BMG entertainment Essay Example for Free

BMG entertainment EssayStrengths*First major record label to ca-ca websites branded towards different unison genres.First major record label to use downloading technology to promote sales of CDs and cassettes.*Merged with AOLAOL has the largest internet service provider in the industry.*BMG was the largest music club in the world, and arguably the leader of the v major labels.*BMG set up a series of websites dedicated to specific genres of music. These sites linked fans to the artists websites, where they could download or purchase CDs. (Another innovative move from BMG)Weaknesses* Through sites similar CDNow and Amazon.com customers had the option of having CDs or cassettes mailed to them. Consumers may not want to deal with downloading music from the net. They may just stick with what they have. Many sites had misappropriated downloads, so the formulaic consumer may not want to bother with this new type of technology.* Although BMG was the first company to create brande d websites for specific music genres, they only focuse on promotional aspects here, rather than foc exploitation on selling music and in turn making money.Opportunities* The innovativeness and newness of the digital era could spark a surge ofconsumer take in the music industry. For instance, the CD had a big impact on industry revenue owners of tapes simply replaced their collections with CDs.* BMG is arguably the leader in the music industry, and because has the influence to take its existing customers with them into the digital mp3 era.* BMG had close relationships with all the players winding in setting tech standards for downloadable music. This could give BMG the heads up on newest technology, and an advantage for food market entry.* If BMG begins to sell music on the internet, they can reduce their costs greatly by doing away with distribution and manufacturing expenses.Threats* -In 1929 the new technology of radio posed a serious threat to the music industry. Could a simi lar event take place with Digital music, where BMG loses a lot of money due to a diminish in CD and cassette sales?* -Time Warner had one of the most advanced cable systems in the US. They were experimenting with services such as video on demand and HD TV so the possibility of digital music was definitely there for TW, and they had the internet resources to distribute it too.* -Would conventional music buyers want to go through the hassle of link a website, installing a media player, and then buying additional softwargon to play the music at their convenience?* -With a 56K modem (one that many still used 7 years ago), a song took roughly 7 minutes to download. Ten songs can take 70 minutes, and that is not appealing or persuade enough for conventional consumers to switch over to mp3s usage.* -Sonys Kiosks in retail music stores posed a threat for BMG. These kiosksallowed customers to choose from a variety of over 4,000 songs, and create their own CD within 15 minutes.Attacking Pi racy at the Source- the CDsIn order to attack piracy, record labels must start at the source. close to all of the music traded on the Internet originally comes from CDs, which can be easily copied, or ripped, onto any computer as MP3 digital audio files. closely analysts point to CDs as the biggest hole in the music industrys strategy for aiding online piracy. The recording industry wants to make it harder for consumers to directly copy CDs, but it faces enormous hurdles. First, any barriers to copy must be backwards compatiblemeaning the new technologies would have to work on old CD players that dont screen for pirated material, and vice versa.Eventually, the group SDMI was formed, consisting of all the major players involved in setting the technological standards for downloading music.(ATT, Microsoft, Liquid Audio, IBM, etc) SDMIs efforts have focused on installing digital watermarks on CD tracks that would enable copyright holders to trace illegal copies and to create devices t hat would refuse to play copied tracks. In its first phase, SDMI selected a watermark system created by Verance Technologies as the global standard.Future record releases for BMG- Copy Management.It is the mark labels responsibility to protect the work of their artists. Copy management technology is one of several responses to illegal file sharing and mass copying, which has had a detrimental notion on the music industry (unit shipments have fallen 26% from 1.16 billion units in 1999 to 860 million units last year).There are a few features that are new to this type of technologyDevice playability- These discs play just like an enhanced CD. Certain products recently tested had playability issues with DVD players, carstereos and game consoles, merely these discs play on nearly all DVD players, car stereos, etc. Anywhere an enhanced CD will play, these discs will play.Mac playability The discs can in a flash be played on a Mac like any other CD.Voluntary Collective Licensing- Musi c Industry and the InternetMany discharge Labels have spent countless amounts of time evaluating alternatives that would pay artists while making file sharing legal. One solution that has emerged as the favorite is voluntary joint licensing. The concept is simple the music industry forms a collecting society which then offers file-sharing music fans the opportunity to get legit in exchange for a average regular payment, for example $5 per month.So long as they pay, the fans are free to keep doing what they are going to do anywayshare the music they love using whatever software they like on whatever computer platform they preferwithout fear of lawsuits. The money collected gets divided among rights-holders based on the popularity of their music. In exchange, file-sharing music fans would be free to download whatever they like using whatever software works best for them. The more people share, the more money goes to rights-holders.