“The Who’s Pete Townshend says Apple Inc.’s iTunes is a ‘digital vampire’ that profits from music without supporting the artists who create it,” The Associated Press reports.
“Townshend says that faced with the Internet’s demolition of copyright protection, iTunes should help artists by giving space to allow them to stream their music, and pay smaller artists directly rather than through a third party aggregator,” AP reports.
“Townshend asked if there was any reason iTunes ‘can’t provide some aspect of these services to the artists whose work it bleeds like a digital vampire’ to make money,” AP reports.
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Without iTunes – iTunes Store, to be exact – there would be no music business. Unless he was massively misquoted, Pete Townshend should brush up on his facts before opening his mouth again. Apple not offering a streaming service currently hardly makes them a “digital vampire.” Besides those who torrent, the real vampires are the often unnecessary middlemen (the music labels) standing between Apple and the artists with their greasy palms ever extended for their too-large cut. As is typical, these artists who complain about the oh-so-evil iTunes generally aren’t the world’s greatest businesspeople, nor do they seem to really understand how the music business works. You’d think someone like Pete Townshend would have a firmer grasp of things by now.
As for his “pay smaller artists directly rather than through a third party aggregator” idea: Yes! Yes! Yes! If he’s talking about artists going directly to Apple’s iTunes Store without a music label, but it seems that smaller acts would need the labels more than established acts who already have fans. It can be done, but even someone like Lights had a record deal before establishing her own personal label.
““The Who’s Pete Townshend says Apple Inc.’s iTunes is a ‘digital vampire’ that profits from music without supporting the artists who create it,””
So pretty much like the rest of the music industry. Maybe Pete should work to blow up the current music industry structure so they can get a bigger cut of the sales through iTunes instead of letting that go to the real vampires.
How about Google who wants all music to be free? Isn’t this more or less vampiric than sucking free blood from victims to extend its shelf-life selling loads and loads of nickel-and-dime ads.
Without the music business, there would still be music, but the reverse is not true. People get too hung up over the big labels, like they were crucial or something. They are just parasites.
Enormous *DING* factor. 10 points.
Kill the RIAA.
Nothing stops artists from selling their work directly to their fans. I’ve bought several albums that way, notably Terra Naomi, who launched her career with a couple of home-brew YouTube videos. AT this point, I can’t imagine why bands would want to go to record labels, since the #1 music distribution channel (iTunes) offers few (if any) advantages for record labels over individual artists.
Agreed. A lot of the book publishers and music labels have increasingly offered less and less value to writers and musicians — this going back decades. The digital revolution has only accelerated that process.
One industry that has been more resistant to it has been TV and film, but even those have been showing certain cracks.
Exactly my sentiment. The artists with label contracts must have known from their labels that their music is being placed on iTunes and they get the same percentage from the sale. If the label’s pie is smaller ‘cuz iTunes take 30%, then the artists should demand a bigger slice from their labels since they don’t do that much anymore in marketing and merchandising the artists’ music.
For those who are not under label contract, the artists can always sell directly through their own website or label (good luck to that) and bear the costs of making their music available to their fans. I wouldn’t be surprised if their take is about the same as those artists under label contract.
For every “Pete Townshend” detractor there are dozens of musicians that are supporters. It is impossible to make everyone happy.
Who’s Pete Townshend?
…kinda says it all
Only if you’re a Glee or Justin Beiber fan. Or maybe you prefer Barbra Streisand? Still, I do think he’s remarkably out of touch on this, I would have expected a musician of his experience to be much more aware of what opportunities are available for young musicians now. iTunes has no need to have any kind of streaming function, not when there’s LastFM, Soundcloud and Bandcamp. The last two are heavily used by people to promote music, and iTunes is great for bands with no labels, like a new band from Northern Ireland, called Wonder Villians. I heard a song of theirs played on a late night BBC Radio2 programme, looked them up on Facebook, where they announced the song was on iTunes. Had a look and found a three track EP, which I bought straight away. No intermediaries, and I don’t have to faff around trying to find someone selling a CD. Instant gratification, and the band gets an instant sale. Pete, how the fuck is that vampirism?
Are you serious?
If the article didn’t say he was part of the who… I wouldn’t know who he is either.
I honestly couldn’t care “who” are in a band… If the music is good, it’s good.
I can name a handful of people in bands… I listen to music (rarely anymore) not follow some drugged out member of a band.
