Conventions & Awards

What Should We Talk About At The MIDEM Bar?

image from www.midemclassicalawards.com During January's MIDEM international music convention in Cannes, I've been asked to host a day of their new MIDEM+ program. It's a great opportunity to get off the convention floor to network in a much more intimate setting. Part of the my job as a "Connector" is to host an informal discussion at the MIDEM+ bar. I'll let the wonderful folks from MIDEM explain:

image from popsop.ru "MIDEM+ delegates will be invited to join you at the MIDEM+ bar, for a one hour of informal discussion about a new business topic of interest pertaining to the Music Industry. This session will be announced in the programme as 'Join the Conversation with Bruce Houghton', and is scheduled from 3:30pm to 4:30pm."

They're asking me to choose a topic and I'd love to hear your suggestions. What should we talk about at the Midem+ bar? I hope to see you there.

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10 Comments

  1. It kinda depends who attends Midem+! Labels are probably wondering how to actually make money out of Spotify and MySpace. Managers will have different concerns. I still feel one of the most pressing issues is one of the oldest: how to break through the clutter to get noticed beyond one’s direct circle, whether you be a label, an artist or an Internet radio. [Raising voice] It is kinda noise tonight on the web!

  2. You have your finger on the pulse of new companies, artist trends, thought leaders. I’d use that as a way to educate those who come on what the meaningful trends are in digital marketing, online music sales, touring, etc…
    Is the format more of a townhall q&a or keynote? Do you have a choice?

  3. You guys should talk about whether the music tax(music like water) or ad supported streaming should be the next model.
    Or perhaps how the emergence of the semantic web aka web 3.0 will change the way we discover & consume music.

  4. How about what other industries ex-music execs have successfully transitioned to. There is a world outside this beleagured business.

  5. How technology has changed the music industry. That could easily be broken down into more specific topics, like social media, digital music, DIY vs A&R, booking tours, recording, etc.

  6. Been attending Midem since 2002, a couple of suggestions for conversation
    1. A short discussion of Case studies and success stories re: independents in terms of actual deal-making while at Midem. Types of deals, etc. What should indies and artist attending Midem come to expect?
    2. Viable and scaleable Business management resources tools and systems for indie, DIY artists and labels. While there’s a plethora of tools and solutions out there to assist DIY artists and indies, what are the most practical solutions? Which solutions are best-suited to meet the needs of today’s DIY artist?
    3. Indie Labels and artists now require more complete data transparency from aggregators, distributors and service providers, alike. For services to treat indies and majors differently when it comes to data transparency is downright insulting. How can we pro-actively get our partners to give us what we need in order to make more intelligent business decisions and achieve greater ROI?
    4. A uniform set of reporting metrics. Bandmetrics uses a “gold, silver, bronze”, Big Champagne uses traffic, others make ***t up. Better reporting criteria and scale is needed.
    5. A thoughtful and fruitful discussion on Social Media best practices for artists and labels.
    That’s it for now, thanks and happy holidays

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