Posts by BrownHouseMedia

Absolutely -

I have seen this statement in many other threads and would like to hear peoples thoughts on the topic. I agree on some level all art is subjective but by and large I think you can define “quality” music.

I live in Nashville TN which is one of two or three places in the United States that are the heart of the music business. I can tell you that here there is never a discussion on the subjective question of quality. You can take a song or track to any producer or music executive in town and immediately get the same response from any of them as to whether the track is “quality” or not. They may not like the piece creatively but they can recognize good vs bad.

I am throwing this out there because I have seen this posted on many other threads and honestly don’t understand what it means. In the world I live in quality it is pretty easy to identify.

Any thoughts.

soundroll said

garethcoker said
I don’t think you need to have ‘hit’ tracks to be successful here on Audiojungle (and people’s definition of success is different). You just need to have stuff that sounds good. I’m amazed at some of the things that people buy on Audiojungle, and for that reason, I keep my portfolio varied. As I said before, the only real problem I have is the new authors coming in and flooding the marketplace with new material, it should probably be controlled a little bit better. Apart from that, this marketplace is huge and there’s lots of opportunity here if you stick around.

Very well explained, Gareth. Sometimes I’m confused too when I see what people buy. And maybe, you’re right about some upload limitation or better control, and , like Scott mentioned, some test for new author before he submits his files.

I think you guys are exactly right. This is a marketplace and buyers will buy what works visually for their project. I also agree that it would be nice for some test for new author before he submits his files.

For what it is worth, I think the royalty rates and generally low price of the music on AJ could be driving good authors away if anything is.

Do you think “new” artists generating one-thousand sales are the norm, or the outliers? It’s a serious question I have since you have been on the marketplace longer.

I have been seriously on the marketplace for less than a year – I posted my first track last February but got serious several months later. In my experience it is the exception that a new artist sells a 1000 tracks in a year – but generally that is how the music business and the creative world work. 95%-98% of all artist on labels never make back enough money to pay for their production and promotional costs. The 2% carry the label. Although Tim McMorris is the exception (Tim I hope you don’t mind I used you as an example) he proves that with a lot of hard work (he also markets himself very well) you can make a series impact in a short amount of time.

What would you consider a new artist? How long would an artist have to be with AJ to be new in your mind? 6 months 1 year? I am just curious – there has been a lot of discussion of perceived “unfairness” to new authors.

I have to respectfully disagree with you. Take Tim McMorris for example – he posted his first song in August of 2010 (7 months ago). I would consider him a new author and he is burning up the charts. He has 28 items in his portfolio and has nearly 1000 sales. He does great work and has a very commercial portfolio. I could point out other artists that have similar track records in a less than a year.

I am going to go out on a limb and say that I think if anything the marketplace is too fair to new artists. There is quite a lot of material that gets uploaded and never sells or only sells 1 or 2 times because it is not mainstream and not really what a consumer visiting a music library is looking for. I think the top artist could make a case that the current system of only posting new music on the front page and not posting the best selling tracks un-fairly slants the marketplace to new artists.

Look at itunes or any other store – what is placed on the homepage – their best selling stuff or the stuff that has the potential to be the best selling.

I can understand a new artists frustration with the perceived difficulty of “breaking in at AJ”, this is a marathon not a sprint. It takes time, a commercial portfolio and a catalog that is big enough to generate consistent revenue.

Does that mean that every early track that has high sales should be popular today? Absolutely and without question not. You’re basically saying that what may now be a not-so-hot “hip hop” track should still show up as #1 in popularity even though there are lots of other great and perhaps better engineered/written tracks. I disagree. What if an old “hip hop” track is written in the style of Heavy D, but now the 50 Cent sound is popular. Should the Heavy D file still be the #1 popular track today? What? It makes no sense. Sure, someone may want that sound today, but it won’t be a top seller like it once was. That’s why we need to keep popularity nice and flexible – it has to reflect recent sales. If you removed the stars and sales numbers and one of the tracks with a high sales number still makes big sales every week and month, then GREAT !! Put it up at the top of the popular files! It deserves to be there! I have nothing against that.

I think we can agree to disagree. I think top selling files are there for a reason. In your example the buyer can decide that they want 50 Cent instead of Heavy D and if enough buyers make that decision the 50 Cent file will move down the list and the Heavy D will move up the list. Hey the Beatles are still on the front page of iTunes and its been a while since they made any new music.

Its been a great discussion and I appreciate the community here that we can have honest but respectful conversations.

Cheers

Tim

Let’s say we wipe out sales and stars from showing up. Then we calculate sales for 3-6 months based on search alone – I am certain that you’ll have a much more accurate version of what “popular” files are. If we go from there I think this place will be highly competitive and the playing field will be leveled and completely fair. I would be very curious in hearing someone argue that the current system is more fair or more beneficial to both the customer or author. And I mean that in all sincerity. I would like to understand.

Ron, I get your point about posting the actual number of sales – I have seen it both ways. I have seen a few sites that post a number range >10 >100 etc…

As far as changing the way the popular files are calculated I think the current system is fine. The top authors got there because their content was strong. They built AJ into the popular library it is and deserve to benefit from their hard work and patience. Without them there would not be a strong marketplace for new authors to break into. I don’t see how penalizing the top authors helps the marketplace. AJ has a special section dedicated to new authors http://audiojungle.net/page/top_new_sellers.

On a totally different note – I don’t think many authors understand the purpose of a music library. Producers/buyers are looking for a very specific and narrow range of music for the most part. An authors tracks can be amazing but if they aren’t commercial i.e. what video/tv/web and radio producers are looking for they won’t sell. I don’t want to knock anyones library but I see a lot of authors complaining about sales but when you look at their library of tracks they are not commercially viable libraries and unlikely to be what producers are looking for. (as a disclaimer I have not looked at any of the libraries of the authors posting in this thread so this is not being pointed at any particular author – just a general comment based on my experience here at AJ)

I agree with Ron about sales count stat – why not make it visible only to authors, and give buyers a list of items ordered only by relevance (tags match), so new authors (like me) could have a chance.

I have to say that I disagree – as both a seller and especially a buyer – I know that I like to be able to sort based on sales. Files that sell well usually sell well for a reason – generally a good selling file is done well and has a broad appeal.

I’ve never come across an established library that shows # of sales.

I agree. My only qualm with AudioJungle is our commission table. Our highest selling exclusive author has around 2300 sales of items averaging say $11 each. ThemeForest has about 75 exclusive authors with more than 2300 sales of items averaging $30 each.

I have too agree, in my opinion, the prices for the audio files on AJ are too low and the non-exclusive commission is way to low as well. I would live to see the prices inch their way up – I can’t imagine a price jump from say $14 to $19 would scare many buyers away. Just my thoughts.

Scott,

Here are my suggestions:

http://audiojungle.net/item/blue-skies/165806

http://audiojungle.net/item/finding-my-way/166806

http://audiojungle.net/item/above-and-beyond/164090

Thanks!

Tim

Scott,

Here are my three suggestions.

http://audiojungle.net/item/blue-skies/165806

http://audiojungle.net/item/song-for-tomorrow/163296

http://audiojungle.net/item/strolling-along/166824

Thanks

Tim