Is it really worth buying CDs?

[MrGongGong]

Before we had the convenience of remote control we used to go on a little walk to change TV channels, turn over the Lp or re-lace the Revox
so i'm interested in what things people have done with the time they have saved by not having to do these things ?
for example, how many people have used the time saved to learn another language ? improve their piano playing ? master the art of the souffle ?

I have central heating
but
we also have a woodburning stove
it's a pain in the arse in some ways when one could just flick the switch
but it is one of the best things we have bought
the kettle sits on it all day
I light it in the morning and it ticks over
I even get a bit of exercise chopping wood .................and it's great to put the sourdough in front of for a long slow rise
and i've been drying chillies over it

[Thropplenoggin]

Surely Thropplenoggin's use of the phrase was as self-criticism for his or her crass error in counter-posing 'digital' to 'CD'? Every schoolboy knows that CD is a digital technology.

Well spotted! Apologies to all for any misunderstanding!

[teamsaint]

I don't trust the long term availability ,(or free access ) to the internet.

I am happy to use spotify etc, but if its a piece I really want i buy it.

I would urge great caution in trusting solely to things that are well outside our control...governments LOVE control, especially those who are in favour of de centralisation like this one..apparently..

[Chris Watson]

Lots of lovely nerdy comments here but I notice that nobody seems to have spared a thought for the many people who devote their working lives to performing on/engineering/editing etc the recordings that you enjoy so much. A composer friend of mine Tweeted yesterday that 21 streamings of an 8 minute piece on Spotify generated 1p in royalties, and I've had similar comments from a friend who owns a highly respected recording company. The debate about CD over high def downloads (such as those offered by Gimell) is an interesting one, and if you've got the right equipment you can end up with better than CD quality, but if you just decide to stream because you can't be bothered to pay very much then I fear it won't be long before programs like CD review have few new releases to play every week.

[teamsaint]

Lots of lovely nerdy comments here but I notice that nobody seems to have spared a thought for the many people who devote their working lives to performing on/engineering/editing etc the recordings that you enjoy so much. A composer friend of mine Tweeted yesterday that 21 streamings of an 8 minute piece on Spotify generated 1p in royalties, and I've had similar comments from a friend who owns a highly respected recording company. The debate about CD over high def downloads (such as those offered by Gimell) is an interesting one, and if you've got the right equipment you can end up with better than CD quality, but if you just decide to stream because you can't be bothered to pay very much then I fear it won't be long before programs like CD review have few new releases to play every week.

So why on earth would music companies license spotify etc then? I can guess some of the reasons...perhaps it's because there isn't much money in some of the backlist anyway, so they may as well use it as advertising.

Book publishers get lots of complaints about pricing their digital "product" but in the end they have to make a commercial decision, and rely on making money on brand new product.

FWIW, probably not much, I am of the opinion that most suppliers of digital content have a long term problem, which is that as long as the total amount of "product" keeps increasing, the value drops. Take the inevitable Beethoven Symphonies. If you want a specific new release, then there is a premium, but as we have seen on this board, prices in general just fall and fall, including in CD digital format. There are probably more versions of this body of work available than ever, so very basic supply and demand dictates the outcome.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I am pessimistic over the future of recordings. So many labels and a classical market that appears to be contracting.

[jayne lee wilson]

Before we had the convenience of remote control we used to go on a little walk to change TV channels, turn over the Lp or re-lace the Revox
so i'm interested in what things people have done with the time they have saved by not having to do these things ?
for example, how many people have used the time saved to learn another language ? improve their piano playing ? master the art of the souffle ?

I have central heating
but
we also have a woodburning stove
it's a pain in the arse in some ways when one could just flick the switch
but it is one of the best things we have bought
the kettle sits on it all day
I light it in the morning and it ticks over
I even get a bit of exercise chopping wood .................and it's great to put the sourdough in front of for a long slow rise
and i've been drying chillies over it

Lovely poem, GG... would a certain WCW be in the background somewhere...?

[Dave2002]

Lots of lovely nerdy comments here but I notice that nobody seems to have spared a thought for the many people who devote their working lives to performing on/engineering/editing etc the recordings that you enjoy so much. A composer friend of mine Tweeted yesterday that 21 streamings of an 8 minute piece on Spotify generated 1p in royalties, and I've had similar comments from a friend who owns a highly respected recording company. The debate about CD over high def downloads (such as those offered by Gimell) is an interesting one, and if you've got the right equipment you can end up with better than CD quality, but if you just decide to stream because you can't be bothered to pay very much then I fear it won't be long before programs like CD review have few new releases to play every week.

There are very good points here, though I wonder how much the same actually applies to CDs too. While there are still CDs at higher prices I tend to avoid them, except if I pick up a CD from an artist at a concert where I assume that most of the money goes to him or her. That might typically be £10, which might represent close to that once the sunk costs are taken out. If the "artist" is a string quartet, or small ensemble, then the per capita income goes down - say to £2 each.

If I buy a CD for under £5 - which is frequently possible - let's say I'd like at least £2 - preferably more - to go to the artists. I think they may not always achieve this rate of reward.

