Music Ally

Industry analyst Forrester has just published its boldest report yet, setting out how it sees the distribution of music evolving. And how does it see it evolving? With the deployment of three broad “music release windows”, staggering releases for premium services, then mainstream retailers, and finally ad-supported services.

So, in week one of a release, it’ll be made available to ‘Premium Club’ members through device makers, mobile operators and ISPs. That means people who’ve signed up for music bundled in with their mobile or broadband contracts. From week three, it’ll be made available through mainstream retailers: digital and physical retailers as well as radio. And finally, from week six, it’ll be made available through ad-supported music services.

And beyond that, Forrester says that “the straitjacket of album format can now be shaken off and in its place releases can become part of a continual artist-fan relationship with artists delivering a steady stream of creative output.” That means backstage footage, cover versions, remixes, mobile apps… The stuff that artists and labels are already creating.

“This is an MTV Moment in the digital age for the record labels,” blogs Forrester’s Mark Mulligan. “They only realized that music videos were a value commodity in their own right rather than just a promotional tool by the time MTV had established a successful business. Now it is time for them to learn the same lessons about added value content.”

Thought-provoking stuff indeed.

As the web goes wild reporting the news of the Guilty verdict in The Pirate Bay’s trial, Forrester Research analyst Mark Mulligan has posted a more thoughtful take on the implications of the decision on his personal blog, saying that even though the verdict is by no means definitive, it’s still good news for the music biz.

“The music industry has come out of this with a ruling that is more positive for them than many had been expected,” he writes, before suggesting that “there are some interesting implications from this ruling, most notably the question of whether Google could now be held responsible for posting links to content that does not have copyright cleared?”

However, he points out that the net effect on illegal file-sharing from the verdict will be pretty limited.

“Whatever the ruling would have been, file sharing wouldn’t have gone away. In fact the problem is worse than that, the new additional threat of non-network file sharing (via Instant Messenger, email, blogs, newsgroups, iPod ripping) is growing strongly and becoming firmly established. And then there’s also a whole mass of anonymous networks lurking in the wings.”

Plenty more to read on his full post.