Does the Music industry in China have a future?
Click on all of the links within the following article:
http://www.inaglobal.fr/en/music/article/does-music-industry-china-have-future
Inside the Rise and Receding of Russia’s Music Industry
in Billboard – click on all of the links and video within the following article:
http://www.billboard.com/articles/business/6707208/russian-music-industry-history
Both these article were very informative on the Chinese and Russian music industry. The articles were full of information and covered the vast history of the music industry in the respective countries. I had a bit of a hard time processing all the information on how China is growing its potential.
I found this article “Five Reasons Why China is Going to be the New Trendsetter in Music.” This article lists the five areas where China is growing and concisely explains how it will benefit the Chinese music industry.
Here is a link to 5 Reasons why China is going to be a trendsetter in the music industry:
http://hub.stereotheque.com/2018/07/05/five-reasons-why-china-is-going-to-be-the-new-leader-in-music/
I believe that both markets are extremely worth at least learning from in terms of their shortcomings, mistakes, and the issues they come across. Currently the issue of piracy is extremely high in both China and Russia, so much so that “Russia is the second biggest consumer of digital piracy in the world” as of 2017, with 73.9 billion visits to piracy websites for music alone.
To learn more about the stats on that:
http://www.ewdn.com/2018/03/27/report-russia-ranks-second-in-the-world-for-digital-piracy/
And it is also reported that in China “[T]otal music revenue… for 2010 was only US$64.3 million.” In Thailand it was “US$68.9 million” which is a country that has less than five percent of China’s population and similar per capita GDP, according to TechinAsia. It also stated that if “Chinese sales were equivalent to Thailand’s on a per capita basis, music sales would be almost US$1.4 billion”
To learn more about China’s piracy
https://www.techinasia.com/ustr-music-movie-tv-show-piracy-china-2012
Yet despite said shortcomings, China has attempted to implement ways to combat said piracy especially by lowering rates for streaming services as reported from Xinhuanet. It is expected that with lower prices to a streaming service the consumer would find it more applicable, easier, and accessible to just pay the subscription fee and find the newest music from their favorite artist on their platform or their favorite show on that same service.
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-01/26/c_136927675.htm
These articles were full of information about the past of the music industry in China and Russia. It also touched on whats changing in their music industry currently. I think it’s awesome that the music industry is keeping in mind that these sectors exists and that they can make money here.
I found an article by digitalmusicmedia that talks about how blockchain might affect the corrupt music industry in Russia. I believe it wouldn’t just affect Russia, but could also be used in China too. Check it out!
https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2017/05/01/blockchain-russia-ipchain/
Looking into the Music Industry and Music Market from a different viewpoint than the one we live in and Understand here in the United States is almost impossible. It never really occurred to me what it was like for countries like China/Russia competing in the Competitive Global Music Industry.
Article one gives a close glimpse into what music has been for China since the arrival of the western gramophone in 1902, after reading further, article one tells us that China has the biggest potential for growth in terms of the Digital Music Industry, attesting most of their music consumption through the internet.
Article two explains how the Music Industry in Russia has evolved into a Multi-Billion dollar industry with net worths being calculated at a whopping $2 Billion dollars by the early 2010’s. While Russia’s music industry has grown immensely since the fall of the Soviet “Iron Curtain”, Russia still struggles to attract western artists to its music venues. Mostly because of the adoption of ruthless national laws being adopted by Russia.
Here is an Article on “Pussy Riot” protesting in Russia.
https://www.reuters.com/article/russia-pussyriot-musicians/pussy-riot-not-a-big-hit-with-russian-pop-stars-idINDEE87F0EP20120816
After reading these articles, it became evident to me that the way in which each country is dealing with the social-cultural challenges, and the legal-political challenges that threaten the growth of the music industry in their respective countries is paramount to their success. Where China has found a way to achieve government support (in some small way), it seems the Russian government wants to continue to keep the biggest part of the pie. I feel the music industry in China does have the potential to grow their industry on both the local and worldwide stage, as long as they keep pushing. One other thing that was apparent is the growth of both industries in the streaming of music and online distribution, but there is still work to be done to open that avenue as well, because of the piracy issues.
