the durability, if not always the sound.

But music that I have to continually wear ear-plugs to hear? Music that is not in any physical form? Music in a format that is destroying the livelihoods not only of factory, electronics, and store workers, but also of the musicians themselves, because of the pick-and-choose purchasing nature of i-Tunes?

No.
And I use only a land-line.

Amazingly, I'm an extremely well-informed geezer who is a DEMOCRAT.

P.S. This statement is ridiculous:
The southern "Republican states" are still under the spell of the MSM. They are still using land lines, they can be swayed using silly political ads and have simply not discovered the "modern" world.Yeah, Atlanta, Miami, N.O.---just can't get into the "modern" world.

[Chico Man]

61. Obviously I wasn't talking about the big cities

But I do appreciate your point.

[Jamastiene]

95. I live in a small town in the south and I am a die hard Democrat who has always

voted for the Democratic Party... Every.Single.Time. And I always vote. My tiny little rural county has gone for the Democratic Party in every single election I can remember seeing. That's 42 years of life and 24 years of actively voting.

[Chico Man]

123. Bell curves support outliers

Thanks for the comment.

[nadinbrzezinski]

62. I guess them southerners still use horse and buggy

[LanternWaste]

132. And bayonets, too...

And bayonets, too...

[Chico Man]

64. I plug my phone into my stereo, it works just fine

I also plug it into my car and I can control it via my steering wheel.

[GReedDiamond]

116. +1000 as they say, esp re: your P.S. - nt.

[HappyMe]

9. I still buy CDs, and I still have a land line.

I rarely take my cell phone with me when I leave the house. If you drop the mp3 too many times or lose it, ALL of your music is gone. I think your whole assessment is kind of unfair.
Not everyone wants or needs the latest new pricey thing.

[randome]

12. If you have an organized backup system, your music is never gone.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

14. Except it takes up a lot of memory space on the computer.

Whereas if you have a physical CD, you can burn on to the MP3 and then erase to free up more computer space. And still have a handy backup.

[randome]

17. Not wanting to sound like a 'techno-geek' but you can easily get a terabyte detachable drive...

...for $100 these days. I have about 2 terabytes of movies and music and I'm starting to run out of space now. But it's all supremely organized.

[MrSlayer]

81. Not for nothing…

But what is the point of owning a cell phone if you have a land line and rarely take the cell with you when you go out?

This seems strange.

[HappyMe]

101. Not so strange.

I text with my sons sometimes while they are working. I take it with me when we go out, so I can call a cab. I take it with more in the winter if we're driving any distance.
I just don't feel the need to be in constant contact.

[Dr Fate]

10. I think CDs sound like crap, but I would note the music that is ON the CDs.

"Country" music these days is nothing but Red-Neck Pop.

Now where is that George Jones LP of mine...

[Puzzledtraveller]

15. Was thinking this recently about "country" music

My girlfriened likes contemporary country music and I had to tell her that isn't country music, it's not even good garbage, the lyrics seem like something that took all but 3 minutes to write and are wrapped around the most juvenile word rhyme schemes a 6th grader could write better. I grew up with classic Alabama, George Strait, Merle Haggard, Eddie Rabbit, Ronnie Milsap..."steppin off the soapbox now.."

[Dr Fate]

73. Eddie Rabbit wrote some killer tunes for Elvis too.

Such as "Patch it Up" and "Kentucky Rain"

He also wrote "Sounds of Goodbye" for Vern Gosdin.

Not to mention his own mega-hit- "I Love A Rainy Night"


BUT WAIT- Ronnie Milsap also penned "Any Day Now" for Elvis! (But I have to admit, Ronnie's version is sung with a little more feeling)

[randome]

11. I'm 54 and I gave up on radio and CDs a long time ago.

Digital all the way. Easier to organize and takes up less space.

Anyone know where I can dispose of 2000 CDs?

