Napster as "Viral Marketing" - A Listener's Perspective

[Moses]

Why is it frequently assumed that Napster is used mostly by penniless college students?

I'm certainly not going to claim that I know the real statistics and demographic profile of the "typical" Napster user, but I can speak for my own experience. I am not a penniless college student.

When music started to become available to me to listen to first before I bought (for me) when the local Block Buster Music stores would let you listen to anything in the store first before you agreed to buy it at their often inflated prices (15.99 to 21.99). This was a real bad thing for my pocket book because I often walked out of that store with at least two or three CDs. Before that, I would rarely even go into a record store and buy anything because I got tired of buying albums that I really didn't like. Eventually, Warehouse Records bought them out and canceled the "Listen Before You Buy" program.

Then along comes Amazon.com. They had little snippets of RealAudio (yuk) samples I could listen to before I bought. So, I started spending between 65.00 and 200.00 dollars a month at Amazon on music I liked based on those "samples." While being able to hear only small fractions of the tracks on a CD, I still ran into some selections that if I had heard the whole thing, I probably wouldn't have bought. So I began to investigate this new technology I had read about - "MP3." I read that the quality was much better than those "RealAudio" clips and wondered why Amazon didn't use MP3 instead. So I went to search for it on the Web.

Along came MP3.com. Hmmm, here's a Site offering full length tracks to download and listen to them as long or as many times as I wanted? But "Oh No! They only have artists no one has ever heard of before." OK, I thought I would browse through some of the music to see if any of it was any good. Just about the time I was ready to give up after listening to a dozen or so bad tracks, I ran across a track I really liked! Investigating the rest of the music by this artist led me to a whole bunch of music that was great! Wow! Here's an artist that I (and probably most of the real world), had never heard of who is making quality music worth listening to! And it was all available for free! I started to wonder what he was doing giving away all his music and what the motivation was to create all this wonderful music without any kind of compensation. Looking closer at the artist's page, I saw that he was selling CDs through this new site MP.com. I thought, great! He must make some money through selling these on line. I went ahead and bought every CD he had on MP3.com. I also thought it was very unique that I was able to communicate with this artist via e-mail. I found that he was also selling CDs direct and thought yes, I'll buy those too. He probably makes more money selling direct than from those that he sold via MP3.com. So I e-mailed him with complements on his music and asked to buy everything he had. It turned out that he had like 3 or 4 CDs which he promptly sent in the mail to me. In the time that it took for them to arrive in the mail, I knew he didn't have time to get my check yet, so this guy sent them to me on my word that I would pay him for them. How cool!

So I continued to search the charts for any other music that might be worth listening to. I heard a lot of works I couldn't appreciate and a few that were OK. From the ones I did like, over the next 8 months I bought about 85 DAM CDs and at least 30 or so CDs directly from the independent artists themselves.

Then along comes Napster. I first tried Napster to download a few tracks I was reminded of and even if I did try, I probably wouldn't be able to find in any store. Then I started using it to preview whole CDs that I would find on Amazon.com. If I found one of Amazon's recommendations that sounded interesting, I would switch over to my Napster window and do a quick search for the music. If I liked it, I would sometimes listen to the whole CD all the way through over the course of several days. If it was something I knew I could repeatedly listen to for the long term, I would then start a search for the best price from the numerous online sources and then buy the CD(s). I haven't kept track, but I can estimate that there has been at least 100 CDs I have bought this way.

So I guess the point of this lengthy post is: Would I have bought all those CDs if it weren't for being able to listen to them first? Not nearly that many! Maybe a half dozen. It was the ability to listen to how much I wanted, when I wanted, that sold me. So if Napster goes the way of the Dodo bird, then I guess I'll be buying a lot less CDs. Maybe that's a blessing (for my wallet) in disguise. I know there are probably plenty of leaches out there that will download music they like with no intention of ever buying it. Those people will always exist and you can't eliminate them. The truth of it though is they probably would never have bought the music even without Napster. The people that are really in the market for music are the ones going to Napster and then the online and brick and mortar music outlets to buy the CDs they hear on Napster. So how has this hurt the record industry? It hasn't the way I see it. How is this hurting the artist? Maybe the naysayers are looking at the wrong party for blame. It's the major labels that have been hurting the artists for years, and I suspect will continue doing so for millennia. Are the listeners getting hurt? They will if Napster is shut down. If that doesn't make your heart bleed, then maybe you should find another product to sell. Because it's the listeners who are ultimately going to buy the bread on your table or buy that new piece of equipment you've been wanting - not the major labels (that is if your in this to make a living). I mean If I was in the shoes of an artist, I wouldn't care about the pettiness of not wanting a few listeners that were never going to buy my music anyway, get it for free, if I had the ability to reach the vast pool of listeners who have money and will buy good quality music.