https://www.fool.com/investing/2018/02/02/meet-chinas-top-3-music-streaming-platforms.aspx
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kerryflynn/2014/08/19/before-spotify-enters-russian-streaming-music-service-closes-20m-series-a/#2fbf7a094ba4
I think that China has the ability to market music fairly if pirating is continued to be cracked down on and outdated as a practice. Time will tell for sure, but they do have the most potential for having the most paying listeners in terms of sheer population numbers. I found an hopeful article from CNN that highlights some modern changes with China and its system of paying instead of pirating.
https://money.cnn.com/2018/01/24/technology/china-streaming-music-video/index.html
As for the Russian article, there seems to be less hope for a thriving music market due to some internal corruptions, its poor foreign policy, and some conflict of interest between the church the rest of the west’s opinions on LGBTQ+ rights. Here’s an article about why artists are not fans of touring in Russia. https://www.quora.com/Why-dont-famous-rappers-singers-or-DJs-come-to-Russia-e-g-Eminem-Ed-Walker-Garrix-etc-I-mean-140M-people-live-here-and-are-waiting
The first article discussed the issue of the music market in China. While China seems like it would be an ideal market to break into due to the very large population. However, the level of piracy in China has been so large, the market is very difficult to break into and actually make any money.
I was interested to learn more about the piracy situation in China. While looking into it, I found this article that illustrates the fact that things in China relating to piracy are slowly improving due to rapidly changing technology that makes it easier to crack-down on pirating. https://money.cnn.com/2018/01/24/technology/china-streaming-music-video/index.html
The articles above provided an insight into the music industry in Russia and China. As others have noted, the industry in China is very intriguing due to the population there. They do have a problem with piracy, but the number of people makes it enticing. If the problem with piracy goes down, there will surely be a market there.
Russia has similar problems, but its biggest one is corruption. One thing that stood out to me was how Spotify was set to open an office in Russia and enter their market but was seemingly scared off by the Russian Government. It will be interesting to see how things develop in the coming years.
These articles got me more interested in what piracy is like today. This article from 2017 dives into that topic.
https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2017/05/11/music-piracy-looks-like-2017/
I think it is interesting that the article about how Russia deals with a heavy load of piracy highlighted how it is a major problem in that country, that it causes the music industry value to go down. In the United States we also deal with a piracy problem, and it mostly happens with our teenagers. It is easy to find a website or an app that you can download music for free, in which causes the user not to pay any royalties, which of course makes the industry lose some money. But I find it interesting that Russia is passing all these rights and amendments claiming that it will be more transparent with its users and audience, but this has done nothing to help the piracy problems. Now a question I have is how does the U.S deal with piracy? This website gives more insight about the piracy here in the United States.
https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2017/05/11/music-piracy-looks-like-2017/
It was interesting to see how the music industry varies from country to country. A factor I didn’t really see was the government and its effect on the business and success of musicians. In the U.S. I feel that music has its ability to do what it wants. there’s of course some laws and guidelines, but when I think of how different countries work and the guidelines they have compared to ours, I never put music in that category.
Will the music industry survive in China? If their methods of managing the music industry continue from this 2015 article, then most likely not for long. With such high piracy rates and severe scrutiny by the government, it’s amazing that China has had punk bands or anything nontraditional. Similarly, Russia seems to control its media on a national level which can place bands in precarious situations when it comes to lyrical content. Having seen the Pussy Riot trial play out in the media a few years ago I’ve even wondered how bands like that aren’t immensely successful in the U.S. The tenants of rock and roll, rebellion and expression seem to be strong in the musician’s convictions. I would be remised if I didn’t mention the immense support that bands like Pussy Riot garnered from the world stage. It’s similarities like this that may creep up in China someday, when a band that goes against the state media regulations challenges all the norms.
