“Of course, consumers won”
“We used to fool ourselves,’ [Edgar Bronfman, CEO of Warner Music] said. “We used to think our content was perfect just exactly as it was. We expected our business would remain blissfully unaffected even as the world of interactivity, constant connection and file sharing was exploding. And of course we were wrong. How were we wrong? By standing still or moving at a glacial pace, we inadvertently went to war with consumers by denying them what they wanted and could otherwise find and as a result of course, consumers won.“
Link
If I am working for Warner Music I wait 6 more months before printing my resignation letter, just in case this is finally the definite sign that this industry is waking up. The “inadvertently”part is a bit too much, not sure how you can sue hundreds of people without noticing but hey, at least the process started.
December 28th, 2007 at 10:46 am
the topic instantly reminded me of xavier comtesse’s speach at Lift 06 … the concrete outcome in relation to Edgar Bronfman’s confession is that, the “consumer-actor” has to be seriously recognized as an active key player in the value chain, especially in the realms of web 2.0 applications and its interacting computing and mobile devices…I’m also curious of why or how, big corporations-with their great amount of capital/resources-have a hard time to adapt to certain market conditions(any recommendations of written source to read?)…
p2p file sharing is not something that is just new, but a web-application that has been gradually & rapidly evolving since the first days of nabster…maybe some consulting is needed for these firms.
December 29th, 2007 at 4:15 am
Why do you say “maybe” ;) These guys need a hard wake up call, and now they see their sales dislocate they finally start listening.
December 29th, 2007 at 5:34 pm
Good catch on that quote Laurent. The big question now is when is when are the television and movie producers going to wake up as well? As the American MPAA is “inadertently” going to war with consumers around the world (and warping copywrite policy while they are at it) while still no major studios offer downloadable DRM-free alternatives.
Will the Walmart failure be a wakeup call to that industry? I dunno.
I just posted on the Warner story here: http://www.thomaspurves.com/2007/12/28/and-then-there-was-one-warner-music-drops-drm/
January 3rd, 2008 at 9:40 am
I definitely agree…TA for your response & TA to Thomas for his post.
happy new years & wish you a prosperous Lift 08