” The end of the second world war brought a variety of new products that vastly changed the world’s media scape and how they consumed popular culture, this included televisions that posed as equal as a threat to the music business as radio had decades before. Like the response to the radio, record companies initially resisted the threat but then gathered a substantial amount of revenue due to social and technological changes. A major change that came from this transition period was rock’n’roll music and quickly it took over the entire recording industry. The post-war era saw major technological developments coming from various broadcasters and recording companies as networks such as Columbia Broadcasting Services (CBS) started to experiment with microgroove technology as a way to improve sound quality and help the storage and preservation of records.
This is where the vinyl LP came into play as a new form of technology to record and distribute popular music. Soon after, CBS’s 33 rpm LP came into competition with RCA’s 45 rpm LP’s as popular music was decidedly placed onto the latter while classical music on the former. With vinyl LP’s one could now record 70 minutes worth of music and as a result, entire albums instead of singles were being released. ”
“ Considering the various technological advances that has transformed the music world, it is difficult to say what lies ahead for the current recording industry. If we have learnt anything, it is that the relationship between technology and the music industry is very cyclical in where you see periods of high consolidation and high profits as well as periods of crisis through either technology or other social effects that challenge the dominance of the industry and its tight control over music. If history were to tell us the future, one could say that the major record labels will always find a way to profit of new and improved technologies that threaten their economic performance. Every time they have run into a crisis, whether it be with radio, cassette tapes or an mp3, they have found ways to make money off of it. However, within our digital era of mp3’s it has been over a decade since file sharing has come about and consumers are still able to download entire discographies as well as movies and television shows for free. The music industry has exhausted its efforts in trying to reign in digital distribution but it seems that technology has out run them.
Personal computers are in the ownership of so many people around the world that is has almost become a staple in people’s lives, there is no way to effectively stop every single person from uploading a CD onto their computer and sharing it with millions of people. If I were to forecast the future of the recording industry I would say that even more smaller independent labels will be created with the aid and easy access to computers and new media. One does not need a major label to create and develop a musician, an artists can do these tasks themselves if they desired. This fact has become apparent to many consumers and musicians a like and as a result, we have seen artists creating their own record labels. As for the consumer, file sharing and digital distribution will continue and consumers will be able to download music for free and computers become more complex and increase their capacity for various tasks. The future does not look promising for the traditional music industry, and all of these factors undoubtedly will take away from a record industries profits, but like before, major labels with major power will always find ways to continue to adapt and transform itself to match the way of society. “
Various sections of an assignment / article I wrote about technology and its powerful transformations of the music industry.
(Written March 2010 - Alex LeRose)
(Photo Courtesy of www.esdmusic.com)
