Following a recommendation by Vince Millet on his Secret Archives of the Vatican blog, I’ve been reading Andrew Dubber’s e-Book: Music In The Digital Age.
It’s a follow on from a piece he wrote in 2007, called 20 Things You Must Know About Music Online and is quite thought provoking.
He talks about the 5 ages of media: Oral, Scribal, Print, Electric & Digital. He argies that in all of these ages we’ve been looking at the future in reverse as if through a rear view mirror. We see where we’ve come from, not where we are or where we’re going to.
Two comments struck me as important conclusions and I want to focus on these:
- Opinion Leaders Rule – there are some key “tastemakers” in the digital age. Although I’d like to think that my podcasts and this netlabel are striving to be “tastemakers”, Dubber does go on to mention that in the digital age, everyone is an influencer.
- To make a difference in the digital media age, we must stop making electric age media (e.g. records) and make digital age media: make conversations.
So here’s the challenge: Should Angel Dust Records continue to focus on my role as “tastemaker”, providing you with music that I believe should reach a wider audience or should you be more involved? Should the releases that come out here be part of a conversation?
If I accept the challenge to be be influenced by you, will you engage in that conversation and be that influencer?
Please drop me a comment here, send me an email at angeldustrecords@gmail.com, via Facebook, Google+ or Twitter
My initial response to this challenge would be that as a netlabel you should release the works that you want to release and stick to being a “tastemaker”.
Having not read the eBook yet I’m not entirely sure what a “conversation” would be but my guess would be that it’s the people conversing about new music. If I’m correct it would be safe to say that your releases would be part of the conversations had by others.
I imagine some sort of unwritten hierarchy where labels and distribution methods exist so that others can discuss and influence others by recommendation.
By relying on others to converse, discuss and create the releases that are put out I fear that the label would lose sight of it’s own end goal.
However, I haven’t yet read the eBook and my opinion is subject to change.
Thanks Tom,
I suppose what Andrew Dubber is trying to say that the artist and the label must also be part of the conversation, in order to fully engage in the digital media age. It doesn’t stop with the production of music artifacts. The conversations begin before these artifacts are created and continue after they’ve been released. The conversation is itself a new artifact.
Another way of saying this is: I’d like to hear about more artists from the people that like this netlabel. I’ve already had artists recommend other artists, but I want to further engage with the listsners and hear their recommendations.
Thanks for kicking off the discussion!
As you’ll have seen, Pete, we’ve initially tried to take the conversation concept literally and asked people what they would like from the band and label this year. You were the only person to reply seriously. Anyway – the concept is right. In your case, yes, you should be a tastemaker and a filter, through your label and through your podcasts. However, in the digital economy the information flows both ways – so maybe hearing from listeners and downloaders might play a role in deciding your direction. What do they like? How often do they want releases? It might not be a literal conversation but the fact that they communicate with you either directly or indirectly through stats etc means there’s more going on than just you deciding randomly what to release.
Dubber’s book requires some thinking through but I found it inspirational.