[maxsolomon]

21. sell them online.

or craigslist

[randome]

29. Yeah, I know, but that takes up a lot of time.

Not sure I want to expend the energy on that. I'd rather just dump them somewhere. Best Buy accepts CDs for recycling and I've taken a couple of boxes there in the past. Guess I'll just have to resign myself to getting rid of them at a slower pace.

The problem is, an uncle of mine died last year and I have another thousand CDs of his that my brother wanted. Not sure if my brother is ever going to pick them up so now I have about 3000 CDs to dispose of. I'm drowning in them!

[maxsolomon]

54. people buy collections in bulk on CL

just put up the number, genres, and your price. you'll be surprised.

[davekriss]

93. I can relate to the bulk

I have 50 very heavy boxes of books, records, and CDs that I have to lug around every time I've moved, and I've moved far too often.

While I mostly buy digital now, I just can't part with my old friends. Seeing them out on the shelves is comforting in a way, part of my identity.

Vinyl still is king for sound, but there are sites where you can download audiophile quality digital (I personally dislike CD quality, but better is available).

Anyway, just my opinion.

[randome]

98. I hear you.

I gave away about half my books a few months ago. I still have a thousand and I kept the truly important ones, those dear to my heart and those that most likely are semi-valuable.

My 'old friends', too.

And I have comics from the 60s that I will never part with but I stopped collecting years ago. You can only go through so many reboots before it gets tiresome.

Curiously enough, my daughters -15 year old twins- took to the comics a few years ago and now they are heavily into some of my philosophy books and stuff by O'Henry, Hawthorne, etc. Even Tolstoy.

I encourage them to take the world for how it is, not for how it used to be, but they seem to be finding some relevance in the old stuff to apply to today's world.

[Nikia]

44. Some pawn or resale stores buy cds and dvds

This might be a good option for you. You get a little money and get rid of all of them at once. Other people get a chance to buy them if they want.

[randome]

49. Huh. I never thought of that. Thanks!

[Democrats_win]

13. Catch-22: poor selection of CDs at brick and mortar stores.

People aren't buying CDs at stores so the stores cut back on their selection. Then when I want to buy a CD, they don't have anything I want.

I guess it's ok because I have far more music than I really need.

[Puzzledtraveller]

18. Luckily we have many good second hand book and music stores here.

What I cannot find in a store, Amazon usually has and CD Universe, sometimes Ebay, I like a lot of Australian indie bands so I'm quite adept at acquiring obscure titles. Many times I will order direct from the publishers as a lot of what I listen too is on small labels.

[BumRushDaShow]

16. What happens when you can't afford broadband to download?

I hate to say that too many people out there just "assume" that some "cloud" will always be there and they will always have access to it. It sortof reminds me of the part near the end of the movie "The Cable Guy", where Chip falls onto the satellite dish, causing a big outage, and the scene switches from house to house while people sit there staring at the snow on their TVs like zombies... until finally one guy turns on the light, reaches over to pick up a book, and opens it.

There's a reason why having something "tangible" or "physical" gives you some piece of mind.

[randome]

20. I have no problem switching to new paradigms when it becomes fashionable.

But I still distrust the cloud, too. I had no choice but to switch to digital. Last time I moved, I had 2000 books, 850 videotapes, 2000 CDs and 6000 comic books.

Having tangible items is preferred but after a while, it gets to be unsupportable. With a trio of detachable terabyte hard drives, I'm set for a long time to come.

[BumRushDaShow]

23. I am starting a project to convert hundreds of VHS tapes to DVD

and onto a 2 terabyte drive, as well as get my records into MP3 format, so I definitely understand. There's just no more room.

[whistler162]

90. rip the records to .WAV and then

convert them to MP3 or FLAC or OGG.

[GoCubsGo]

26. Exactly.

Technological innovations are great--until shit happens. Somebody mentioned landlines earlier in this thread. A few years ago, we had an ice storm. The power was out for days. The only phones that worked were the old corded land line phones, of which I still have one, and will never get rid of. Needless to say, there was no access to the Internet or "cloud" that may have existed then. BUT, my old boom box and CD "Walkman" still worked as long as I had batteries. And, I could still read my books, too, even by the light of the fireplace, without having to worry about recharging them.

