Jazz Odyssey

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Here’s a fantastic article from Wired discussing the explosive popularity and effectiveness of MySpace. From a label perspective, getting a feature at MySpace carries weight–its the kind of exposure that resonates through the industry as well as the online music communities. The power of MySpace cannot be overstated….debuting a video on MySpace vs. MTV has become a serious debate in label marketing meetings across the country. But beyond the promotional value is the business model that MySpace enables…from the Wired article:

…artists have discovered what could be the first serious business model for music in the post-Napster era. The old way of doing things, which counted on a few blockbusters to finance dozens of expensive failures, is yielding little besides a decline in major label revenue. By contrast, “MySpace bands,” as the site’s publicist refers to them, keep production and promotion costs as low as possible. They give away their best two or three songs as downloads or streams and use social networking and email blasts to reach an audience hungry for new music. Converts become zealots, more than making up for any lost CD revenue through sales of concert tickets, T-shirts, messenger bags, hoodies, posters, and bumper stickers. With little fanfare, these groups are creating a new middle class of popular music: acts that can make a full-time living selling only a modest number of discs, on the order of 50,000 to 500,000 per release.

Possibilities and opportunities abound, but some questions remain. How will the recent News Corp takeover of MySpace affect their ability to move independently? And can MySpace scale technically and feature-wise to keep up with its explosive growth? Friendster was all the rage 18 months ago but have largely fallen off the radar now….will MySpace suffer the same fate in a year or two when a new service with slicker features and portability starts to gain momentum? After all, who knows what secret project(s) Google might have in their secret underground labs….