jamie hill🏴‍☠️Oct 30, 2023

fascinating (and gorgeous!) chart showing the evolution of recorded-music revenue over the last 50 years

the first thing that jumps out at me is how much smaller the overall pie is post-streaming. the streaming services and major labels have successfully managed a) to dramatically devalue recorded music and b) to put a much larger percentage of it directly into their own pockets. it's one of the single biggest upward transfers of wealth in history — from artists to billionaire corporations

Show threadDr Lisa EvansOct 30, 2023
@hilljam I'm wondering how much of the overall contraction in music sales during the cassette and mp3 eras are due to the easy availability of bootlegs/downloads.
Show threadjamie hill🏴‍☠️Oct 30, 2023
@lisae it did contract in the mp3 era for the reasons you surmise — but you can see in the chart that the cassette era accompanied the single biggest growth era in the history of the industry!
Show threadTMaibaum #FBPE #FBSI
@hilljam @lisae And that was the time the major labels were trying to convince people that "home-taping is killing music." In fact, the opposite has happened: Mixtapes circulating in schools and colleges brought artists to people's attention in the first place and motivated people who liked them to buy their official releases.
Oct 30, 2023 at 9:18amWeb
Show threadMael DuinOct 30, 2023

@maytree @hilljam @lisae

For an album release this guy made more money from a donation link on piracy sites than he did from Spotify

https://youtu.be/L7EHRpnJICQ?si=GhP_BA1IM6pGXhCZ

Can Software Piracy Be Justified?

YouTube
Show threadTMaibaum #FBPE #FBSIOct 30, 2023
@maelduin13 @hilljam @lisae Thanks, interesting example. But then he'll have made nowhere near the amount that major labels expect to make from Taylor Swift or any other big name on Spotify. But this guy is on Bandcamp, one of the few sites that might have had the potential to reduce parasitic middleman practices. Let's see how it fares now that it's been sold on for the second time within a year. #Enshittification ensues.