[laundry_queen]

99. For power outages I bought

one of those solar/hand crank powered radio/flashlights. It has a USB plug in so you can charge your phone/mp3 player. So long as I have that thing (and it keeps working) I can play all my games on my iPod, read all my ebooks and listen to all my music as long as I have sun and can crank the handle.

[Chico Man]

118. for power outages and the zombie apocalypse

I have an acoustic guitar.

[Chico Man]

79. Then...

Driving to the town to buy CDs seems like a hefty price to pay for music as well.

[BumRushDaShow]

89. A CD is a one-time purchase

Broadband is monthly.

[leeroysphitz]

19. I agree with the thrust of your argument here. The South is, has been and will most likely continue

to be our nation's most backwards and least sophisticated region and, if allowed to, it will continue to retard all the social, cultural and economic progress the rest of us have been fighting so hard for.

[WinkyDink]

92. I like living above the Mason-Dixon Line as much as any other Yankee, but...really?

[leeroysphitz]

100. It is what it is. n/t

[derby378]

97. Then why did we launch all those spaceships from Florida?

I don't recall Jim Lovell saying "Brooklyn, we have a problem."

[Odin2005]

102. Florida is closer to the equator.

The closer you are to the equator the more the speed of Earth's rotation gives you a speed boost right off the bat.

[jmowreader]

105. Lovell said "Houston, we have a problem"

Johnson Space Flight Center is in Texas...look at a Texas license plate and you'll find a little space shuttle, in tribute to Texas' NASA operations.

Besides the equatorial advantage, NASA needed a place where a spacecraft falling to earth would kill as few innocent bystanders as possible. At Cape Canaveral their mistakes can crash into the ocean.

[leeroysphitz]

106. Into the ocean or Florida. Either way...

[jmowreader]

110. When they built the place, that part of Florida was largely uninhabited...

which is why it's there. No longer is that the case.

[dmallind]

24. I bought my first CDs in about 2 yrs this weekend

Being a relatively deep diver albeit (not obscuarantist) into the less charted waters of the repertoire, I have relied on mp3 downloads and yes file sharing for at least that long. Trying to find that old pressing of Juan Arriaga's Symphony in D at Target is not going to happen. Specialty publishers like Hyperion and Chandos do a great service in offering works well past the "Best of Mozart" standards in high quality formats like FLAC, at prices that are affordable while highly profitable on a per-piece basis (although I'd hate to guess how few pieces of some works are sold).

That said, at times there are deep discounts on such material at Amazon etc, and in many cases they are cheaper than mp3 downloads and more readily available than file shares (and more legal too of course). The ones I bought fell into this category - 10 total CDS for $34. A boxed set each of Nielsen's chamber works and some less common Holst.

[Arugula Latte]

25. It's the Land Time Forgot.

Or Land of the Lost ... except the fundies down there don't believe in dinosaurs.

[randome]

27. Because they ARE the dinosaurs.

Dinosaurs probably didn't believe in dinosaurs, either.

[Erose999]

42. We just call them "jesus horses".

[Arugula Latte]

50. *snort*

[pstokely]

28. many country music fans probably live too far out of town for a broadband connection

nt

[DeschutesRiver]

48. This is the reason. We still have dial up.

And we have neighbors who do not have computers because things are too tight financially. The free ones at the library are a fifty mile roundtrip. Sone drive there daily to work but many work where they live out here on a ranch or farm.

[themaguffin]

30. I mostly buy Cds. why pay for inferior downloads?

Yes it saves space.

Yes, you can get lossless at times, but most people don't and often the cd is better product.

I realize that is now what this post is about, but I hate the inference that cd buyers are backwards, mp3 is NOT better quality, it's just easier to obtain.

