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@Art
it’s just a joke really. There’s like $1.80 profit on a sale (talk about a bad deal for the content provider).
If you want one for yourself you can open an account at zazzle.com and paste the text into a t-shirt and order it, super easy.I was hoping the irony would come across. that I could make a t-shirt and have it on sale in about 30 seconds while people in this thread are complaining about composers using plugins and loops to create music.
Again, it is a new world out there.
What I don’t understand is selling music for $15 a track. $89 is a hell of a lot better than $15. 10 to 20 years ago no one ever had a problem paying $250 for a needle drop track for a corporate business video or low budget spot. I know this because I was a buyer and I was happy to pay $250 and i understood why i had to pay $250. Are economic times really that dire right now that businesses can only afford tracks for $5, $10, $15??? What a joke!
Glen, I’m not sure it’s a matter of times being dire. 30 years ago I was getting $100 to $200 per minute to score corporate films. Music was a percentage of the budget. Corporate films had budgets of $1,000+ per minute. In the 50’s they were shot on 35 mm film, like features. Then, they were shot on 16 mm film, then video (beta). Now, I’m sure someone is shooting corporate images with an iPhone. Technology and priorities have changed. Music is not a high priority in the budget. One of my corporate clients who produces annual meetings now uses music from a CD that he bought…200 cues for $200, because the company reduced his budget!
Like, I said the answer to your question is supply and demand mixed with want/need and priorities. It’s not whether or not companies can afford more than $15 per cue, it’s whether they think music is worth more than $15 per cue. In some cases, and for some uses, clearly they do not.
A friend once said that “you know you’re getting old when you spend more time looking back than forward.” (I see another Tee-shirt coming).
It’s a cliche, but then was then and now is now._Michael
I was hoping the irony would come across. that I could make a t-shirt and have it on sale in about 30 seconds while people in this thread are complaining about composers using plugins and loops to create music.
You know Mark, back in the day, you could get $100 to silk-screen a custom T-shirt like that, and it only took a week.
What irony?
“One of my corporate clients who produces annual meetings now uses music from a CD that he bought 200 cues for $200, because the company reduced his budget! ”
The only reason he bought the disc was because some moronic idiot created the product and offered the product at this ridiculously low price. JUST STOP DOING IT.
If airlines can do it (raise prices, charge for bags, not give us a soda, make us buy the soda, and pack us all on a plane like sardines)…so can composers. We can get more for our works simply by asking for it. I’m a believer in my own philosophy. Checkin’ out guys…It’s been fun…I’m getting back to my work for hire where I am being paid $1000 a track for 26 tracks. (The client said why not $450?…I said sorry…this is my price) I still got the contract.
If I may be so bold, I think that most of the points on all sides of this are valid, just often expressed so passionately that they evoke equally passionate and misunderstood responses.
We would all do better to value rhetorical skill as much as compositional skill and not use the same tired “loops and beats” in discussion. We all went to school for that right?
Glen, when you use the word “slave” you can see how easy it is for MichaelL to use that exaggeration against you when he says, “TV execs and library owners are not sitting in board rooms trying to figure out ways to make ‘slaves’ out of composers.”
The truth is that library owners, like all other business people, do sit around and have meetings. Businesses have meetings to help further their business goals. They are not trying to make slaves out of anyone, but every decision a business makes affects something or someone. Some win, some lose.
My heart is with Glen, but I know the realities of the world we live in now.
MichaelL is right when he says, very simply, that it is supply and demand. I also think that what I said earlier in this thread about the “demand” for exclusivity being somewhat of a cover for libraries to acquire the free assets of composers is also valid. I didn’t say that they were enslaving anyone – just that they made a logical business decision that almost hard for them NOT to make.
Be logical. Imagine yourself on the other side. Think about motive. It’s not hard. Then you can act, or react, accordingly. If you are not doing that then you are thinking about your situation in a vacuum, and something like asking every composer in the world to set a minimum price, however noble, or even desirable that is, starts to actually make sense to you.
