Jim Griffin CEO, Cherry Lane Digital/Pho (moderator)
Mike Dreese CEO and Co-Founder, Newbury Comics
Peter Jenner Sincere Management and Chairman, AURA and Chairman, IMMF
Gary Shapiro President and CEO, Consumer Electronics Association
Cary Sherman President, Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA)
Tina Weymouth & Chris Frantz Talking Heads/Tom Tom Club

Is this a Good time for being in music?

Shapiro _ this is a transition, we are in the middle of a revolution.  What we are changing is the way everyone has access to music.  Because of technology you have a phenomenal level of choice.  Do no wrong - don't come in an legislate.   You would never have had alot of the ingenuity we have had today had copyright owners gotten everything they have wanted over the years.

Tina
We have to do it all ourselves now.  The new model is labels have to have merchandising.  I didn't get into this to be in the garment business.  I don't have time to write my own music.  We spend all of time to keep our heads above water.  What's going to happen to my kids  - you complain when we get seventy more years on our copyrights, but it my take seventy years to pay for my casket.

The whole republican party has been hijacked by gangsters and crooks.  I never thought the mafia running the music business would look good in comparison.  Deregulation has created Clear Channel.  And record labels have to pay to have music played on the radio.  It costs more to get music played on the radio than to simply buy the ad time.

Mike
The entire world is turning into a brandfest.  Even the spice girls didn't think ehy were going to sell lunchboxes.  The Tiger woods effect is everywhere  - he will eventually collect over one billion in endorsement revenue.  The landscape for artists is changing very rapidly.  People are moving away from radio - or towards Topless Radio.  Just like John Madden footbal steals attention from other entertainment forms, artists have to deal with this.  This is the entertainment business.  But if you want to compete in the entertainment business, you have to think about this new business.  Even google is plain payola, you have to pay for every click through.

Gary
How much is radio really going to matter in the future.  Defeated through indencency laws and the lack of interest by the digital youth.

Mike
When a band that can put 2000 butts in chairs get a $200,000 endorsement from a soda company, is it good or bad.

sadf
Springsteen was offered a bottling plant from a soda company.

Tina
The best music is not in commercials on television.

Manager guy
The essential model that hypnotizes us all is mass media.  COnflict of interest between the huge retailers/labels and radio who all want huge volume from less titles, less choice.  It reminds of Henry Ford - you can have nay car you want as long as it is black.  Technology presents the opp to pass from a mass media model to a mass of niche markets model.  Some of the richest earners in the world have been musicians, which may not continue.  The vast bulk of musicians do not earn a living, while a tiny percentage earn insane amounts of money.

Tina
With marketing and promotion costs where they are, labels cannot afford to break new bands.  Bronfman is killing the industry.  Thanks to deregulation he is able to ruin thousands of people's careers.

curly
When somebody does this no one wants to complain.  We had a good record at Ryko.. they fired the product manager four weeks after our record was released.  They had to let people go in order to survive.  Walking into record companies is not what it used to me.  It;s like walking into a morgue.  You would to hear a telephone ring.

Cary
Its tough being inside the RIAA.  There isn't an appreciation that these are businesses that have to make a profit.  I think its great that bronfman bought Warner, cause AOL wan't do well with it.  When you lose 30% of sales you cannot afford all the employees and the impact is felt by the music.

Jim
Are yo doing more with less at the RIAA

Cary
It is tough.  Not a more challenging job in Washington.  If you try to explain the stakeholders in the music industry, people have no concept of how difficult it is to get things done.  Only in music is there such a multiplicity of players

What about the anti-trust exemption you are looking for?

Cary
Offer new products that bring back the habit of buying music .  Like the DualDisck - CD on one side, DVD on the other. Publishers, say this is more than one copy of themusic - the red book, the compressed file, each DVD version - that's five copies.  Thus they each need to be separately licensed and they may be new types of mechanical licenses.  They was no royalty for streams, subscriptions, until we gave the publishers an advance so we can proceed and agree to a large-scale rate later.


Shapiro
New technology is dislocating.  When the TalkingPicture came out, a lot of people lost their jobs.  For the first time in history, the customer has stepped down in quality.

Tina
We need better software (meaning music).  Who do you fire are record labels - the accountants and lawyers? No the artists and A&R people.

Brit
The present structure of the industry represent the technology of the 20th century,  The future label will act as venture partner and broker of licenisng.  The present heirarchy is disfunctional and will not work.  THey are tasked to an impossible task.  To sign an artist they "know" is going to be a worldwide, star.  You ask people to do stupid things, stupid things result.  We have to find ways to get music into the market in better ways.

Next - Where are we going from here.  Will it cost $40,000 to fill an iPod
Mike

Chris
I get my biggest checks from ASCAP.  Which is directly related to how many times my songs are played.

Tina
Its a good model, as long as it is scaled to the size of the business.  A compulsory (per track) would not scale in the same way.  I don't think sampling is "art".  I don't want to hear the

Peter
My crystal bollucks - the model in 5 or 25 is $100 a year subscription to all the music you want.  There will still be CDs.  There will still be other incremental model.  Everyone will pay for music services.  We will look back and wonder what we were worried about.  The present business model sucks,

Cary
All things that have been said are true, and all are possible.  The industry is re inventing itself .  we will see many new oppotunities.

Shapiro
I can never hear the government the government has all the solutions.  We are becoming more like poland was.  While the internet is providing such a wider level level of choice.