[randome]

32. You're right about the quality.

But digital with an iPod or something similar also allows you to play your entire collection randomized so you never know what's coming up next.

It's like radio but without the annoying talk.

[TwilightGardener]

37. I do like the shuffle feature. I am not a whole-album listener.

I like hearing the weird mix of stuff that comes up, from different genres. Keeps it fresh-you appreciate it more.

[randome]

41. I'm pretty obsessive when it comes to being organized.

Every MP3 I have has dead space at the end stripped so when I listen to my iPod on shuffle mode, it all comes through as one continuous stream.

The 'weird mix' you mention is something I value, too. Contrasts and transitions.

[themaguffin]

38. I also have a landline because get crappy cell reception at house & why talk on crappy phone when I

can talk a much better sounding land line and not even have to deal with the fucking batteries.

Again i realize that's not what this thread is about but it's worth noting...

[jackbenimble]

39. You're right

and that is why I still buy CDs. I rip them to my computer at a higher quality than mp3.

Oh, I also still have a land line, but then I guess I feel I need to support jobs the field of work I'm in.

[Carolina]

31. I still like CDs and DVDs

guess I'm a dinosaur.

Heck, I just invested in a new turntable so I could play all my old vinyl albums!

I still like hardcopies of things and actually think a return to paper ballots would be a good thing.

[PowerToThePeople]

33. I still buy CDs

Not very often, but I do.

I usually buy used, either from music store or pawn shop. I rip flac files and put it on my NAS for use in the house. 2-5$ for a CD is the correct price in my mind. 0.99$ per song without physical media is way too expensive imo. I can remember thinking that CDs were too expensive when they came out. How could they be more expensive than a tape, considering how much more complex a tape is to manufacture?

[Bake]

34. I guess nobody here remembers vinyl ...

The smell, the sound ...



Bake

[HappyMe]

36. I do.

We have an excellent record store within walking distance. If I were to upgrade my tunes situation, I would get better speakers, better cd player and a turntable.

[dipsydoodle]

43. And before that too.

The only known copy to survive : its in Joe Bussard’s collection.

[BumRushDaShow]

45. See post #23

I also have some reel-to-reel tapes (mostly 6" but also a couple of 10&quot that I want to convert as well as some casettes and yes, a couple 8-tracks.

But for my records, outside of my own (including piles of 45s), I do have some of my father's jazz records from the '50s and early '60s when he was fooling around with his Fisher Hi-Fi in the tube days (I debated getting a tube amp about 15 yeas ago but decided on solid state).

[Chico Man]

57. I have quite a bit of vinyl

And I'll continue to lug that collection around with me anywhere I move.

But my OP is really in reference to the mainstream - how is the mainstream buying music now?

[Xyzse]

35. I tend to like CDs

I love the experience of opening it up and plopping it on to the Car CD to play.
I enjoy seeing if there is a correlation between the songs in regards to how they are arranged, they sound and if they have a narrative from one song to the next.

It also allows me to experience an artist's other songs rather than just the ones playing on the radio or what is popular.

Regardless, I think that with books and with CDs, that if you buy the hard copy, you should be more than welcome to the digitized version of it.

Yes, I know there is a thing about storing music in detachable Hard Drives, which I do, but to me, nothing replaces the original CDs bought from the stores. With the CD covers, the art work and everything else.

I also tend to like having a wall filled with CDs that I slowly browse through and choose which one to listen to now and then. It is such a nice tactile experience, and quite a conversation starter. Since I built shelves on a wall just for CDs, which can look really pretty.

I have not gone through the tedious process of digitizing all of it, but I'll get to that some time.

Any how, yes, I am early 30s but still prefer CDs just for some of the fringe benefits. Besides, I've had Hard Drives die on me quite a few times, I have back ups, but I find that I can't back it up online via cloud, even if I do have the CDs because that would be possible copy right violations. Not that I'm sharing, just want to back it up.