You’ve got to be an ignorant, culturally deprived, narrow-minded son of Tricky Dicky to not know Who Peter Townsend is or to compare Barbra Streisand to Justin Beiber. There’s a difference between personal taste and brainless snobism.
I didn’t compare anyone to anyone…
Reading comprehension?
And I don’t give a shit WHO is in a band. Or who they are. I only know of one who song honestly… Ask me a van halen question and I’ll know.
The who was nobody I gave a shit about.
Outside the bestbuy commercial, I have no clue who beiber is, except some kid everyone seems to hate.
Ask me to name the Beatles… I’ll say Lennon. The rest? I never liked them so I don’t know.
SRV, BB king, VH, Metallica, megadeth, ac/dc. Them I know.
I like some music, could really give a shit about the people IN the bands…
Wow, that’s sad. Van Halen & Metallica but no Who. There would be no VH or the others without The Who, The Beatles or The Kinks (I’ll throw that one in too).
Every serious rock fan knows who Pete Townshend is. You can argue whether he good or bad, but you’ve got to know him.
@Billy
I am NO Fan of music… people, band, genre, nobody, nothing.
Half of the music world could OD on drugs tomorrow… Meh.
however *some* of their music I listen too. My “library” is small… And I listen maybe 1-2 times a week to something.
Music has Zero effect on me.
Honestly I have heard his name before, but in reading some of the other comments… I’m thinking it was from the Child Porn stuff.
the CSI song is the only Who song (at least one that I know of anyway) that I kinda like.
I can’t fill up half of a 16GB iPod.. hell, the playlist I actually play.. has 197 songs in it. I have the same CD I made in my Car for almost 2 years.. MP3 CD with like 130ish songs.
I’m sitting here typing this in complete silence… First time all day I could tune the world out. I know there are people that this would drive them insane, I love it.
I’m fishing tomorrow, nothing but the sound of my fly line. Now thats Musical Bliss.
I know many bands I “listen” to got their inspiration from others, I don’t care.. It means nothing to me what some band listened to.
Heard of the Kinks, I know VH covered them. have NO clue of any names..
Obviously heard of the Beatles.. I just don’t like em. as I said before, couldn’t name em.
I have heard of the Who, I just don’t care for the “music”. I now know of one guys in the band…
Main reason I know VH stuff, My Brother in law was a huge VH fan and thats all i’d hear around him. I was 10 when we first met (he’s 10 years older than me) so he was like a big brother, I did everything and listened to everything he did.
That phase passed, but I still like VH.
Ok, since everyone will ask at some point.. Sammy.
I liked them Both, both Dave ranks a tad lower than Sammy IMO.
and besides, Dave’s a nutcase… and Sammy has a Bar. 😉
Same goes for Gaming.. People go nuts when I say I have an xbox, but don’t like Halo. (any FPS on a console is an instapass for me)
Now everyone can bash me for not being like them… or liking what THEY like..
“”It would be better if music lovers treated music like food, and paid for every helping, rather than only when it suited them,” he said.
“Why can’t music lovers just pay for music rather than steal it?” he said.”
uh….yeah.
Apple DOES PAY those with a legal right to the money. They cannot unilaterally decided to pay certain parties, but not others.
Some of these old rock & roll types (remember the Stevie Nicks rant) seem to not understand what they are talking about.
Or maybe they really are so stupid that they don’t know that it is the record contracts they signed that determines the royalty payments?
Mr. Townshend got his facts from a dubious source (some (Middle)Bronfman character, no doubt).
My current old band has had an album on iTunes for at least five years. Services such as CDBaby make it simple, easy and rather quick to sell independent music on iTunes without going through a label. Artist receives approximately 72 cents, from the 99 that Apple charges, for each sold track. This is better than app store (for apps), as well as iBook Store (for books), where the commission is 30%.
While it might possibly be even better if Apple had the facilities to do this directly, rather than through a middle man (CDBaby, in my example), it is still vastly superior to the standard music label, which takes lion’s share of those 99 cents, and pays artists no more than 10-15%.
As I said, Mr. Townshend must have received his talking points from some big label suit.
WTF is he talking about? With iTunes people can easily release independent albums which means artists get 5 times what they’d get with a label.
MDN Take – “Without iTunes – iTunes Store, to be exact – there would be no music business.”
