Friday, November 15, 2013
New technology has vastly impacted the music industry
In my final ePortfoliio I want to discuss the influences that new technologies have on the music industry. I want to focus on how legal products, such as iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, and other services have changed the ways that artists become recognized and make money. I also want to discuss the influences illegal technologies, such as pirating music, have changed the way an artist makes money and gets popularity. I intend to focus on how methods such as YouTube and pirating music can get an artists name out there, and vastly increase their popularity, while sometimes stripping the artist of money taken from album sales. I also want to discuss how paid services, like iTunes, have changed how the artist makes money when compared to older technology like CD's. I intend to compare and contrast how the newer technologies have altered the music industry, and compare the new technologies to older technologies. I also want to talk about how streaming services play a role in the industry. Streaming music have shifted some people from downloading music to only streaming it. It makes the music easily accessible and you don't have to permanently store it yourself. Previously, an artist would make a majority of their money from album sales, but the newer technological age has changed the way they they gain popularity, and how they make money. The music industry is forever changing. New mediums for distributing music constantly arise. It has gone from records, to cassettes, to CD's, to now digitally. I want to focus on how the newest medium, that is apparent in our day and age, have changed the way the industry functions.
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I certainly believe that discussing the music industry and illegal downloading is a "doable" idea. I would love to see which of the legal products lead the market today, as well as statistics regarding the number of people today who illegally download music. Any statistics regarding the effects of downloading music illegally would certainly benefit this final project. As for potential interviewees, I believe the student body here at Maryland provides a target audience for the music industry today; interviewing a handful of students (or, perhaps, using an online survey to increase the number of participants) could provide strong information. The major 'pro' of this final project idea is that there should be plentiful information on the internet regarding music downloads, and the impact of illegal downloads on the music industry today and into the future. A 'con' I would mention is that I am unsure exactly what this idea centers around. I understand that this final project will involve a discussion of the music industry, but am wondering whether this will center around products such as iTunes and their growth, or illegally downloading music and the impact that has. While both can be discussed, I would love to know what the overall thesis of this final project would be. The audio clip makes clear that the digital age will be the background for this final project, although there may be too many focuses to develop a thesis around.
ReplyDeleteI definitely believe that the topic of the music industry and technology is "doable." There are lots of possible angles you could focus on here. You could look at the evolution of technologies in the industry, the financial and other impacts on the artists and the industry as a whole, or even what potential responses from artists to this technology will be. This is where I had a question though. You slightly touch on a number of different topics here but jump around a bit. I think you should pick one aspect of this large topic to focus in on. Attempting to look at technology and the music industry as a whole may be too much for this project.
ReplyDeleteI personally am a huge music fan and am interested to see some of the information you come up with here. I think it would be interesting to see how people currently take in their music. I have my own preferences (I just bought a CD the other day) but am interested to see what the general public does. In my sophomore year here I took a "History of Popular Music" class here at UMD and was thinking that the professor there or a professor in the music department could be a good resource to interview. They are obviously an expert at the topic and also keep in touch with how students are acting.
The overall best thing about this topic is it's broad appeal and interesting nature. Many people are interested in music in some way and would be interested to see more about your research. The two cons that I see with it are the lack of focus, as mentioned above, and the fact that this topic is so widely discussed you need to make sure you are offering a fresh perspective rather than just restating the facts that are already out there.
I thought the audio narration of the topic was good. You spoke clearly and slowly enough to follow what you were saying. The tone was conversational and did a good job of summarizing the overall idea.