The piece of the "emerging artists..." bit that still mystifies me (as in why do they think it would encourage me) is this: suppose they get a hundred emerging artists to sign up, and suppose it gives the artists a better revenue stream than spotify, and suppose the effort to animate the thing even gets them some new fans...why would that interest me all that much given that the chances of those artists being exactly the ones I want to listen to seem slim and I already have bandcamp? It makes a sliver of sense as a total startup, but it remains unclear how far it is immediately relevant to me as a former user of what emusic has been, i.e. a music sales platform where at one time I could get things from pretty much all of the labels that were actually interesting. It's as if my local supermarket stopped stocking food but assured me they had a new plan to support four asparagus farms in the next state, with three of them already signed up - it might well be a noble thing to do, and I might even be in favor of it, but for now it does not help me much with the groceries, so if I want to eat I'll be shopping elsewhere until the asparagus revolution is much further along.
Hello, a bit of a rambling post to introduce myself with.... on the "emerging artists" thing, I currently have two releases available on eMusic, there should be more but my more recent releases haven't been sent to eMusic as Ditto (and I presume Distrokid) aren't providing them with content anymore (Ditto have told me this is the case, I haven't asked Distrokid). One of the releases should have been taken down ages ago but this hasn't happened. It's the same situation with 7Digital although Ditto have told me that they haven't actually stopped providing them but there's some blockage somewhere apparently (I'm not really bothered tbh). So anyway if two of the biggest distributors for "emerging artists" aren't using eMusic I assume they are expecting these artists to use their own eMusic distribution tool. Which is fine, but as Germanprof says above it means absolutely nothing to me as a long standing customer of eMusic (14 years) - I might be interested in listening to some new artists but that was never the reason I signed up in the first place and there are so many other options for discovering new music out there. I have 4 days until my 3 month hold period is over, I might give it another month but it doesn't look like I've missed very much while I've been away. And no I haven't received any payment from sales on eMusic (there should be at least 2 sales!)
@soyabeanz, welcome, and well said! I've always felt the "we're going to be a distributor now because we have a blockchain!" approach was a really bad business strategy.
For starters, we all know by now that eMusic has struggled to stay solvent (or at least pay their bills to labels) when keeping 50% of gross revenue for themselves (and giving the other 50%, in theory, if not in practice for the past 12+ months, to the label). So how does replicating that same model on a blockchain, with a much smaller set of artists, as you note, somehow making things better for anyone? And if they really claim to be a "community label"/distributor for these "emerging artists", aren't they going to have to replicate/compete with services from the likes of DistroKid to get all these emerging artists on Spotify, for example? How will they make any money doing that? They certainly won't be getting 50% in the streaming cases - maybe 2% (if they are lucky - many distributors just get an annual fee and take zero cut of revenues)? Of course, the irony in all of this is that they have said repeatedly that the reason they had to abandon their retail business is because of the rise of streaming, yet the only way they've hinted they will make money on their blockchain is selling directly their "community label" of emerging artists with roughly the same 50/50 split they claim they can't survive with in retail today. "Logic spill on aisle three! Cleanup, please!"
They already seem to struggle with high overhead (esp. vs. lean distributors like DistroKid), so why are they moving from the "higher" margin business of retail to the very low margin (but high volume) world of distribution? It seems like they could do much more interesting things with their blockchain and not have to burn their existing retail business and label relationships to the ground. Some future business major is going to get an "A" on a term paper or complete a thesis on the case study of how eMusic self-immolated for no logical reason.
Hello @confused, and thanks for the welcome! I'm listed as Neonian (or Neonian/ for some reason for one of the releases). Honestly my better stuff isn't on eMusic, not for want of trying though lol
Hi @soulcoal, thanks for the reply! It's all really weird and to be honest I'm only hanging on as a sort of "car crash onlooker". I get most of my music through the likes of Boomkat, Bleep and Bandcamp (and Amazon for my chart music wedding DJ stuff). Also, talking of the blockchain, does anyone know anybody who has actually managed to purchase any tokens. I mentioned on the reddit (I'm mooydjbeanz on there btw) a few months ago that I had tried but gave up because of all the hoops that were put in front of me, and I was a willing participant until I got to the last hurdle. I can't see the uptake from casual users being very large.
