January 25th, 2010 
Kathy McGraw 
While the RIAA may have you believe that every single file-sharer out there is nothing but a dirty pirate who just wants everything for free, there are some artists and labels out there who embrace the concept of file-sharing and are using it to bump up revenues.
The most noted example is Trent Reznor, the front man for Nine Inch Nails. He has easily made $1.6 million on his last release, all the while giving away his music for free. How has he done this? By connecting with his fans and giving them a reason to buy his albums by offering something unique and at a reasonable price. For example, you can get a two CD set for just $10, or a boxed set for $75, which includes the CDs, a DVD, a Blu-ray, and a photobook.
Reznor doesn’t worry about licensing or DRM and he’s not busy making enemies of his fans by suing them or calling them pirates and thieves. Instead, he embraces his fans and encourages them to connect with him and each other. Read more about Reznor and other artists like him here.
Now think about the RIAA and pretty much how universally hated they are as an organization. If they would just take a page out of Reznor’s book, they could be laughing all the way to the bank, too.
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[...] whole they’ve been fighting changing pricing and technology for years. In January Kathy wrote an article talking about Trent Reznor and how he offers cheap access to his music, but also more expensive [...]
Give it away I say
Songs from our catalog have been played by hundreds of radio stations and podcasters worldwide and it didn’t cost them a penny, in return we got exposure and promotion…..sounds like a good deal to me, that’s why many of our tracks have been released under a creative commons license and are free to download. So what if you lose out on lost sales, you gain more in the long term by increasing your fan base (If you can survive that long)
With such an overcrowded market place giving away your music is essential in my opinion. The biggest problem for emerging indie artists today is obscurity, not piracy. To find out more listen to The Antiqcool Podcast
http://antiqcool.podbean.com/2010/01/22/the-antiqcool-podcast-episode-1-how-can-you-be-a-part-of-our-success/
Thanks for the comment, Pete. It’s nice to hear the perspective of someone inside the music business.
Your welcome Cliff. Just Received your email. I will get back to you ASAP.
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