Vinyl.org - The Netflix Of Vinyl

Here's an interesting idea that's sort of a cross between a record club and Netflix, but it deals exclusively in vinyl. In fact, it calls itself the "Netflix of vinyl." It's called vnyl.org, and for $15 a month they'll send you a stack of vinyl records tailored to your tastes.

First you choose the category that you're interested in, and the service curates album choices for you and sends you a stack. If you choose to keep any of the records, it will cost you $8 to 12 each. If you don't want them, pre-paid envelopes are provided to send them back.

The site is in invite-only beta mode right now, and while it sounds like a great deal, expect for it to see a lot of scrutiny as an illegal rental model. If you take notice, any vinyl or CD rental services that have popped up in the past have been quickly beaten down for breaking copyright laws.

It's legal to try before you buy, but you can't rent with an option to buy, so just how vnyl.org plays this will have a lot to do with if it succeeds or not.

Still, any service that gets more vinyl into the hands of consumers can only be a good thing for artists, as long as it's legal. Check it out at vnyl.org (check the spelling - it's vinyl without the "i").

The Lie That Fuels The Music Industry’s Paranoia

We’ve heard it for a decade now. “We’re losing more than half of our music sales thanks to digital piracy,” says the music industrial complex. The problem is that the music industry has freaked itself out so continually over hyped-up numbers attributed to music piracy that it can’t tell the facts from the reality anymore. The truth of the matter is that while music piracy was a real live problem at one point in the past, today it’s just a distant memory.

Don’t believe me? Let me give you a couple of data points:

• A study released earlier this month by networking company Sandvine on Internet traffic trends found that peer to peer traffic is now below 10%, down from 31% five years ago and 60% eleven years ago. Less P2P traffic equals less piracy according to a report from Envisional.

• Meanwhile, a combination of Netflix and YouTube now account for more than 51% of all Internet traffic in North America. YouTube is now the go-to platform for consuming music for US teens according to Nielsen’s annual Music 360 report, with more than 64% of teens consuming their music that way.

Here’s the bottom line - people don’t pirate songs anymore because they don’t need to. They can get whatever they want for free online via YouTube or a streaming service like Spotify.

After all, what’s the point of clogging up your hard drive with songs that you rarely listen to when you can have access to literally millions more any time and any place you want, and a lot more conveniently too? And why try to steal a song from a Torrent when you’re not sure if what you’re downloading is the original song or if it’s encrypted, corrupted or spoofed? You can waste a lot of time just trying to find a usable song to listen to. Who needs that? Read more on Forbes.

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You should follow me on Twitter and Facebook for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Check out my Big Picture blog for discussion on common music, engineering and production tips and tricks.

BitTorrent Traffic Lowest In 10 Years

You haven't heard much from either the film or music industry about piracy lately, and that's because piracy is far less of a problem that it's been in some time. For music, that's because of the rise of streaming services, while for video, it's mostly due to NetFlix and YouTube.

While the decline of piracy was somewhat empirical until now, a new report from Sandvine shows that BitTorrent traffic has fallen to 7% of all Internet traffic, down 20% in the past 6 months alone. To put it into perspective, 10 years ago BitTorrent traffic accounted for 60% of total network traffic.

Meanwhile, video traffic is high, with NetFlix and YouTube accounting for 50% of today's Internet traffic.

Consumers embrace technology that make things more convenient for them. In music, subscribing to a streaming service or watching YouTube is far easier than pirating. With video, see your favorite movie or program on NetFlix or YouTube is easier than stealing it. In both cases, having access has a lot more benefits than owning.

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Help support this blog. Any purchases made through our Amazon links help support this website with no cost to you.

Follow me on Forbes for some insights on the new music business.

You should follow me on Twitter and Facebook for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Check out my Big Picture blog for discussion on common music, engineering and production tips and tricks.

Spotify Begins Original Music Series

Spotify may soon find itself under siege thanks to the introduction of iTunes Radio the other day, but an initial response might bring at least some music fans into the fold. Yesterday the streaming service launched an original documentary series called Spotify Landmark which will feature significant moments in music history, and is built along the lines of Behind The Music.

The first episode is "The Real Story of Nirvana's In Utero," and it debuts on the 20th anniversary of the album and a week before the album's deluxe reissue. The audio-only program features lots of behind the scenes stories from Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic, producer Steve Albini, Curt Kirkwood from The Meat Puppets (who toured with the band), and comedian Bobcat Goldthwait (who opened for the band).

The site doesn't require membership, but it does require that you sign in to Spotify to hear it. It launches the series of smaller clips that play sequentially.

One of the things that both smaller cable channels and Netflix discovered is that they can compete with the big guys if they have compelling original programming. Landmark probably won't cause a major shift to Spotify, but it's a start in their fight against Apple.