Instead of jumping on the major label's band wagon, why aren't independent artists looking for a way to develop this technology into something that will work for them? It's obviously not going to be the majors helping you. Why aren't you taking advantage of the ID3 Tag in the MP3 file and leaving a URL where your music can be bought? Put your music in folders named after popular artists you may "sound" like? Or name the file "Like Vangelis" or "Like Peter Frampton" or whatever? Use it as a marketing tool. Believe me, there are quite a few listeners out there who have money and want to buy music. Sitting back and whining that someone is hearing your music that hasn't paid for it isn't going to advance the cause of the independent artist. See it as an opportunity. Be creative. Your going to need to have CDs for sale somewhere to take advantage of this type of marketing, so you'll need to be prepared. If you say you're "like" "so and so," you better make sure that's the case or you'll just tick off the listener and foul the waters for everyone else including yourself. I have seen independent artists do this and it resulted in my at least checking out their work. It's all about ingenuity. Those who take advantage of the current circumstances and use them to the fullest extent will be the ones who are successful.

So, Who is listening to your music tonight? Have you done everything to make sure those that are listening know where to find both you and your product? If you don't know the answers to these questions or don't care, then technology will pass you by in favor of those who can answer them.

I know when I was growing up in the 70s and 80s, there wasn't a lot of choice in what I could find in music. Mostly what the media machine was willing to spoon feed everyone. When the Internet connected the world and made it a much smaller place, I discovered there was much more than what I thought was available when I was growing up. I have spent a lot of the last 2 years catching up and discovering what was actually available 10 or 20 years ago. This is after I have explored many independent artists not only in the USA, but all over the world. There is a lot of fantastic electronic music coming out of Sweden, the UK, Germany, etc. that I was never exposed to when I was growing up.

I think it's only natural that people who are into computers are into electronic music. They are the ones most likely spending the time on the Internet seeking it out. I work with computers every day for a living. Even so, it's only been over the last 2 years or so that I've become familiar with all the great electronic music being produced. I haven't progressed into actually creating it (yet anyway), but 95 percent of what I buy is electronic music. I've been advantaged to find obscure places around the world to buy many albums by artists that simply are not available at Tower, Warehouse Records or even Amazon. Some of those places do not even bother to post prices in US dollars.

As time progresses, I believe there will be more and more people who are connected with the world as a whole and be enlightened to what's available beyond what the big five want to spoon feed us. That's another reason I believe that the big five hates music being available over the Internet. Not just that their music is being distributed, but more competition from artists who they don't own. They are loosing the exclusive rights to spoon feed us what they think we should be listening to. Their paradigm is dependent on mass distribution of just a few artists they pick. Everyone should be listening to the same set of artists. They make more money that way. Mass production brings their economy of scale. The limitless variety of music available will cut into their profits.

Independents have to find a door to the masses. Whether that be by association to music that's already made it into the public eye, or simply by word of mouth. It has to call attention to those who are looking for new and different music. This is one reason why I thought that some of the newer options of distribution might help the unheard Indie get noticed. Wouldn't it be ironic, if the "mainstream" music actually gets filtered from Napster, and suddenly, the only thing available for peer to peer were unsigned artists? I know everyone (or even the majority) of people are not like me, but I can't help but believe there are a significant number of people who after discovering something they really like, would seek out the authors of that music and become loyal fans. This is where it becomes critical that independents have something to market. Indies have to find a way to produce CDs themselves or through one of the online music dot coms. Every track that's out there should have the ID3 tag listed with a URL where fans can go to, to find the artists. Numerous times I have looked at the files I have downloaded and have scratched my head in wonder why this isn't being utilized. Even the MP3 files artists are uploading to the OMDs themselves. Why aren't the artist's URLs in these files?

I don't claim that I have all the answers. I'm just a listener trying to offer suggestions as to how to make it work. I want to see the Independent artist succeed. I'm tired of the crap that is being pushed on the general public.