Basic Music Industry Basic Music Industry ResearchResearch

What is the current state, concerns and future of the

Music Industry, particularly in the UK but also worldwide?

∗ At this current time in our society, the music industry is extremely healthy due to music being so easy to access. Whilst there are ‘illegal’ ways of accessing music and downloading music from other sources, the music industry are still able to make a lot of money from selling artists merchandise as well as concerts.

∗ However, some areas of the music industry are doing significantly better than others which has an overall effect on the whole of the music industry which ultimately puts the industry under threat, world wide.

OverviewOverview

∗ There a three major music companies which are in control of a lot of the production, promotion, distribution and exhibition of music in the music industry.

∗ These companies are Universal Music Group, Sony BMG and Warner Music Group with over 28% of the music market sales shares being controlled by independent labels such as XL Recordings.

Music Companies

∗ Digital Music revenues had a 6% growth in 2010 which shows that the music industry is benefiting a lot by digital media. What is even more outstanding is that there has been a 1000% + increase in the value of the digital music market from 2004 - 2010 and The Unites States alone made $4.6 billion digital revenue in 2010.

∗ There are over 400+ licensed services which are becoming available to a wider audience due to social networking sites and the internet being readily available to more people on a daily bases. This enables music subscription numbers in many countries to steadily advance.

Digital Media

∗ Digital Piracy has become an increasing problem in the music industry and whilst digital media has been up 1000%+, revenues have decreased by 31%. These figures show that even though companies are licensing hundreds of digital music services, they have been unable to prevent the decline in the legal and legitimate music market.

∗ Harris Interactive found that 76% of all music found online in the United Kingdom in 2010 was unlicensed which shows just how much of an effect piracy has on the music industry.

∗ The IFPI Digital Music Report 2011 reports that there is a high chance of one million jobs being lost in Europe by 2015 if piracy is not addressed.

∗ BitTorrent websites are becoming commonly popular which makes the access to illegal and unlicensed music easier for everyone.

Digital Piracy

Threats to the Music Industry• The biggest threat to the music industry is the

increasing access to illegal music from the internet which has an effect on all of the new artists that have recently released albums as people are stuck with a ‘why pay when its free’ state of mind.

• Technology is increasing just as fast as the music industry is expanding which means that people will always find ways of gaining music free of charge, for example, burning illegal cd’s to those that are not fans of digital music.

• Social channels such as YouTube, Facebook and Twitter are making the access of unlicensed music easier to access and so the social media has a huge impact on the music industry.