Welcome @soyabeanz. Thanks to the wonders of Google I have now learned that “neonian” refers to a 5th century octagonal baptistery in Ravenna as well as to you on bandcamp :-).
Re: Blockchain - My understanding is that there are a few factors at play for eMusic. First, they never got regulatory approval in the US to sell their tokens, so you don't even have the option to buy them here. Second, for those in overseas markets where they have their tokens available in the token sale, it seems (based on some comments made elsewhere by others) that, while they can sell tokens, they have not reached their "soft cap" limit (e.g. lower bound of stated prospectus, etc.) for their ICO, so everyone who has purchased tokens essentially has their money held in escrow (or similar), awaiting either a successfully completed ICO and release of tokens, or a refund. (Sort like some of those Kickstarter-like campaigns where you have to hit a stated target for crowdfunding or else everyone gets their money back and the project doesn't fund). And finally, the particular flavor of Ethereum coin they have specified (ERC20) has taken a beating in crypto markets, so there has not been much appetite for these "white paper" ICOs for the past several months.
Of course, these last two points might explain why they keep extending the deadline for their ICO instead of declaring it failed. They already have a bunch of money from people (have they spent it? that would be a very bad thing...) and would prefer not to have to refund it. If they can eventually reach their self-created $20M soft cap, they would declare their ICO "funded", everyone outside the US could start using the tokens, and eMusic could use the proceeds from the ICO as originally intended. I think the term "hot mess" might have been coined in anticipation of what eZombie has become. ;-)
He has answered that question previously, albeit somewhat indirectly. They are not going to pay their past due bills, and they are not going to rebuild the retail store. Koch has claimed publicly on multiple occasions that labels are the enemy of independent artists, so he seemingly has no interest in paying them what they are due (which ironically means not paying artists, either) - it looks like eMusic was just opportunistically milking retail sales as long as possible to take that money and put towards their block chain. Ethical? Absolutely not. But it looks to be reality.
Reading between the lines, the only reason they still exist is that they are sitting on some not-insignificant amount of money from early ICO participants that we know is less than $20M (the minimum for their ICO to fund), but probably still several million dollars. If they officially cancel the ICO, those funds have to be returned to investors. Presumably the money is in escrow somewhere, and not already being spent (which would create some serious legal problems). Continuing to hawk the blockchain project in hopes of getting to that $20M threshold is basically all that is left for eMusic. If they get there, they essentially get $20M for free without any obligation to actually deliver anything for it. (Buyer beware if you are thinking of investing in an ICO!) The minute they cancel the ICO, though, any funds already received go back to investors and they literally have nothing left of the (former) business they intentionally set afire and burned to the ground through negligence.
As for money being around, my impression from the articles about 7Digital is that Tamir Koch is investing his own money (and, yes, you could wonder aloud why he won't invest in his own company if he can invest in a dying 7Digital, but perhaps he IS actually investing in his own company, too, to keep the lights on - surely they are bleeding money badly on a month to month basis at this point, so someone somewhere must keep injecting cash to keep it alive). The words "dumpster fire" seem to frequently come to mind whenever thinking about the TriPlay era of eMusic...
Well, it was just announced today that Mr. Koch and his investment group have effectively acquired 7Digital, with Koch now chairman of 7Dig and the eMusic CFO taking over the CFO role at 7DIG, too. The previous 7Dig CEO and CFO, who just started their positions 3 months ago, are leaving the company. So does this mean 7Dig will soon be adopting the eMusic practice of not paying for the music they sell? ;-)
I note that 7 Digital is a UK based company, away from the US Blockchain regulations, currently preventing US citizens from investing in the Blockchain. It is an "interesting" time to invest in a UK company with a no-deal Brexit potentially on the horizon, with possible share price drops and pound value falling
I note that 7 Digital is a UK based company, away from the US Blockchain regulations, currently preventing US citizens from investing in the Blockchain. It is an "interesting" time to invest in a UK company with a no-deal Brexit potentially on the horizon, with possible share price drops and pound value falling
You are assuming logic is involved in any eMusic business transaction? ;-)
As has "Cult Legends" which recently had 25 to 30 of the eMusic top 100! And "Red Bullett", home to Dutch 60s prog rock legends such as Supersister, Alquin and Focus. Those three bands being my best eMusic finds of 2019.