Perhaps the biggest pile of BS I’ve ever read on this site in the five or so years I’ve been visiting; so big that it’s not even worth discussing. Talk about hubris…
were it not for iTunes- people would still be “stealing” music via torrents. There is a direct correlation between people purchasing music based on the .99 a song model and less free downloading of music. Given all the major labels have seen physical media sales plummet over the years, and their bumbling business tactics on top of it- they’d surely be bankrupt hoping lawsuits would bolster their plummeting profits.
“were it not for iTunes- people would still be “stealing” music via torrents”
So. . . people no longer “steal” music via torrents? Nonsense.
We can be thankful that Jobs and Apple provided such an elegant, ground-breaking solution to SOME of the problems plaguing the industry, but to suggest that the entirety of the music biz would no longer exist – which is EXACTLY what the MDN take asserts – is poppycock.
If you read the second sentence you’d have no choice but to agree with my entire factual statement.
And do you agree with MDN’s statement that if it were not for the iTunes store, there would be NO music biz anymore? Piracy shows no signs of abating; in fact, there are far more avenues for pirating now than there were when iTunes began.
Also, correlation does not imply causation.
iTunes saves the image of the music labels. Prior to that, they were like rampaging gangsters demanding disproportionate million of dollars from schoolboys who took free of hundred of dollars of their stuff from the Internet.
Now they are more respectable and have learnt that people would be willing to pay for their stuff if they treat their customers with respect.
“Now they are more respectable and have learnt that people would be willing to pay for their stuff if they treat their customers with respect.”
HA! There is absolutely nothing “respectable” in the slightest about the majors, as anyone who’s had to engage with them on any level greater than the Columbia Music Club will tell you. The suits took over and completely sullied the industry in the late 70s-mid 80s era and it was no garden party before that, either.
Let’s not have a bunch of “Who’s Townshend”. That’s not clever and only shows your ignorance.
Also, let’s not have a bunch of old wankers posting lyr… what?
Oh, well then, nvm.
oops, too late.
Reign o’er me…..
of course, “same as the old boss.”
No one knows what it’s like to be the sad man…
He’s entitled to his opinion. As a music industry (former) titan, his opinion carries weight.
But I’m entitled to mine: Baby boom whites discovered music copyright protection only after shamelessly ripping off blues, R&B and early rock and rollers who were almost exclusively black and poor. They stole ideas, riffs, lyrics, beats, chord progressions, and even entire songs.
Magic Bus is a great tune. Did Bo Diddley get anything for that beat? No, when Peter Townsend was in his 20s he was none too concerned about compensating others for stealing their ideas.
There are hundreds of other examples.
Yup. And Led Zeppelin who stole just about every song they ever recorded.
Say what you want about Pete, but when you mention Zep in a negative light…well you better Ramble On!
What Pete fails to realize is that Who records aren’t selling, not because of iTunes, but rather that the Who haven’t written anything relevant in over 30 years. The majority of the music buying public are teenage girls. And I’m sorry Pete, teenage girls don’t give a rats ass about you or your generation.
As a musician I respect the man. But the respect ends there, for obvious reasons.
“iTunes is a digital vampire, that I can’t use to find kiddy porn”
Pete Townsend
Has he finished that book that he was researching yet?
Another drugged out old Limey has been. He’s delusional.
Pete Townsend is a digital vampire!
Silly rant, Pete. When I want a song, e.g., I hear a song on the radio and want to get it, I fire up iTunes either on my iPhone or my Mac and I BUY IT. I don’t torrent it, burn if from a friend’s CD, etc.
The truth is, Pete, iTunes does a lot to promote artists. Just look at the albums and tracks offered for free, or at special discount prices, or the promotion given to new albums being released, or allowing people to pre-order a new album. I don’t see your record labels doing any of that.
Until artists sell their music on their own, or directly through iTunes, there will always be middlemen who take money away from artists. However, let’s be real, artists make their money playing live, not selling tracks or albums.
iTunes refired my love of music.
Townsend is way out of line.
I thought a “digital vampire” would be closer to hat he is.. you know.. an internet pedophile.
Well then, Pete Townshend is an ACTUAL vampire!
How does THAT feel, Mr. Townshend?
Happy Halloween everybody.
Hey, Pete, stick to your area of expertise: child porn.
