Vevo’s Eric Mackay told audiences at The Great Escape this morning that music rightsholders should take risks on new technologies or risk falling behind the media revolution.
Talking at a PRS for Music hosted panel discussion entitled ‘Goodbye idiot box, hello smart TV’, he said that new TV and internet technologies are allowing businesses to do things they haven’t tried before, which could bring new audiences and revenues for songwriters.
‘In music, you don’t open the door in the morning and see millions of pounds – it’s not the 90s anymore! We need to experiment,’ he urged.
With a recent Nielsen report showing that 70 percent of women and 60 percent of men now email, use social networks or surf the web while watching TV, tech companies are looking to capitalise on the trend while music companies are beginning to connect with these audiences.
Helena Kosinski from Nielsen noted that consumers are moving towards a streaming model to access music over all the TVs, computers and devices they have in their homes, rather than purchasing single downloads that are limited to one machine. ‘It’s all about ease of access. It will become less important to make purchase decisions and just making a decision to spend money on music full stop for all their devices.’
However Mackay said that one of the criticisms of the streaming model is that it doesn’t generate much money for the songwriter. With smart TVs, businesses can more effectively promote the music that’s being used on adverts and programmes to generate album sales, via links with iTunes and other online stores.
Also on the panel was James Cooper, from Sony ATV, who added: ‘Everyone else is making money out of all these new platforms like Spotify, but for me the idea of someone watching an advert and it signposting who you’re listening to and how you can buy it, then that’s great. But there is no business model in gratis. People are still going out and buying the Adele album. If we can make sure that still happens, then it’s a positive thing.’
Talking at a PRS for Music hosted panel discussion entitled ‘Goodbye idiot box, hello smart TV’, he said that new TV and internet technologies are allowing businesses to do things they haven’t tried before, which could bring new audiences and revenues for songwriters.
‘In music, you don’t open the door in the morning and see millions of pounds – it’s not the 90s anymore! We need to experiment,’ he urged.
With a recent Nielsen report showing that 70 percent of women and 60 percent of men now email, use social networks or surf the web while watching TV, tech companies are looking to capitalise on the trend while music companies are beginning to connect with these audiences.
Helena Kosinski from Nielsen noted that consumers are moving towards a streaming model to access music over all the TVs, computers and devices they have in their homes, rather than purchasing single downloads that are limited to one machine. ‘It’s all about ease of access. It will become less important to make purchase decisions and just making a decision to spend money on music full stop for all their devices.’
However Mackay said that one of the criticisms of the streaming model is that it doesn’t generate much money for the songwriter. With smart TVs, businesses can more effectively promote the music that’s being used on adverts and programmes to generate album sales, via links with iTunes and other online stores.
Also on the panel was James Cooper, from Sony ATV, who added: ‘Everyone else is making money out of all these new platforms like Spotify, but for me the idea of someone watching an advert and it signposting who you’re listening to and how you can buy it, then that’s great. But there is no business model in gratis. People are still going out and buying the Adele album. If we can make sure that still happens, then it’s a positive thing.’