There is still something about having a tangible proof of ownership, which is something I just don't get from mp3 files.

[WooWooWoo]

40. I don't buy or download music at all anymore

if there's a song I like, I listen to it on youtube or my wife has it on spotify. I've heard all the good old songs a million times and all the new good one's are catchy, but meaningless.

I doubt I'll ever pay for music again.

[OriginalGeek]

136. Pretty much the same here

except my wife recently said I should start collecting something. I have a ton of vinyl and CD's and I think I might start buying vinyl again. A lot of the new releases from artists I'd be interested in are releasing vinyl with special extras (non-cd/DL songs - artwork, books, etc) PLUS they are making the digital version available included in the price of the vinyl. So I can have my collection and still listen with ease on my music server at work.

And there are still some good used record stores around here that I can fill gaps in my collection.


Imma have to build some shelves though.

[Erose999]

46. The way big retailers like Wally World and Target censor their music selection, corporate/country

music is about all you can get there. Its almost always void of any potentially offensive content.

[onenote]

47. You're "amazed" that Target and Wal-Mart still sell cds and dvds? Really?

Yes, digital album sales are increasing and at some point likely will supplant physical album sales. But in 2011, there were two physical cds sold for every digital album sold. So why would you be surprised that major retail outlets still sell physical cds?

[Chico Man]

56. Yes, amazed

Particularly with DVDs. I never understood why someone would want to own a movie, actually. Is it really worth watching over and over again?

[TwilightGardener]

59. That I don't get, either. I have never had the urge to own

a movie.

[onenote]

63. Well, appararently millions of people don't feel like you do.

Some people don't see the need to buy books -- they go to the library. Others buy books and after they're done, they give them away or sell them. Others have big collections of books, 99 percent of which they never re-read.

No different than with DVDs or CDs.

[Chico Man]

60. I imagine the southern / midwestern population skews this statistic

Just as it is skewing the Gallup poll.

[msongs]

52. some people don't believe in stealing from performers and songwriters. quaint isn't it? nt

[dipsydoodle]

53. I'm pleased you mentioned that.

[OriginalGeek]

75. I thought they were talking about legal downloads

"digital distribution". Artists can get their music out there and get almost all the profits instead of giving them to record companies.

[Chico Man]

77. I agree

I think digital distribution weighs heavility in favor of the artists.

[haele]

85. Only if they have their own site.

The distributers and the recording companies take a huge chunk out of digital distribution through I-tunes, Amazon, and other corporate distribution site as portals/gatekeepers between the artists and the fans/downloaders.

An author friend sells short stories and novellas from her site; she has gone ahead and gotten the licenses to convert her .pdf files into the various formats for different online and e-reader formats, and makes so much more money than if she had Amazon or B&N handle her stories.
A couple local musicians do the same sort of thing; they have CDs for when they play at venues, and sell both the albums as convertible downloads directly from their home page. One of the musicians blogged on their page on how he makes much more money now on the indie band SoCal circuit than when he was with a mainstream genre band under the MCI label.
The only time he or any of the other band members saw any money with that mainstream band was when they were on tour and could get a cut of some of the ticket and trinkets (souvenir) profit.

Haele

[Chico Man]

119. And what about marketing / exposure?

Perhaps it is worth the massive quantity of eyeballs iTunes automatically provides.

If I wanted to make a profit, I'd probably use every avenue I possibly could. Why not? If you really hit it big, does it really matter?

[haele]

140. It's up to the artist and their agent at that point -

But just from a "in the neighborhood" experience with the recording business - one of my husband's best friends is an indie US rap artist that's very popular in Argentina(of all places) and I know a few local groups that do the SoCal tours and festivals (a few having opened locally for larger bands like the Kings of Leon and the Killers) - and while most of these bands have some songs on I-Tunes, most of their music and their albums are down-loadable on their own website. That's primarily because they aren't pop enough to make it "big", but they are good enough to quit their day jobs so long as they can get a more few gigs doing back-ups, covers, and openings for the really big name artists.