To all future library composers,wannabes, hobbyists and amateurs(especially those using loops) the library buisness is now closed. There are too many of you, making too much music (most of which lacks artistic merit). Please stop and go away, because you are causing the value of my labor (I use the term loosly) to go down.
In the words of Kramer… “I’m out!” 😀 🙂 😉
it’s just a joke really.
Oh, I got that. The irony was not lost. 😉
Crikey I go out for coffee and come back and there’s t-shirts already.
There is another simple point to be made here, if it were possible to charge $99 min per track, do you not think that the libraries would jump on it, they make more money too.
Also lets not forget each RF library has a different client base, I have sold tracks on Music Loops that have not had traction anywhere else and vice versa. Its an intriguing business to analyze. You have to trust that each library owner knows their business and clients.
10-20 years ago in Ireland (very small territory ) it was possible to get $10-20 k per 30 sec track for a commercial. Exclusive buyout on the track fro 3 years. You are now talking in single figure percentages of that figure.
At that time they were still shooting on 35 mm film etc and budgets could be 500k + easily for the whole commercial. That world is long gone, trust me.Checkin’ out guys…It’s been fun…I’m getting back to my work for hire where I am being paid $1000 a track for 26 tracks. (The client said why not $450?…I said sorry…this is my price) I still got the contract.
Well, why didn’t you say that from the start? Then, we would have understood your message clearly. 😉
Thanks for the lively debate Glen, it was fun. Best wishes and continued success with your music.
-MarkI live in Nashville TN and when you talk to guys in the music business they say it is becoming a pennies game – BUT – if you add up enough pennies it turns into real money.
For most people, myself included, volume is the only way to make decent money. Some are fortunate to make decent money with only a few songs. But most of the successful people I have encountered have released hundreds of songs to make decent money from their music.
@House: Yep, lived in Nashville (actually Kingston Springs) for almost 7 years and heard that story. I’ve always maintained that it’s best to have as many income streams as possible. If one, or some, go away it doesn’t hurt as much.
Going back aways on the thread, the notion that one could get all composers to adopt minimum standards, unionize, etc. just isn’t realistic. There will always be someone hungry enough to sell their product for less, especially when there are so many people out their who can readily make music (leaving out any quality qualifiers) at home.
Yes, I agree that we should be careful what we do– we shouldn’t give away writer’s share, sell tracks too cheaply on RF sites, etc. But for every one of us that sets limits, there will be another who doesn’t.
Oh, and I disagree that for music to be high quality, only live instruments should be used. That’s ridiculous. There are tons of excellent pieces of music out there earning good money in respectable outlets (network TV, feature films, etc.) that use virtual instruments, samples, etc. It comes down to the skill and talent of the person employing those tools.
Going back aways on the thread, the notion that one could get all composers to adopt minimum standards, unionize, etc. just isn’t realistic. There will always be someone hungry enough to sell their product for less, especially when there are so many people out their who can readily make music (leaving out any quality qualifiers) at home
One obvious point that gets overlooked: library music is a global enterprise. There are places in the world where $15 (USD) is a lot of money. Just consider the monthly wage for garment workers, Bangladesh $38 per month, Cambodia $61 per month and China $150 per month. If someone living under those conditions could manage to save enough money for a laptop and garage band, who is actually going to tell then to not sell their music for $15, or that they must use real instruments? Perhaps Bangladesh and Cambodia are extreme examples, but a quick look at the composer list on a site, like Audiosparx, reveals many composers from places where $15 goes a long way.
In other words, like every other industry, we face competition from parts of the world where “labor” costs a fraction of what it does in more “developed” nations.
So, while it’s wonderful that union workers in the US can just demand higher wages (that doesn’t work out all the time), there are many places where composers aren’t likely to “just say no.”
Sounds melodramatic, but that’s the reality of the internet. I have a friend who posted an offer to have his logo designed for $150. He got designs from all over the world, including India (I think that’s where he got the logo). He had his pick…for $150!
We’re in the same boat.
_Michael
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