A friend and loyal reader of the Hopp Stop e-mailed several of us with an interesting e-mail from Wilco, as well as Guest X’s thoughts. I’m calling this person Guest X, since I’ve appropriated the e-mail chain, in case Guest X didn’t want to share its thoughts. See below for my thoughts, then Guest X’s, then the original e-mail. Discussion in the comments?
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Doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense to make this plea. As you say, it’s not consistent with what they’ve said before. Second, does it really influence anyone who is on the fence to get out there and buy the CD? Seems like there are those who are going to buy it and those who aren’t, and the most likely outcome would be to piss off a few in the former camp and move them into the latter.
A retort would be that the e-mail is addressing the free rider problem. A few economists, including the Freakomics guys, have considered free riders and social/community pressure. As found in the bagel man discussion in Freakonomics, smaller social settings cause people to act more ethically and cheat less, so perhaps Wilco is hoping that a non-buyer will say, “Hey, I’m cheating the band! I kinda feel like I’ve been called out in front of my brethren! Time to buy!” Two flaws with that are (1) how effective is this e-mail and the Wilco e-mail list at simulating a small office setting or other situation where moral suasion is more effective and (2) seems like the moral suasion is undermined by their former views (Lessig, etc. per Borders).
Thoughts?
-Hopp
Guest X wrote:
Wilco is streaming their new ablum, which comes out Tuesday, at http://wilcoworld.net/sbs/.
I found this out from the message below which I see as shameless and a little sad. Notice they borrowed the subject line from the satirical essay on the indifference to the suffering of the poor in an effort to encourage people to buy the album, which seems pretty preverse. The Wilco approach of the last few years has always been used (by Lessig et al) to support the notion that giving away music, creates friction to allow people to form an opinion, which led to record sales, and they seem to be abandoning that notion, at least philosophically.
—— Forwarded Message
From: Wilco HQ <hq@wilcoworld.net>
Reply-To: <hq@wilcoworld.net>
Date: Fri, 11 May 2007 21:13:32 +0000
To: <>
Subject: A Modest Proposal (from Wilco HQ)W I L C O
Greetings to you all from the east coast branch — where we’ve been burning the midnight oil for months getting ready for May 15. And it is finally upon us.By now, you know that next week is the official release date of Wilco’s 7th album (or 9th depending on how you count). Hence the slightly serious tone of this note. Tuesday, to be precise, marks the US release of Sky Blue Sky on Nonesuch Records. If you haven’t had a chance to listen to the on-demand stream, by all means click here and take it for a spin. We’re pretty sure you’ll enjoy the ride.
But once you’ve done that we hope you’ll take a moment to reflect (see, I told you this was serious) on how this dynamic has worked over the years — the dynamic between us and you. We (and this “we” means the band, first and foremost) expend a lot of time, energy and other resources trying to make this something you are not just a witness to, but a participant in and we genuinely hope you can feel that.
We’ve been asked many times if we’d consider changing the way we do things, usually by people who are convinced we’d be more successful if we did. And either out of stubbornness or something else, we keep refusing. Instead, we just do what we do and somehow it all works. We continue to make lots of music available free to all in the road case, continue to allow taping/photos at shows, and basically just try to keep the things we do charge for of a quality that make you feel like you got a bargain. You know, mutual respect and all that. We like the way it works… a lot. We really do believe in trying to keep as much of it as free and open as is humanly possible. That seems pretty obvious… but somehow it remains a slight novelty in the modern day music business. So much so that people continually mention it in their stories when they write or speak about the band or the somewhat sad state of the music business.
Anyway, what we’re getting at here is that right now we need you to participate in a way that is part of what has made this nice little story work. We’re actually asking you to please go out next week and do the right thing for Wilco. That is, vote with your feet and prove the band’s faith well-placed and buy the record. It’s available from Tuesday at all kinds of retailers everywhere. Ask for it by name. It’s also available here, and for those of you who are more digitally inclined, here.
Okay, enough campaign speeches. You get the message. And we trust that you’ll act on it as you always have. Other things on this week’s extremely busy agenda…
This Saturday (May 12) Wilco are in Minneapolis performing on A Prairie Home Companion. It’s on too many stations to list… many NPR affiliates as well as XM, Sirius and online here. Note that there are also some tickets left for the show so if you’re in the North Country and wanna check it out click here. It’s gonna be fun. On Tuesday (May 15, release day) it’s New York City where they’ll be musical guests of David Letterman. Check your local listings. After that it’s on to the UK, then the continent, and finally back to the States in early June with a US tour to start soon thereafter. Dates and ticket info here. If you live west of the MIssissippi, fear not… the band head that way later in the summer. So be patient, okay? Oh and one last thing, both London Shepherds Bush Empire shows will be streamed live on 20/21 May via Wilcoworld. Info in the Roadcase.
That’s all folks. Tune in, turn on, and um, buy stuff.
yours with the usual loving embrace, the Wilco HQ staff.
What bothers me about the Wilco letter is that I thought they were a band that really got how to be successful in the “new” marketplace. They consistently delivered a high quality product and cultivated an avid community of supporters. Now, as I understand this letter to be saying, they’re telling us they worked really hard on this and they’re not dicks so please buy the album. That argument only works for me if that my niece’s band. Otherwise, you need to make the same sales pitch you make when you’re trying to sell any other product: this album is worth your money.
The streaming or permitting the taping of their live shows helps the community building aspect but also serves to promote their album sales. This seems like a no-brainer to me although many artists and labels are against such practices. First, the recorded live shows are not a substitute for the album versions of the songs. The streaming of the actual album would be a substitute if someone recorded them but I think that’s at least a step away from the Freakonomics bagel example. For years bands have been having cd release parties and playing entire albums on the radio with the goal of increasing the record sales. I think that method works over the internet as well, even with the on demand feature. It’s like an all-Wilco-all-the-time radio station without the payola! Note that Wilco has been doing that for the last three albums and each album has sold more than the last. Second, since most bands lose money on tours and a concert is more of a long commercial for the album anyway, allowing bootlegs or streaming songs seems to serve the same or similar purpose at a lower cost to the band (understanding you would have to accept the non-substitute argument for this argument to be meaningful). If allowing such practices creates goodwill for the band so be it but that’s just an additional benefit.
Artists are also including value-ads to their albums to help people “vote with their feet [read as dollars]” like art-quality liner notes to make the cd seem like a collectible, a code on the sleeve to authorize you to download other songs on a periodic basis, and bonus DVDs. All of these ad-ons create further goodwill to the people who would have bought the album based on the music alone and reduce the loss to record sales from pirating or the-streaming-album-as-substitute danger.
Another thing that bothers me is that they don’t recognize, at least in this letter, the effort given by the witness/participants. The people who are listening to the streamed album, forwarding it to their friends or taking the time to read that letter are the ones that already have invested and are continue to invest in the band. As they say in Buenos Aires, it takes two to tango.
Sorry for the ramble. I guess my main comment is they should have sent the letter without the fourth through sixth paragraphs
A.Bo, well said re: niece’s band. This is not a charity that Wilco is running. And their plea for sales, as you say, calls into question their understanding of an alternative way to make it in the music biz.
One question: my understanding was that musicians, once they get to some modicum of popularity, actually make most of their money off touring and related merchandise sales. Sounds like that’s not true. That Steve Albini screed on the topic of recording contracts (http://negativland.com/albini.html) made me think that albums were loss leaders for most bands, designed to get people out for the tours. I also am under the impression that bands get a much larger cut of touring revenue than is the case for recording contracts, hence the greater potential for profitability. Then again, as I re-read the Albini post, looks like my memory was mistaken…