Print is Dead: Books in Our Digital Age

The New York Times on Monday had an article entitled “Plunge in CD Sales Shakes Up Big Labels,” talking about how the continued dip in the music industry is rearranging the landscape of music, and there doesn’t seem to be an end in sight: “Despite costly efforts to build buzz around new talent and thwart piracy, CD sales have plunged more than 20 percent this year, far outweighing any gains made by digital sales at iTunes and similar services.”

The article also shows that even the genres that used to sell well, are now in trouble: “Sales of rap, which had provided the industry with a lifeboat in recent years, fell far more than the overall market last year with a drop of almost 21 percent, according to Nielsen SoundScan.”

Also mentioned is that the industry, desperately seeking some revenue, is willing more than ever to peel back the DRM restrictions that have hindered digital sales. But others aren’t sure if even this is the answer: “Some music executives say that dropping copy-restriction software, also known as digital-rights management, would stoke business at iTunes’ competitors and generate a surge in sales. Others predict it would have little impact, though they add that the labels squandered years on failed attempts to restrict digital music instead of converting more fans into paying consumers.”

Idolator, the irreverent music blog, reporting on the same article had a, well, irreverent take on this. Yet I thought that their sarcasm had more than a little truth to it:

“Here’s another way to weather the storm, and while we’ve said this before, it bears repeating: Everyone in the industry has to get used to making less money. That goes from the execs at the top all the way down to the EAs at Rolling Stone. You can’t live like it’s 1985 anymore, with those Rumours and Thriller accounting statements coming over the Telex, and with the only competition for young kids’ dollars being the Pac-Man machine down the street. If everyone could get used to this concept, maybe there’d be less panicking about lower physical-CD sales and piracy, and more emphasis on A&R and talent.”

While publishing is not yet in a comparable situation in terms of sales, books now have much more competition than they used to. And I also think that how stubborn the record industry has been — and how badly this attitude has served them — should be an example to us in publishing because we’re going to have to, at some point, similarly change. We need to be ready to change not just ourselves, our products, and our various business models, but we also need to change our expectations. And, in a way, that might be the most difficult thing of all.

NY Times: Plunge in CD Sales Shakes Up Big Labels