Cheap Trick’s Manager David Frey Responds To SoundScan Controversy
On Thursday' Cheap Trick manager David Frey published a scathing attack on the collection and sale of artust data by Soundscan and others. I wrote a rebuttal on Hypebot suggesting that the culprit was not to much data, but rather the lack of artist access to it. Last night Frey responded:
"Thanks for the constructive criticism.
The point is that the band simply didn't want SoundScan to track this release.
I certainly didn't mean to come off whining and complaining, I'm not, and I agree with most of what you've written here.
And this was also written in reply to a prior post on this topic.
In my opinion (Cheap Trick's) "The Latest" is a record and there's never been a better time to be in the record business, The Latest has exceeded our expectations.
The distributor(s) of The Latest, including Tunecore provide us with fantastic information on who is buying what.
So in my opinion SoundScans' only stake in the band's new self release is to sell what I view as the BAND's information to others.
I called SoundScan in advance asking them to ignore this release, but "they can't."And you're right, this is an old topic, from an excerpt from thesis on Strategic Information Management:
"Given the ‘hit-and-miss’ nature of the music business, a key competitive edge for a trendsetting retailer like Newbury Comics is knowing what will sell, and then selling these products aggressively and exclusively within a short window of time. As Dreese of Newbury Comics discovered, among the beneficiaries of the information provided by SoundScan are intermediaries like Handleman. Handleman credits SoundScan with getting them detailed information that it uses for inventory planning and replenishment at the stores of clients like Wal-Mart. Once Newbury Comics realized to what extent its mainstream competitors such as Wal-Mart were benefitting from the precise regional data that it shared with SoundScan— information which these competitors could never compile on their own— it ‘pulled the plug’ and stopped sharing information with SoundScan." (source)
So I figured why couldn't Cheap Trick simply "pull the plug" like Dreese did?
And now that I've poked the bear I'll concede that I'm an information predator also.
I've paid for information on the band's fans; who bought what, when, how, and all that, and it's been tremendously useful. When a show is put on sale or an amazon.com promotion is scheduled I've arranged for info on who bought before, even did the; "if you liked this band you'll probably like that band" program.
I simply feel that the only entity who should message any band's fans is that band themselves. So to me Cheap Trick buying information on Cheap Trick's fans is okay, but others may not be.
If SoundScan bought information on SoundScan's fans or if Ticketmaster bought information on Ticketmaster's fans, that would be fantastic. Maybe like Apple has with Apple fans.
And again, this is only my opinion on an old topic." – David Frey
David is right…sales info for Cheap Trick belongs to Cheap Trick. Soundscan has no place even having that DATA, & monetizing it is not only criminal, it also constitutes career damage.
David if your lurking, our wheatus.com numbers are totally quarantined & paypal direct. They surpass any of our other distro in MANY other ways as well. Also please ask the guys to take us on tour cause I could die happy then… Ok, that is all.
brendan b brown
wheatus.com
I agree with the intent behind what David says here (that there’s potentially a data privacy issue at stake), but disagree with one small aspect of this: the idea that what is countable can and should only be counted by the person doing the countable thing.
There are so many valuable – even critical – services, particularly outside of the music industry, in which the collection, aggregation, interpretation and provision of data can, should or must be performed by a third party.
Obvious examples include instances where online services provide public data on countable things done by government or corporate bodies for the purposes of informing or inspiring to collective action.
And only an information aggregator (like, say, Last.fm or Amazon) can provide Cheap Trick fans with usable and reliable ‘If you like Cheap Trick, you’ll also like…’ data.
Cheap Trick has no intrinsic motivation to direct their fans to other acts they might like – possibly even more than they like Cheap Trick – other than to just be nice and helpful.
Which is always a good (if not a common) strategy.
Mr. Frey’s analogy with Newbury Comics is a poor one.
Newbury Comics is the owner (and sole source) of information about what CDs Newbury Comics is selling. Newbury can choose to withhold that information from Soundscan.
Cheap Trick’s management does not control information about what Retailer A sells to Customer B; they are not a party in the transaction. If Cheap Trick wants to avoid Soundscan, then they need to avoid Soundscan-linked retailers.
If you rely on SoundScan exclusively, you may be concerned to learn about the many questionable “reporting” procedures.
1) Books a Million is a SoundScan reporter and has been for as long back as I can remember and they are “heavily weighted” yet prior to their on line store, they did not sell CD’s in their stores
2) The “Weighting” issue. One store in Long beach, CA has the weight of 7 stores due to the fact that soundscan claims if there were 7 stores specializing in “urban” music in this particular neighborhood, then 7 cd’s would have been purchased, but since thats the only store in the neighborhood, they call each sale, 7 units. Huh?
3) Club sales reporting. When a Bar Manager can sign off on how many CD’s an artist sold at their bar you have to question that. I think the bar manager can only attest to how many cocktails were sold at his bar!
Since David is all fired up about the rights of Cheap Trick, I think it’s only fair that the egregious and onerous photo release that they foist upon photographers is also brought up, as counterbalance. Basically, in order to take photos of the band in concert (for legitimate editorial usage, which garners publicity for the band free of charge), they take any and all copyrights, and are free to use the photos in any manner without any compensation to the photographer.
http://www.flickr.com/groups/concertshots/discuss/72157608692726945/?search=cheap+trick
Myself and my editor respectfully declined to be taken advantage of in this manner.
The notion that the manufacturer of a product is the only entity entitled to information about its retail sales is just nonsensical. Extening wallow-T’s comments, if this were enforced, Newbury Comics would not even be allowed to use its own sales data. But, Frey’s use of “mystique” in his original remarks makes me wonder if he’s primary concern is not about fan-abuse or label-misuse, but public knowledge of how many albums Cheap Trick sold – or didn’t sell.