More types of music streaming services exist in the asian continent aside from what we know here in the United States. Apple music dominates the streaming game here in the states closely followed by Spotify, then Pandora radio. According to The Motley fool, neither pandora or spotify, “has a meaningful presence in China’s market of over 650 million streaming music users.” Tencent, NetEase, and Baidu are the biggest in china. All 3 are even listed on NASDAQ. Russian users consume their streaming through what many websites refer to as a ”russian facebook” called VKontakte. VKontakte offers a subscription tier priced at 149 rubles ($2.60), in addition to a free ad-supported option. The ironic part about VK is that it was formerly notorious for fostering user-generated illegitimate music content. One can only imagine the complexity of it all when you include the rest of the Asian continent and surrounding geography.
https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/8461743/russia-vkontakte-subscribers-music-streaming-service
https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/russias-facebook-launches-fully-licensed-spotify-rival/
https://www.techinasia.com/southeast-asias-popular-music-streaming-services-infographic
One thing I found interesting while reading both of these articles is the fact that culture can have such an impact on what is trending in music, and how successful an industry is. The second article is what I found most interesting, and specifically the parts about performers either not wanting to perform in Russia, or having to perform out of the country.
Here is an article I found by NAMM about the potential for market growth in Russia:
https://www.namm.org/playback/around-globe/russia-new-musical-frontier-ripe-market-growth
I think the music business will continue to thrive in foreign countries, especially China. While there may be huge issues concerning the governments control on the market, this does not mean the business will fail to succeed. When human beings have nothing, they may always have a tune, a beat, a rhythm, or a song in their head. I think we are creative creatures (in this circumstance) and we, no matter what land mass inhabited, will continue to see that we attain our music.
Now, this does not mean the music business will be the same, by any means. Because there is a strong sense of censorship in the country of China, I can foresee the government making it more difficult for certain types of music, or companies to thrive. I believe that in China, the music industry will continue to grow, but will be truly ran by the people at the top. I think this will all be behind the scenes and music will still be enjoyed, but people will not know that their shady government is running the show.
Below is a link which gives insight as to how the music industry felt in China, when the government banned Hip-hop.
https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/8098147/chinese-music-industry-china-government-hip-hop-ban
Though the task of trying to summarize the music industry and piracy thereof in Russia and China into a couple articles might seem daunting, I believe these articles to be thoroughly informative. In my research, I wanted to understand why America’s piracy rate was so much less significant than other countries. I came across an article by the business insider that compared the cost of software piracy and how much money the country was losing because of it.
Surprisingly, America was at the top of the list for being the country who lost most of their expenses due to software piracy. This is due to the fact that American software in and of themselves are more involved in their conception and consequently are more expensive to produce.
With more money to spend, America can deploy many more resources into piracy prevention programs, a luxury that other countries cannot afford.
To read more about the cost of piracy, click here:
https://www.businessinsider.com/software-piracy-rates-and-value-by-country-2016-7
It really is a shame the China is as closed off and communist as it is. If the music market was truly free who knows how big the industry could really be. With over a billion people in a country if they tightened up regulations and made it possible for any and all artists to be distributed the amount of money that would be made would be staggering to say the least. Luckily, though, they’re starting to see the error of their ways. They’re beginning to make strides in the music industry and are projected to be the new music trendsetters. It may take s while, but they’re are already starting to work on decreasing it’s piracy issues that have plagued the country for years. With as big of a potential market that they have and the amount of growth they’ve experienced economically and with their massive tech industry, China will take over the market. It’s just a matter of when.
Here’s an article that describes what I’m saying in more detail.
http://hub.stereotheque.com/2018/07/05/five-reasons-why-china-is-going-to-be-the-new-leader-in-music/
Reading through both articles, I see how much negative influence a controlling government and religious group can have on an industry as important as the music industry. Its even crazier to think that these huge markets didn’t develop until recent years. While the Chinese market developed earlier than the Russian market, the fact that have great potential for the industry as a whole is crazy. I’m in full agreement with the comments prior regarding that if piracy continues to be taken down by the Chinese government, then the Chinese market would be reminiscent of the California Gold Rush. With the sheer amount of people, the streaming numbers would be absurd. I also feel that more artists should perform in Russia, even though the ticket prices will be low. The bigger the artist, the more tickets to be sold, even for the prices mentioned in the article. For an artist like Drake, he would definitely be able to sell the absurd amount of tickets it would take to make a profit. Profitability wouldn’t be as great, but the amount of people that would go, especially since artists avoid Russia, would definitely be in good numbers and a good turn out. Plus, you would potentially be getting positive feedback from an untapped market. At one of Drakes biggest venues, he had around 58,000 tickets sold, which would be more than enough tickets to turn a profit for performing in a market like Russia. Overall, both markets have their flaws. It is only a matter of time before the industries in both countries flourish, and when it rains, its going to pour.