I do understand the most part, I am still a content purchaser, not a provider, and my opinions are more skewed in that direction rather than the artist is, but I was pursuing a career as a musician (classical) a long time ago and I am still in touch with some of my compatriots who are commercial musicians (as well as visual artists and writers) who make a living off what they create and "sell", so I'm familiar with many of the problems that come with having to rely on a customer base for your revenue. One of the reasons I'm not my own business person - I'm not a good "marketer", and as one of my few fears is of harming those dependent on me through my personal failures, I'm very cautious with the risks. My loss, but another bold artist's or entrepreneur's gain.

From what I've experienced, if you are good enough and think you can be popular enough that I-tunes and Amazon can generate you enough revenue that it's worth the hassle of dealing with their "cut" and challenges to the licensing and "ownership" of the music you record, then putting a couple singles or a collection out on those sites that you think might sell well could be a good investment until you know you've really hit it big and can put a catalog up.

But my primary complaint is from looking from the side of a content purchaser. I'm not happy with the business model that is increasingly looking towards "renting" every access to their "library" content - while the artist gets fractions of pennies for putting their music up on that library - rather than allowing me to purchase the song and listen to it whenever I want to.

I know that in the "old days" (pretty much before accurate recording devices), to get the full impact and quality of a piece of music, the listener pretty much had to drop some coin to be able to listen to the artist personally, by going to the concert. The quality in any subsequent copies of the musical piece pretty much depended on the musical talent and memory of the listener him or herself - if they could recall the tune and sing, play, or whistle it on their own after the concert (especially if they could purchase a copy of the score to keep at home for future reference). That, or hope some itinerant musician/tinker/buskers could reproduce what the artist created when they came through town.
The ability to record the artist changed this, and ever since, both the artist and the listener have been fighting with the recording entity (which also took over as the promotion entity) on who should be most rewarded for the ability to listen to an artist whenever desired.
While the recording entity has been pretty much the winner over the past century as it acted as a gatekeeper between the artist and the listener, the ability to control one's own content in one's own "home" (i.e., website) has created an evolution in the models of content control as artist and listener are gaining more power to directly negotiate who controls access to the art.

Haele

[SomethingFishy]

88. Yeah too bad those people don't work for record labels.

I don't think the OP was talking about stealing he was talking about digital delivery. The future of the Recording industry is already here. Music is being recorded on home studios and distributed via the internet. Since an artist usually gets less than 10% of the sales of CD's they can sell fewer recordings and make more money. They will be able to market through online radio and social media.

[Chico Man]

55. I imagine that if I were to post this to Facebook..

The response would have been wildly different. At least, it appears that age is a big factor.

Most everyone I know uses Spotify now anyways. and if they really like the album, they will digitially download it.

CD's are a niche industry now at best. Most new cars have plugins for MP3 players and phones.

[mr blur]

58. I still buy vinyl.

CDs? Pah!

[Chico Man]

65. I do too

But my OP was in reference to the direction of the mainstream.

[whistler162]

69. Wax cylinders is the way to go...

vinyl? PAH!

[dipsydoodle]

71. Indeed.

[HopeHoops]

67. I still have vinyl and consider it far more durable than digital formats. Besides,...

Even if you download the music, if your hard drive shits the bed and you don't have a backup, you're out of luck. You can always rip a CD to a new hard drive.

[PD Turk]

70. I still buy CDs

And I'm glad a lot of artists are once again putting their new titles out on vinyl. If lossless digital formats are available I don't mind buying those but the compressed formats like mp3 and aac, no way I'm spending any money on those. The audio performance of those compromised formats on quality playback equipment is way below par. If I want music "on the go" for my portable player, I'll just rip it from the cd, and I record my vinyl over to digital so I can even rip that too.

