July 13, 2010 2 Comments

Books are not music, but they’re close

Publishing peeps like to say that books are not music. Indeed. But supply chain models are the same (or so similar the differences are meaningless). Investment models are the same. Royalty models are the same. Commitment to marketing and artist/author development is the same.

Tommy Boy records founder Thomas Silverman said recently in a Wired interview, “80 percent of all records released are just noise, (they’re made by) hobbyists”.

He then went on to explain his label’s business model:

“Every artist is a business, and has its own corporation under this model, and all of that artist’s creative equity goes into that – not just music, but everything they do. And the investors who are investing and trying to promote on the other side – they own half. So it’s more like a business. An equity partnership.”

Notwithstanding that I had conversations with major label CEOs back in 2003 advising that this was the future for their investment strategy – i.e. this is hardly revolutionary – book publishers could learn a thing or two.

So take it from someone who spent more than a decade working in and around the music industry during its digital evolution, as far as business goes books are exactly like music.

And as for Silverman’s comment about hobbyists, he was bemoaning the amount of ‘junk art’ cluttering the commercial music environment. Publishing already has the same problem.
July 13, 2010 No comments

Ideas are free

Interesting post by my biz partner on whether authors should be worried about publishers stealing their ideas when they submit a manuscript.

Ideas have no value. They’re free. Easy to come by. Most people have ideas, all the time.

I am not saying ideas are not powerful. They can be extremely powerful. But what changes the world is not the idea per se, but the execution of the idea.

Action is powerful. Ideas and just that, ideas.
July 12, 2010 No comments

Apple iPhone 4 reception ‘solution’ very ugly

One of the things I admire in Apple is their design sensibility. In my view they make some of the most beautiful consumer goods on the market.

Why then are they proposing as a solution to the reported iPhone 4 reception issue/s the use of a bumper case? Apple wants users to ‘uglify’ a beautiful example of industrial design.

That’s no solution Steve.
July 12, 2010 No comments

No friends in business

I recently outsourced several elements of our production workflow to an Indian firm. We looked at several businesses and were in constant communication with them during the trialling of their services.

What I find really interesting is that these Indian guys continually want to be my ‘friend’. Where do they get this stuff? Is it cultural? Or are they reading from the same MBA notes?

There are no friends in business, particularly at the start of the relationship. What I want from a supplier is that they do what they promise and don’t go to ground when things go wrong. If that happens regularly enough then maybe a friendship will emerge, but that takes a long, long time.
July 10, 2010 No comments

MasterChef producers think we’re stupid

MasterChef is one of the most highly edited/manipulated pieces of ‘reality’ TV on the box at the moment. Do the producers really expect us to believe that they’re shocked by the elimination of audience favourites? Just like Apple is ‘stunned’ they got their signal metering algorithm wrong?

They edit the contestants’ appearance to fit particular (and required) psychological profiles. They expect their audience to respond in a particular way, yet claim no responsibility when their online forum is overwhelmed with spite.

Perhaps the sheeple aren’t aware of what’s going on, but some of us get it.
July 5, 2010 2 Comments

Apple oh so average after all

As is the case with most small business owners, I am by necessity a jack-of-most-trades. IT acquisition for Acute Communication and Red Hill Publishing is one of the things I do.

I started falling out of love with Apple recently; don’t know why, maybe I was perplexed by paying a lot for MobileMe and not getting much in return? Maybe it was the iPhone 4 and Apple’s handling of the problems?

Whatever the case, Google is now our mail serving partner. Amazon our remote data storage partner. I’ve kicked a couple of old WinTel boxes back to life with Windows 7, which is surprisingly excellent.

Our office iPhones are a couple of years old and due for renewal. I’m seriously looking at Android. Software updates are due on Adobe’s Design Premium; do I really need to run it on a Mac?

It’s a timely reminder for all business people (myself included) that customer loyalty only extends so far.
July 4, 2010 1 Comment

Any lefties in Apple’s building

I’m an Apple fan. Love my iMac, iPhone, some of their software and various bits and pieces. And I really wanted to buy an iPhone 4. But I have to wonder whether there are any left-handed peeps in Apple’s engineering team? What a stupid design error!

And as for their recent mea culpa, I call bullshit.

Is this the same problem that when the iPhone first came out people were only getting a few “bars” (like that’s any indication of signal quality) and Apple adjusted their signal “formula” so that more bars would appear? Problem solved, no?

Nonetheless I’m blinded by emotion, because if I wasn’t I don’t think I’d trust Apple as far as I can spit.
July 1, 2010 No comments

Do paywalls mean less content (for bloggers to rip off)?

Murdoch wants to save his business by erecting paywalls around his content. Good idea? Bad idea? Time will most certainly tell.

One thing I do know first hand is that creating news takes time, is expensive and is extremely hard to monetise on the net. Another thing I know is that opinions are cheap, plentiful and mostly worthless.

What most bloggers don’t seem to appreciate is that they don’t actually create news. With news creation disappearing behind paywalls I wonder what it will mean for those who don’t have sources, or know how to interview a subject, and in turn what that means for the quality of free online debate?

The major publishers are already guilty of regurgitating vast quantities of corporate PR disguised as news, it’s probably only going to get worse.