Also, for more information on concert and performance venues in Russia, check out
https://www.inyourpocket.com/moscow/culture-events-venues-mos/Music-and-Concert-Halls
as well as http://www.cityvision2000.com/entertainment/theaters.htm
I think that even though China has a 99% piracy rate, if the majors companies work with the Chinese government they might actually see some progress in the removing of links to peer-2-peer illegal downloads. If the piracy rate is just dropped to 75% the amount of money the industry can make is quite large considering the vastness of the population. Its also interesting to see that Russia has made a lot of money in the music industry but has face issues mostly with the suppression of artistic individuality especially if it conflicts with the principles of the Kremlin.
Here is more details concerning the struggles of the Russian music industry:
https://www.rbth.com/arts/2013/11/05/technology_and_russias_music_industry_30585
After reading both articles, I have learned that both China and Russia deal with government control issues and piracy. Russia also deals with religious issues. They both were similar in the fact that they developed later than most countries in the music industry. The article on China did state that they are finding new ways to control piracy. Here is another article on music in China.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/dec/25/china-music-valley-cultural-profile
In the first article I found that Like film, recorded music arrived before the actual arranged time in China. In 1902, the American organization Victor Talking Machine Company sent the pioneer of the gramophone, Fred Gaisberg, to Asia. While there, he took 1,700 examples of nearby music and in 1903 in Shanghai, he made the primary account ever of, along these lines issuing the official birth testament of the Chinese recorded music industry. This ifnromation to me was very usual because it shows the work been done for this company.
In the second article I notice as Russia’s specific type of private enterprise rules, philosophy has come back to media outlets, and has started to assume a noteworthy job in the blue grass’ music business and culture.
I found an article that talked more about china music industry https://www.ifpi.org/china.php
Both article were very informative on illustrating the difference and similarities in the music industry in both places. The amount of control that both governments have over the industry goes to show why the piracy rates are so high in those areas. With China being such a highly digital place, it make sense that they have so many ways to pirate and a whole network of things including sales of counterfeit CDs, DVDs and Blu-ray discs and peer-to-peer sites that illegally distribute songs,
In the article i found about music piracy in India, the music piracy capital, it explains the severity of pirated music in india and how new streaming platforms are working to end the amount of pirated music.
Link: https://qrius.com/india-is-the-worlds-music-piracy-capital-but-that-may-be-about-to-change/
Looking at both China and Russia’s music market forecast, it looks like those countries will be counting on streaming to bring in revenue and end piracy. I’ve found two websites that go over revenue and growth projections, and it seems as if majority of the growth is expected to come from streaming. Though the pay rates for streaming wouldn’t be amazing, it will help allow them to protect their intellectual property and discourage torrenting, and hopefully make being a musician an achievable dream.
Link to market projections for china:
https://www.statista.com/outlook/202/117/digital-music/china
Link to market projections for Russia:
https://www.statista.com/outlook/202/149/digital-music/russia#market-age
How Streaming can help end torrenting and piracy:
https://www.androidcentral.com/better-legal-streaming-options-best-way-end-piracy
It was very interesting to read both articles on the music industry in both China and Russia. Previous to this information, I had very little knowledge on the state of the industry in either country. I was very shocked to find out that 99% of music in China is pirated! If such scenario happened in America, record labels and artists would be dramatically impacted, decreasing the value of the industry as a whole. Also, to discover the politics, religious values, and just how much the industry is controlled by the government in Russia was something I knew about but not in such detail. Learning so much about these countries’ music industries made me wonder about the industry in other countries around the world, specifically Africa. The following article discusses the African music industry, detailing industry revenues, changes made by streaming platforms, as well as the issues of piracy and depreciation: https://www.musicinafrica.net/magazine/pwc-internet-boosts-africas-music-industry
With my own concern only lying in my only relative music industry here in America, it was interesting to learn how other countries such as Russia didn’t always have true pleasure of access to local music. It’s hard for me to conceive the music industry only developing truly 25 years ago, and even worse having an even faster decline back to nothing. I personally don’t like how music can be a political issue but I understand since Russia isn’t democratic. It made me think though about how our own music industry is still trying to adjust to streaming.
