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Re: Why did downloading help kill the industry? Here's why.......
In the December issue of Wired, Seth Mnookin sits down with Universal Music Group CEO/supervillain Doug Morris for a pretty excellent profile (which is, tragically, not yet online). In it, Mnookin paints the 68-year old Morris as a crotchety executive who's upset that he can't focus more on simple product and artist development because he's too busy worrying about iPods, MP3s, and his company's digital strategy (which was never really supposed to be part of his job description when he took the gig in 1995). In a way, he almost comes off as cute, like if your grandfather were accidentally hired to run Google (at one point, Morris hilariously compares his embattled industry to a character in "Li'l Abner," a comic strip that stopped running in 1977).
As for his actual digital strategy, it's pretty much what we expected '” Morris's singular goal these days is to limit the power of Steve Jobs and iTunes. He puts most of his energy into designing Universal's own Internet music store (Total Music, which is definitely doomed to fail), cutting deals with Apple competitor Microsoft for a piece of those massive Zune profits, and heroically doing all he can to make it even more difficult for consumers to justify paying for music online. But then he says something so ridiculous it sort of blows our minds.
When Morris is asked why the music business didn't work harder, in the early days of file-sharing, to build its own (legal) online presence, there's this exchange:
"There's no one in the record industry that's a technologist," Morris explains. "That's a misconception writers make all the time, that the record industry missed this. They didn't. They just didn't know what to do. It's like if you were suddenly asked to operate on your dog to remove his kidney. What would you do?"
Personally, I would hire a vet. But to Morris, even that wasn't an option. "We didn't know who to hire," he says, becoming more agitated. "I wouldn't be able to recognize a good technology person '” anyone with a good bullshit story would have gotten past me."
Even though we shouldn't be, we're actually a little shocked. We'd always assumed the labels had met with a team of technology experts in the late nineties and ignored their advice, but it turns out they never even got that far '” they didn't even try! Understanding the Internet certainly isn't easy '” especially for an industry run by a bunch of technology-averse sexagenarians '” but it's definitely not impossible. The original Napster hit its peak in 1999 '” kids born since then have hacked into CIA computers. Surely it wouldn't have taken someone at Universal more than a month or two to learn enough about the Internet to know who to call to answer a few questions. They didn't even have any geeky interns? We give this industry six months to live.
source: NY magazine
Re: Why did downloading help kill the industry? Here's why.......
My jaw hit the floor when I read this. I seriously cannot believe they were that clueless when net dowloading was in its infancy. Talk about being asleep at the wheel. What were they thinking? That one day it would all just go away and things would be back to normal?? Dear Lord.
What makes it even worse is they still have no solutions and are also continuing to blame consumers. One mistake is going after/competing with Itunes. Not gonna work, so don't even bother wasting your money.
Also, they are STILL blind to the fact that besides downloading, CD prices and the death of music store culture have also played a role in this disaster, both issues they had complete control over.
I no longer pity the industry anymore. In fact, it needs to suffer a total collapse, and then maybe someone with a brain can pick up the pieces and bridge the gap between the stone age and the digital age.
Re: Why did downloading help kill the industry? Here's why.......
Wow. 
Thanks for posting this James!
I was pretty shocked reading this too. Definitely not a very flattering image of this guy. I can sort of understand a bunch of old guys not understanding and keeping up with the new technology, but as the guy writes here, "They didn't even have any geeky interns?"
That whole thing about not knowing what to do or who to consult with...amazing. At that point, hiring any even slightly technology-savvy college grad would've been a better idea, but what did they do, just stick their heads in the sand?!
Honest question here, but what's it like back in the US these days? I heard that Tower Records went under a while back, but is that the trend? Are music stores disappearing all over? Here it seems like downloading music (legal or otherwise) has not caught on that much yet (neither has the internet in general for that matter), so there are plenty of music stores and shops that sell new & used CDs, including Tower Records Japan which seems to be doing quite well still. And this is a country where CDs cost 2-3 times as much as they do in the US.
How does the average American think about downloading vs. purchasing? I mean, has it got to the point that it seems weird if someone actually went out and bought a CD rather than downloading it? I wonder what it's like in other parts of the world.
Re: Why did downloading help kill the industry? Here's why.......
Dreamline, there is ONE record store in the entire central valley. Back in the heyday, they were everywhere. The only reason that record store stays in business is because they also sell various collectibles. Everything else is Walmart, Best Buy, Circuit City, and Target.
Downloading is the norm here. At the old site, I mentioned how when I bought Kala there were only a couple people browsing the cd section at Best Buy. Nobody cares about cds anymore. Why buy a 10-20 buck cd when you can either download for free or for a small price? Also, when you go near a section with these insanely priced cds, you see stacks of cd-rs on sale for 5 bucks.
The industry itself knows its collapsing. There's nothing that can stop it now. Its just a question of when will it completely sink.
The film industry is suffering from downloading as well, but not nearly on a massive scale like the music biz. The film industry knows that a large portion of the public enjoys the film experience at the theater, and downloads can never take away from that because it doesn't provide the same experience.
Now if the film industry killed off theaters like the music biz killed off the record store culture, then they would have a serious problem.