[Chico Man]

78. There will always be the case of the audiophile

I also collect vinyl. But my downloaded mp3s sound great in my car, via iPhone connected to the radio. If only I could get rid of the tire and wind noise.

Steve

[randome]

80. Pump up the volume!

[PD Turk]

87. I know, I know

Not everyone is an audiophile... and sometimes it just irritates the hell out of us who are lol

[haele]

72. I prefer CDs because the RIAA can easily claim you are "renting" the music when you download it

from their "cloud storage" rather than purchasing the song for your own use whenever you want it. All they need to do is code their songs at the site for one use only per access/no recording, and you'll be stuck paying "just a penny or so to get the music you love any time" every time you turn on your device and acccess the playlist you keep on your account in their cloud. Sort of like they do with digital downloads of movies now.

Of course, they'll con the artists into thinking that they'll actually get money off "pay every time you play", but what it really means is that the recording industry makes a huge profit off renting storage space to people who just want to keep listening to the music they thought they purchased for their own use - and the artist will get pretty close to nothing, as little as fractions of pennies on the dollar - just as they get from pretty much all profit that could be made off CDs and downloadable media sold through the major corporate labels.

Haele

[Chico Man]

76. I can burn a CD though.

And then I have the best of both worlds.

[aquart]

74. last ditch

[Butterbean]

83. *shrug* Whatever. My parents are boomers, hardcore Dems, and (continued)

still buy CDs like mad, especially my mom. I just got them to get a DVR a few months ago, after a painstakingly long discussion with my dad about why a DVR was not the same thing as a Blu-Ray player. They have a Blu-Ray player because we bought them one.

I'm a gen-xer and let me tell you, getting me to move from a regular non-smart phone (a dumb phone, if you will, ha ha) to a smart phone was like pulling teeth. I also left Facebook, and don't understand why people feel the need to tweet/status update their every waking breath.

So no, it's not an intellect thing or a political affiliation thing, it's probably more generational and may even be more geographical (my MIL lives in the boonies and just got non-dial up internet access last year, for example). Some people just buy CDs just because.

[okieinpain]

84. I haven't bought a cd in 3 years.

[BumRushDaShow]

86. And here is why we buy CDs! Something on the net "broke"

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021601482

Amazon's cloud was down.

http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/technolog/amazon-web-services-outage-takes-down-netflix-other-sites-1C6611522

[dmallind]

104. And that affects the 99% of hardware based mp3 users how?

[Broken_Hero]

91. Hmm,

I still by cd's and dvd's, I have no desire to download any audio cd's at all. I file my cd's away when I get them, burn them to my external HD, and make a copy of the CD so I can listen to it, and if it gets scratched I can just burn another copy.

I'm very far from a country fan, almost nothing but Heavy Metal for me....

[derby378]

96. Want to buy an mp3 of The Hafler Trio on iTunes? Good luck...

Just checked the iTunes Store a moment ago, and Andrew McKenzie still hasn't offered any H3O material there. He doesn't like to see his stuff on YouTube, either. If you want a Hafler Trio release, you've got to buy the CD like I did. Then you can make your own mp3s! (Just don't try to sell them, or McKenzie might come after you. )

[Odin2005]

103. I would guess many parts of the South and Great Plains don't have Broadband access.

Partly because both areas are quite rural (the South less so than the Plains) and because they are RW and so there are no subsidies for putting down high-speed lines.

No broadband = no downloading music.

[Chico Man]

117. If you are going to town to buy a CD..

You might as well stop at the coffee shop and download a few while you are at it. I have friends in New Mexico who do just that.

[RagAss]

109. LOL ! Latte Snobbery !

You're a keeper !

Hey, Don't tombstone this one...good sense of humor.

[Chico Man]

126. It's easy..

But so far from the truth.

[Initech]

111. I still buy CDs - it's the only way to get a lot of the music I listen to.

[cherish44]

112. I still record music off the radio!

Not really but most of us born in the 60s probably did! I buy most of my music in digital form. Still prefer DVDs for video though....don't know why, just do.

