Radiohead: Artists often screwed by digital downloads

In news that should surprise no one, big labels are signing artists to contracts that strip or severely limit their ability to earn money via digital downloads (those things that are changing the music marketplace). It’s often said that labels don’t understand the new digital market, but it appears they do. Maybe a little too well, as they negotiate deals where artists actually make even less money via digital copies than actual CDs (despite the relatively non-existent distribution costs (no packaging, shipping, printing, etc etc). Keep in mind that it’s become common wisdom that artists earn next to nothing per CD (approx 10-15% of the sticker price if they’re lucky).

I guess the money for their bloated salaries has to come from somewhere. As usual, the actual artist (content generator) takes it in the ass as corporate parasites rake in the billions. God bless America.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 2nd, 2008 at 9:08 pm and is filed under mp3, Ripoff, Radiohead, Corporate Hijinx. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.