Like I value the thoughts of Pete ‘ kiddie’ Townsend
Um, I’m an indie musician with albums on iTunes. Last I checked, TuneCore pays me 100% of the purchase price minus Apple’s modest cut. Not a bad deal.
Meanwhile, Spotify and other services stream my music for free or close to it. I get paid almost nothing. Who’s the digital vampire here??
Glad to hear from someone with real world experience with this topic.
Interesting; I thought Spotify was working pretty much on the up-and-up, unlike, say, Grooveshark. A shame to hear that’s not the case.
Wanker.
Pete? Pete Who?
Wow… clever.
I purchase more music today vie iTunes and eMusic.com than I ever purchased in the days if vinyl and CDs… And a lot of it is repurchased classic rock that I used to own… and the rest is new indie stuff I discover out in the world, then locate vie either of the above mentioned music online retailers. During that in between period I was happily loading up on shared music via file sharing (Kazaa, etc.) because of the immediacy of delivery and huge selection usually available if you looked hard enough. So, the bottom line for me as a consumer is: once I had a fair, efficient and well-stocked music inventory to choose from at fair, ala carte prices, I never swapped or stole music again. Thanks to Apple and Steve Jobs creating the path to legitimate online distribution at a critical mass, musicians had a way to get my money… once again. So, Mr. Townsend, I have no earthly idea why you would refer to iTunes as a vampire (or any other music distributor, like eMusic.) Especially in light of the fact I just bought most of the old Who catalog again (remastered) because the price was right, it was convenient, and I was happy to send you (or ‘Who’ever owns the musical rights these days, which may be your biggest problem…) money for the rights to own something you did 40 years ago… So, quit bitching… Seriously!
Unless the whole “vampire” thing was a dumb Halloween joke.
Well said!
Met the new boss
Same as the old boss
hahahahahaa
Oh the vitriol, knee caps, and humor from all kinds of people! I love it!
He should crawl back under his rock and stay there…I have ZERO respect for a PEDOPHILE!
Freakin pervert…
Ungrateful twat.
At least Pete didn’t say the rubbish Neil Young did.
I listened to his lecture live on the radio this evening, and what he was basically saying is that new music, musicians and musical genres had an invaluable showcase on radio shows like that presented by the late DJ John Peel (RIP).
Peely would play anything and everything if he thought it might be groundbreaking, interesting, or ‘the next big thing’, and championed many musical styles, artists and genres loooong before they became popular world wide.
And as such, by being played on the radio it was easy for records of radio plays to be kept and the artists (many new and financially struggling) could be payed a royalty quickly and easily, and receive a larger percentage of the profits than they would from a music outlet like iTunes (which takes 30% of the profits from music sales).
Unlike the John Peel radio show did, iTunes does little to break new music, doesn’t put any money into discovering new bands, AnR or taking a risk on what might be ‘the next big thing’. Townsend said he wished they would, but couldn’t see it happening.
I didn’t think he came across very well in his arguments, but could see the gist of what he was saying.
You might be able to listen to it in the US, you might not – the link is at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b016k4d0
Why should Apple/iTunes do anything to break new music or discover new bands? Does Play.com or Amazon.co.uk? You, like Peter Townshend, seem to be mistaking Apple/iTunes for a recording company, they are a shop, not EMI or Sony.
Pete was basically ranting because he doesn’t understand the world today… he’s old and confused.
“I hope I die before I get old (Talkin’ ’bout my generation)”… there’s one lyric he wrote that didn’t come true
I can’t believe how many posts there are without mentioning that Napster killed the music industry and Apple revived it and made it possible to have artist get paid again.
Any artist can self promote by going on tour or paying others to advertise them but it all costs money. iTunes has to store, distribute, collect money and pay it out to the right people. Does Townsend think they should just shut down? Should iTunes do all that for free just because ‘fat cat’ Townsend can’t buy another castle this year? Can’t afford a newer jet?
Napster didn’t kill the music industry, nothing killed the music industry it’s thriving out there, apart from the few legacy business who don’t want to innovate!
I can understand Pete Townshend’s anger but it’s misdirected. This age of computers has devalued music tremendously. Any garage band can pump out a new CD every week. There are 18,000,000 tunes to choose from at the iTunes Store. 17,900,000 of them are garbage.
Just because Apple has found a way to make money on the music when the artists can’t, doesn’t mean they’ve done anything wrong.
Any savvy, modern professional musician knows that the money isn’t in the music sales; it’s in the tours and merchandising.