[TwilightGardener]

114. Ah, the good old days of sitting by the radio with your fingers

on record and play, trying to catch your song right at the beginning, and hoping the DJ doesn't cut it off before the end.

[randome]

122. I remember those days fondly, too.

[Chico Man]

130. I still have my late 90s Boston WERS saturday night recordings

But times have changed. and I'd be afraid to play one of those tapes. I also remember using a pencil to rewind them if the tape got all tangled up. Nasty when that happened.

[liberal_at_heart]

113. I hear albums are making a come back for collectors

The quality of the sound is much richer than a cd or a digital download.

[Chico Man]

120. I have plenty of vinyl

And CDs. But for general listening, I could really care less. Wind and tire noise in the car is going to lessen the experience right off the bat.

[GReedDiamond]

115. I have a land line, and...

...I'm (finally) releasing a long worked on CD in early November 2012 (11/10/12).

It's "Americana, Country, Pop, Rock, Alternative" and stuff.

Digital download MP3s suck a lot compared to a full-throated CD.

And, to put the nail in MY coffin, if I had mastered my CD for analog vinyl, it would sound better than the digital CD, if it could be played on a decent turntable.

MP3s are audibly inferior to uncompressed CD versions of the same recordings, and analog is even better.

Comparing "the election" to these kind of standards is flawed.

But, then again, what do I know? I'm a 57 y.o. punk rock dude.

And silly political ads have zero effect on me.

[Chico Man]

121. What DU member looks like when they listen to music:

[bigwillq]

124. I still do

I wish there were more video stores around. I would still rent movies.
I am not a big fan of the red box, even though it's cheap. The selection is too small.


I used to love video stores.

[Chico Man]

125. "Be Kind Please Rewind"

If I'm in the mood for some random flick, I'll stream netflix to the TV. There have a pretty random selection, and no late fees. Yeah, those late fees really sucked. Kind of like ATM fees.

[bigwillq]

143. My sister has netflix through the mail

she orders me movies sometimes, but I don't have netflix through the TV.

[ProfessorGAC]

127. I Still Buy CD's

I still have a land line. I still have cable TV.

I also know how to use the internet, have a company cellphone, and an MP3 player.

What's your point? That i'm going to vote for Romney?
GAC

[Chico Man]

133. Cool

And I'm sorry you missed my point. I actually can't afford all of those luxuries. I can't have a cell phone and a land line. So I decided to only get a cell phone and internet.

But back to the point at hand. The point is, the Republican base's water is about to break.

[Third Doctor]

128. I still buy CDs on a limited basis. Most of my music collecting has been in digital form recently.

[hiphopnation]

129. Wait

80% of the country still buy albums on CD?!?!? That can't be right...

[Chico Man]

131. No, for a recent country-pop release

That I'm sure was quite popular in Red State nation.

[Romulox]

135. "They still listen to lossy formats????"

[Chico Man]

137. Hopefully they wear ear protection at live shows too then

Otherwise, lossy or not, they aren't going to hear the difference

[Romulox]

138. Trick question. A dude pushing "play" on a macbook isn't really a "live" show.

[Chico Man]

142. True

I guess iPods and headphones are as guilty of blowing out eardrums as any live show is.

[NuttyFluffers]

139. i still buy CDs. i buy especially obscure, international indie press stuff

and no, your internet is far more balkanized than you think, google is terribly limited for finding such underground things overseas, and int'l indie music, especially older stuff, is far too hard for which to find a download.

thank goodness for CDs (and vinyl, etc) to keep a few records of that stuff around. "way back machines" don't cover every last webpage ever made and abandoned, particularly overseas.

[Chico Man]

141. I realize there will always be the case of the niche market

But my original point really dealt with the music purchasing mechanism of the mainstream buying mainstream music. It would be wonderful if the mainstream sought out obscure underground titles.. market forces may then force them out of the underground and back into... the mainstream