Lots of talk about what the last straw is for everyone, and the rate of attrition sure will make it hard to keep any list updated. I'd say there's still a lot of worthwhile stuff available, but I gather most everyone's patience is pretty worn.
I'm out at last, after 12 years or so. I'd say 80% of my saved list, already kind of marginal, was lost in the latest cull. I was due to renew tomorrow, and couldn't justify spending another dollar that could go to Bandcamp, etc. Pleasantly surprised to learn I still have access to my Library via my "free account"
I'm out at last, after 12 years or so. I'd say 80% of my saved list, already kind of marginal, was lost in the latest cull. I was due to renew tomorrow, and couldn't justify spending another dollar that could go to Bandcamp, etc. Pleasantly surprised to learn I still have access to my Library via my "free account"
I found that when I left most of my library, although suposedly there, contained just partial albums due to loss of liscence or something. I'd suggest you check that it's really there if you don't already have it backed up (I lost much of mine in a h/d failure).
EDIT #2 - Most of the below seems to have reappeared!
There's definitely a system issue connected to the search facility though - a search for Nomark gives one result but searching for the artist Two Fingers shows as a Nomark release.
Same for Caterina Barbieri releases...
A number of Bjork releases that were showing a few days ago appear to have gone (although may be available if searched-for directly rather than via artist).
Original post below.
====================
Alerted via a post on the subreddit forum: Merge have disappeared in the UK.
Also gone are: Moshi Moshi, Because Music, Smalltown Supersound, One Little Indian, Elefant Records, Important Records, Cassauna and Scarlett (and probably a few more)
Edit - Nomark and Notown too.
That took another half-dozen or so from my ever-reducing wish list, so I'm very close to bailing-out now...
Comments
It's as if my local supermarket stopped stocking food but assured me they had a new plan to support four asparagus farms in the next state, with three of them already signed up - it might well be a noble thing to do, and I might even be in favor of it, but for now it does not help me much with the groceries, so if I want to eat I'll be shopping elsewhere until the asparagus revolution is much further along.
Of course, these last two points might explain why they keep extending the deadline for their ICO instead of declaring it failed. They already have a bunch of money from people (have they spent it? that would be a very bad thing...) and would prefer not to have to refund it. If they can eventually reach their self-created $20M soft cap, they would declare their ICO "funded", everyone outside the US could start using the tokens, and eMusic could use the proceeds from the ICO as originally intended. I think the term "hot mess" might have been coined in anticipation of what eZombie has become. ;-)
'Change in the industry is inevitable': 7digital's saviour Tamir Koch on his blockchain vision for the biz
- Will it lead to eMusic having more labels back?
- If there is that amount of money around, why were eMusic's bills not paid?
Reading between the lines, the only reason they still exist is that they are sitting on some not-insignificant amount of money from early ICO participants that we know is less than $20M (the minimum for their ICO to fund), but probably still several million dollars. If they officially cancel the ICO, those funds have to be returned to investors. Presumably the money is in escrow somewhere, and not already being spent (which would create some serious legal problems). Continuing to hawk the blockchain project in hopes of getting to that $20M threshold is basically all that is left for eMusic. If they get there, they essentially get $20M for free without any obligation to actually deliver anything for it. (Buyer beware if you are thinking of investing in an ICO!) The minute they cancel the ICO, though, any funds already received go back to investors and they literally have nothing left of the (former) business they intentionally set afire and burned to the ground through negligence.
As for money being around, my impression from the articles about 7Digital is that Tamir Koch is investing his own money (and, yes, you could wonder aloud why he won't invest in his own company if he can invest in a dying 7Digital, but perhaps he IS actually investing in his own company, too, to keep the lights on - surely they are bleeding money badly on a month to month basis at this point, so someone somewhere must keep injecting cash to keep it alive). The words "dumpster fire" seem to frequently come to mind whenever thinking about the TriPlay era of eMusic...
- Bummer !