And Pete Townshend is an undead rock-and-roller.
You are thinking of The Rolling Stones, particularly Keith.
Didn’t die… got old.
I must be the only one who thinks Pete has a point.
Pete thinks he should be paid for work he did 30 years ago. Boo hoo.
The iTS is just a conduit for distribution. Peter needs to go blame to the content owners. It is the content owners/copyright holders that are preventing the flow of freedom within the industry so they can pocket the big gains.
MJ
What an idiot. Look at the profit share that Apple gets from digital downloads. It’s minuscule. What? 1%? 2%? That’s “bloodsucking”?
You’re the idiot here. You don’t even know what the percentage iTunes take. They do nothing other than provide and interface that’s locked in to every Mac and run their business in an aggressive fashion and take 30%.
Seriously get a clue.
I suppose you think that interface and overall infrastructure called iTunes was done at no cost? I’d be careful tossing that idiot term around… there’s a huge difference between a cut of revenue and profit, last time I checked.
Yet more erudite commentary from the readers of MDN I see.
I’m an artist, making music and I have my own company. Still I can’t get my music published on iTunes. Why? Because Apple has a rule that says I need be a music label to apply = My company need to represent more than ten bands to be eligible for distribution in iTunes.
I’ve told Apple several times this is the opposite of what their original goal was: to help artist. But they are not helping artists. They are only supporting labels.
How is it that people like Alex Goot get on ITunes, then? What about all the indie music that is on the site? I see it all the time.
They go through a middle-hand that manages several artists. May not be a “label” in the old definition but still a second lilk in the supply chain that takes away fro the profit and ownership.
Who cares what a self important pedophile thinks anyway?
It strikes me as a little hypocritical for Pete Townshend to complain about ITunes. I am sure that he has made beaucoup bucks from ITunes. If he wants to donate all that he has made off of the “vampire” and set up a foundation for starving artists, then good for him. But for him to bite the hand that feeds him is not right. Apple found a new way of making more music available to more people for a reasonable price. And people liked it. It is called capitalism and free markets. If Pete does not like that, he is living in the wrong country.
Would Pete prefer to return to the days of Napster and Limewire as the main download sources? And get zero money?
WHO is Pete Townsend?
…uhhh, that “WHO” thing is getting lame. Nothing like a day late and a dollar short, as they say.
MDN: “As is typical, these artists who complain about the oh-so-evil iTunes generally aren’t the world’s greatest businesspeople, nor do they seem to really understand how the music business works.”
That’s the reason the artists need the labels, isn’t it? Apple isn’t going to promote, label, sponsor tours, or any of the business necessary to promoting mass media art.
MDN hates the labels, but they’re an enormous part of how music gets “big.” If you don’t want/need national or worldwide acts, then by all means cut the labels out.
Pete’s got it wrong when he likens iTunes to record/publishing companies. It’s actually the 21st century version of a record store. And unless my memory deceives me, record stores never provided the type of services he’s talking about. Those were the responsibilty of the labels and publsihing companies. And as they still exist, why shouldn’t they continue to provide those services?
I’m afraid Pete just comes across as an old, out of touch, faded rock star who doesn’t actually understand how the music industry has evolved.
It’s ‘Stockholm Syndrome‘ for old era music artists. We’ve heard the same inane gibberish from Jon Bonjovi, Ted Nugent, ad nauseam.
I’ll never forget legitimate musicians defending the RIAA’s attacks against Internet radio. The hearings were like watching ‘Night of the Living Dead’ with the RIAA and their pet musicians demanding the right to eat the flesh of the living. Grotesque.
To quote Sir Paul McCartney: “[T]he major record labels are having major problems. They’re a little puzzled as to what’s happening. . . . [T]he major labels these days are like dinosaurs sitting around discussing the asteroid.”
MAJOR RECORD LABELS AND THE RIAA: DINOSAURS IN A DIGITAL AGE?
The analogy to a record store is dead on. It is just another way to deliver the product. You hit the nail on the head. ITunes is just a better business model for today and Pete may be lamenting the fact that someone else is making money in the industry and he is not making as much as he thinks he should.
The last time Pete Townsend put his foot in his mouth he was apologizing for the kiddy porn police found on his computer. It was ‘research’ material so he could better fight kiddy porn psychopaths. Oops. Kind of reminds me of senility, not that there’s anything wrong with it.