Online Revolution by Dzof Azmi
The letter below was in response to the above article in The Sunday Star Starmag section. To read the article in full see this link:
http://thestar.com.my/columnists/story.asp?col=contradictheory&file=/2010/8/29/columnists/contradictheory/6919678&sec=Contradictheory
The Star failed to publish any part of this which is understandable as they probably got loads of opinions sent on subjects much more inportant than this one (such as imbittered wives of cheating husbands, self-congratulatory letters by Muslims on how easy it is to fast and how well I'm doing with my own fast etc.) This was annoying as the letter contained quite important facts to correct errors or possible errors in respect of the division of spoils of the price of CDs or digital downloads in Malaysia (and in fact The World). So the author of the original article is allowed to print these errors without criticism (mind you it was a VERY good article about the failure to support English Language Malaysian pop and the disregard of extremely talented home grown music in this country).
The article on page 2 of Starmag “Online Revolution” (Sunday Star 29 August 2010) is very illuminating and really quite shocking. When the author Dzof Azmi complains that he cannot even purchase a single by one of the finest singer-songwriters in Malaysia, then you know that something has gone very very wrong.
This startling fact throws light on the scandal of the music business in Malaysia and the whole world, when despite the enormous sums extracted from live music venues and radio, TV and anywhere live or recorded music is performed or played and paid in royalties to international record companies, music publishers and artists through the Royalty Collecting Organisations (RCOs) people in this country cannot even buy their own music because of arbitrary and unjust rules imposed by Western corporations.
At present if you are an artist or band who happen to write songs in English then in your own country you are excluded from radio play and so it is hard to find any distributor who is not going to ask for an unconscionable slice of the financial cake. You are more or less excluded from the AIM awards (which is heavily biased towards Malay music done in a certain style). Thus there is little incentive to encourage talent that might be a real competitor in the international field. And when someone (through You Tube or My Space) succeeds in breaking out of the glass ceiling imposed on local musical talent, then they are slagged off by the small minded “guardians of music” as unpatriotic.
I have to say though that there are some misleading points in the article. The author writes, “about half the price of the CD you bought in the record store could be attributed to the manufacturing and retail end of the business”. Actually half the cost of a RM40 CD (the average price) is appropriated by the retailing and wholesaling side, and the record company takes another 30 per cent. So the artist, composer and music publisher cut is 20 per cent. Of this 12 per cent is artist royalties, and the remaining 8 percent goes to the publisher, who in turn pays 50 percent of that to the composer. To be fair, record companies have to foot the bill for studio time, publicity, graphics and office expenses.
There was in fact some years ago a campaign by the government to reduce the price of CDs, in an attempt to combat piracy, but the retailers and wholesalers, the record companies and shop chains would not co-operate. If you think you want to reduce the price of your CD to say RM25 to be fairer to the public and get more sales, the shops won't promote or display as they see their cut being slashed from RM20 to RM12.5.
Regarding the digital division of spoils, Dzof claims that of RM3 for a download, “after deductions for MACP and the publishers and record companies' cut” the artist only receives 16 and a bit cents (5 per cent). This must be an inaccuracy, as the RCOs are there to collect for the artist and composer, not to pocket the money for themselves. So in theory the allocations ought to be about the same as CDs. But even this would be an injustice, since with digital, unlike CDs, the internet portal (equivalent to retailers and wholesalers) does not have to pay rental for a shop and renovate it, employ staff or run a fleet of vans for distribution. So if that parcelling out is true, they must be really shovelling it in! Similarly the record company does not have to print CDs and graphics, it just has to upload an MP3 master onto a website (about 5 minutes of time).
It would be good if we could have more facts about this whole matter. As Dzof so eloquently makes the point, we the public need to really insure that music reaches the people who really want it, that they can hear the music they choose to hear and know where they can buy it. And the powers that be really must promote Malaysian music and make sure the people with the talent get the audience they deserve.
from Peter Hassan Brown