Re streaming audio - if I listen to between 5 and 10 CD equivalents each month via a service such as Spotify, that would equate to £1-£2 per CD, so I would hope that the artists would get at least 50p for the first streaming each month, and that 5-10 artists/groups would each receive this - preferably towards the higher end, so 50% of my cost should go to the artists. As a consumer I wouldn't necessarily want to have to pay again for something I've already streamed - but I assume the subscription model works on averages. If the artists are only getting a few pence (say) 50p collectively corresponding to my £10/month subscription then they are not being supported sufficiently.

[mathias broucek]

There are very good points here, though I wonder how much the same actually applies to CDs too. While there are still CDs at higher prices I tend to avoid them, except if I pick up a CD from an artist at a concert where I assume that most of the money goes to him or her. That might typically be £10, which might represent close to that once the sunk costs are taken out. If the "artist" is a string quartet, or small ensemble, then the per capita income goes down - say to £2 each.

If I buy a CD for under £5 - which is frequently possible - let's say I'd like at least £2 - preferably more - to go to the artists. I think they may not always achieve this rate of reward.

Re streaming audio - if I listen to between 5 and 10 CD equivalents each month via a service such as Spotify, that would equate to £1-£2 per CD, so I would hope that the artists would get at least 50p for the first streaming each month, and that 5-10 artists/groups would each receive this - preferably towards the higher end, so 50% of my cost should go to the artists. As a consumer I wouldn't necessarily want to have to pay again for something I've already streamed - but I assume the subscription model works on averages. If the artists are only getting a few pence (say) 50p collectively corresponding to my £10/month subscription then they are not being supported sufficiently.

I fear you are extremely optimistic about the amount that goes to artists.......

And of course some labels (including Naxos, I believe) operate on a fixed fee rather than a royalties basis. My wife has made a few CDs and was paid a fixed fee in each case.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Returning to that dreadful Brennan advert, which attempts to con readers into believing that loading a CD player is hard work, it then goes on to say that it can hold "up to 5000 CDs" (which means at a high compression bit-rate) and that it takes "only" 3-4 minutes to lead each CD. To load 5000 CDs at 3.5 minutes (average) each would take 12.153 days, with no time for eating, sleeping, etc. I wonder whether the owner of 5,000 CDs would ever spend that length of time in an entire lifetime, loading and ejecting CDs. Of course not.

[Stunsworth]

wonder whether the owner of 5,000 CDs would ever spend that length of time in an entire lifetime, loading and ejecting CDs. Of course not.

I did precisely that when I copied all my CDs (losslessly) to a hard drive. In my case, from memory, there were around 3,500. I fed them to the computer while I was doing other things. It took quite a while, but as I say I wasn't the only thing I was doing.

Now I have them all ripped, the advantages of having them in this format are - for me - considerable.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I just remember doing the same when I ripped my CDs to fill my iPod. I lost several days of my life for little gain.

[MrGongGong]

I did precisely that when I copied all my CDs (losslessly) to a hard drive. In my case, from memory, there were around 3,500. I fed them to the computer while I was doing other things. It took quite a while, but as I say I wasn't the only thing I was doing.

Now I have them all ripped, the advantages of having them in this format are - for me - considerable.

Do you have a plan for when the hard drive fails ?
(which it will eventually ............... )

[rkyburz]

There are very good points here, though I wonder how much the same actually applies to CDs too. While there are still CDs at higher prices I tend to avoid them, except if I pick up a CD from an artist at a concert where I assume that most of the money goes to him or her. That might typically be £10, which might represent close to that once the sunk costs are taken out. If the "artist" is a string quartet, or small ensemble, then the per capita income goes down - say to £2 each.

If I buy a CD for under £5 - which is frequently possible - let's say I'd like at least £2 - preferably more - to go to the artists. I think they may not always achieve this rate of reward.

Re streaming audio - if I listen to between 5 and 10 CD equivalents each month via a service such as Spotify, that would equate to £1-£2 per CD, so I would hope that the artists would get at least 50p for the first streaming each month, and that 5-10 artists/groups would each receive this - preferably towards the higher end, so 50% of my cost should go to the artists. As a consumer I wouldn't necessarily want to have to pay again for something I've already streamed - but I assume the subscription model works on averages. If the artists are only getting a few pence (say) 50p collectively corresponding to my £10/month subscription then they are not being supported sufficiently.

I fully agree with Mathias in that I think you are way too optimistic about what the artists get from each CD - look up what the founder of Magnatune.com has to say about this: from that I assume the artist's portion of the selling price is more of the order of what Spotify pays out. It actually makes me feel sick when I hear all the bragging of how DRM is protecting the artist's interest - and in reality almost all of the selling price goes to the producer, so the big labels are really just protecting their own interests, not those of their artists. Magnatune.com tried to counter-act this by giving 50% of the selling price of each download to the artist (and the selling price was essentially up to the buyer, recommended minimum was USD 5). I did a few downloads a couple years ago - unfortunately they now switched to a different business model, involving a monthly or annual subscription fee (for unlimited downloads). With this, I no longer know how much the artist is getting - plus, I usually prefer hard copies anyway, so I essentially have stopped using Magnatune.

[Stunsworth]

Do you have a plan for when the hard drive fails ?
(which it will eventually ............... )

Yes I'll restore it from the backup.