Arrival and popularity of digital technology has influenced the way people seek entertainment, such as watching movies and listening to music, among other things. However, the infiltration of technology has not made music industry change some of its older ways. That explains why you still get to hear the same songs in most radio channels over and again. At times, the way they function and broadcast services does seem outdated. The root cause is music industry still does not sync with changing needs of the listeners. It is high time radio stations and major labels wake up to the evolving scene and public needs.
A lot of music lovers are becoming habituated to using personalized digital media services and traditional music business should take note of the evolving usage needs. With internet access speed rising quickly and access being spread to remote parts of the world, user’s access to digital media content is being widened. It is obvious that analogue thought process will no longer work in a digital marketplace! When you can find a newly released album or single by searching in web at the comfort of your home, you will not feel the urge to queue up at nearby music stores for a copy!
In the 1990s, things were rather different. That was the decade of walkman and CDs and internet was in its early days. Internet speed and access range was also nothing to talk about. The industry relied on sales data obtained from billboard charts. Cut back to 2013, and you have plenty of options to access and enjoy all types of media content, including social media service, digital media streaming service. There are myriads of devices to do all that and you can access HD content at trailblazing speed as well. The availability of a gargantuan amount of digital media including music has also taken a toll on CD sales.
Given the ever growing popularity of streaming media services, it seems like a good idea to count the number of times a song is accessed for streaming. However, that method of assessing popularity of song may not be accurate. It is hard to figure out whether the users actually listened to the entire song or skipped it midway. It may also happen that viewers change the channel when a specific song is played. As a matter of fact, music streaming services can fetch a huge amount of data from millions of listeners at any given time from a specific region. This can make analysis and understand difficult given the fact that people access internet 24×7.
While the situation seems difficult for music labels and radio stations amidst the diversity of options customers have and rapid growth of digital media services, there are ways to gauge mindset of listeners. The music industry needs to wake up to the reality that everything has become more interactive now and the days of offering one sided service to listeners are over. It is no longer prudent to count on sales data alone. The ruling days of music labels are nearly over. While public access to music was limited, a section of industry bigwigs were instrumental in affecting mindset of listeners. The audience did not have plenty of choices. However, with the unprecedented paradigm shift and abundance of access means to music, they have got chance to be more selective.
The emergence and infiltration of social media has enabled consumers to become vocal about their taste and needs in everything, including music. It is necessary that music industry starts observing the feedbacks of listeners using these newer mediums and implement changes accordingly.