Here’s an article about how streaming is affecting our music industry:https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2016/03/25/business/media/music-sales-remain-steady-but-lucrative-cd-sales-decline.amp.html
Based off of what I’ve read in both articles, it seems that both China and Russia’s government control over the media, as well as their less than outstanding music market economies have made so that streaming and piracy are the only ways for their people to easily discover new foreign music. China’s communist government not only prevents many artists and songs deemed “inappropriate” to their values from legally entering their market physically and online, but also through the live music industry. Therefore this knowledge, along with the fact that so much of China’s music is online, leads me to conclude that the government essentially a broken music economy upon their citizens by leaving piracy as their only way of discovering certain new artists. This isn’t only evident today, but it was just as prevalent in the late 80’s as pointed out in the article through dekho. The Russian’s similar shady practices have also caused the same results, even forcing some online music retailers to shut down due to the poor performance. The consequential turn to piracy and streaming is evident that the control and censorship has only caused demand for more music to fester within the citizens. However with the increased attention from Western artists on the state of the foreign music industries and the emergence of startups like Dot Blockchain that aim to hold markets more accountable for paying royalties to artists, a major shift in the music economies over seas is scheduled for an inevitable take off.
https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2017/05/01/blockchain-russia-ipchain/
I feel that if China loosens its restrictions on things such as the “no promotion of religion or superstition, public order must not be disrupted or violence and crime must not be promoted” there would be so much room for the music industry to grow. Why? Sadly a lot music and music video do in fact show case a lot of these things, but mostly because the artist is speaking their mind and being creative in their own way. With all the restrictions and rules a lot of artists cant show case their talent the way they want to. In fact, due to the controls it also applies to foreign work such as artist from the U.S cannot be played if their content violates these rules. Also lets not forget that in China piracy is huge when it comes to counterfeit CDs and DVDs making the market sink. Here is more information on the new copyright rules in China: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-copyright/chinas-music-industry-sings-the-blues-over-new-copyright-rules-idUSBRE83G0DK20120417
These articles were very informative about China and Russia in terms of their standings with the music industry. Although they have potential to be very involved in the music industry, piracy in these countries is through the roof because of the way their government is conducted, causing a downfall in the paid-for artists in the industry and access to new music. It is crazy to know how much music is circulating the world un-paid for, and people don’t feel bad about it at all. Music is art… art takes time, uniqueness and creative eye… with 99% of the music that is pirated in these countries, numbers as far as industry data will never reach the Chinese and Russian markets, because they never pay for the circulated foreign music unfortunately.
This article here goes a little more in depth on the China music industry and how it is ran. https://www.ifpi.org/china.php
It is particularly interesting that China is only 22nd in the world in terms of music market, yet it is the most populous country. Because of the strict policies of countries such as China or Russia, the music market has been set back years behind the rest of the world. For example, songs such as Lady Gaga’s “Judas” were banned in China and taken off download sites because they did not comply with the standards set by the People’s Republic of China. There are also strict policies on artists that tour in China on what they are allowed to perform. Though this was only a few years ago, the emergence of digital streaming is helping countries like China progress, as music is becoming more accessible to the public. Piracy, however is another huge issue that is blocking the markets potential in Russia and China. The article posted was dated 2013. In a recent article, it has been stated that China was listed as one of the 10 largest recorded music markets for the first time as of 2017. This is a huge progression in only 4 years.
https://musically.com/2018/05/22/chinas-music-potential-we-are-finally-getting-there/