Peer2Politics

The authors have through this research determined that the artists in the Norwegian recording industry have 4 main sources of income: live revenue, state subsidization and grants, collection distributed to artists, and sales of music physically and digitally. It turned out the declining record sales, which dominate the media picture, only amounted to about 19% of the total artist income in 1999. Today after many years of decline it is 11% of the total income for artists. As such the media were right to point out that record sales are dropping and income will decline, however the total importance of this income source was never more than 20%. This is a reflection of the calculations that from a record sold from producer to retailer, only about 20% in average of the sales amount is returned to the record artists. Live revenue on the other hand has an artist share of about 50% from all income and hence all income increases here will have a larger effect both negatively and positively if the total amount in the industry changes.

The best way to support an artist is to pay then directly. — Ethan Diamond

Ethan Diamond is co-founder of bandcamp, a site established to support musicians.