2y ago

How much would you pay to own the only piece of music you would ever have?

Hi music lovers,

I'm a sophomore student, conducting a research project on the value of music. While music is not a physical object that can be tangibly owned like a fine art piece, I am still curious to know how much you would be willing to pay for a piece of music if you could. Of course, it will vary depending on your personal taste as to which artists or genres you like, but I'm hoping to get a general sense of what people think. If you have a few minutes, please take a look at the link below and leave a response. Your feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Link to survey

Thanks in advance!

13 comments

I'm confused about what exactly you're asking. Are you asking what is the maximum we would spend on a piece of music, like an album or a song? Or are you asking what is the maximum we would spend to be the sole owner of a piece of music?
- First, I apologize if my question was unclear. I was mainly interested in discussing the latter.
  
  No worries. Personally, the only reason I would want sole ownership of a piece of music would be to release it freely to as many people as possible.
  Wu-Tang Clan made an album back in 2015, only one copy of the album was ever made and it isn't available digitally. The album was originally sold for $2 million, before it was seized by the US government and resold for $4 million to settle debt.
  If I were to somehow come into ownership of something like this, I would work to somehow release it to the public (like the current owner is). I don't like the idea of hoarding art for myself.
@eleste I will also complete your form, but I'm struggling to imagine how this would look like in practice. In painting, you would own the original painting and all other paintings would be made after it would be just a copy. I guess in music's case it would be a negative copy of some sort for that particular record? Or if i.e. an album would be recorded digitally, that would mean owning the original files or the hard disk they were originally stored? What if the files were copied on a USB stick or transfered through whatever means from computer to computer? Or if they were restored from a backup, would that mean that their value would be affected in any way?
- Original recordings and masters are worth something, if I owned the original masters of a favourite song or album I'd be beyond pleased.
  
  Thank you so much for leaving your opinion here. Yes if it's possible I personally believe it would be amazing...
- First of all, thank you for complete this form.
  In order for the concept of owning music to work in the same way as owning a work of art, there needs to be a way to control the replication of music. This is difficult to achieve because it is very easy to replicate and transmit digital music.
  However, the music industry is exploring new ways to own music. For example, some music streaming services allow users to download specific songs or albums for offline listening. In this case, users obtain a kind of "digital ownership" of the song or album.
  In addition, new ways to manage music ownership are being developed using blockchain technology. Blockchain is a distributed ledger that can track and manage ownership of digital assets. By using blockchain to manage music ownership, it will be possible to control the replication and transmission of music and protect the value of music more effectively.
  It will be interesting to see how new ways to own music will develop in the future.
I would steal it.
Honestly, money is so toxic to art that I'd avoid trying to look at it through that lens. Value doesn't equal dollars, and it's shameful that the two are so often equated.
Bit confused what you are asking about, as "own" could mean everything from full copyright to the piece in multiple countries & the ability to collect royalties & to sue people for using the piece without your permission, to owning the original written manuscript & composers' notes, or owning a master recording, or a copy to play as one wished, or just access to a copy.
When you ask about the dollar value I'd give to specific pieces, I don't know whether you want to know how I'd assign a monetary amount to the value to humanity, to the music industry, to the artists involved, the retail price of an album or single, or just what I'd pay today to hear those pieces.
I'd have no interest in owning full rights to music I had no part in creating, so wouldn't want to buy such a thing - guess if someone gave me something like this as a gift I'd make it available to the world on a CCC license or similar?
Manuscripts & master recordings? Again, I'd want to make these accessible to the public.
Physical & digital copies of recordings am happy to buy, and do this instead of streaming. Have copies of the released stuff your survey mentions, but idk what I paid for any of it.
- My question was a bit vague, but the main point was to ask how much personal value a particular music piece has. In other words, how much money someone is willing to pay to own that piece. In this regard, it's important to compare owning music to owning a painting. For example, you have the right to display and sell it to others, but you don't have the right to perform it, own the copyright, or create derivative works. Because this is a new concept, I wanted to know what people think about it. In the simplest terms, I want to discuss the value of a work of art when it is compared to the act of buying and selling a painting.
  
  Still a bit confused - haven't we been able to do this since the gramophone (if not before, idk much about early media)?
  Vinyl, tapes, CDs, etc. & digital files? These can all be bought & sold today. My city doesn't have as many record stores as it did in my teens, but two of the big chains are still here as well as one big independent, there's a few small specialists & several second-hand places. Supermarkets & charity shops often have a small selection of new & second-hand respectively. Vinyl sales are steadily increasing & though I can't imagine cassettes making much of a comeback, one local hifi shop recommenced stocking cassette players a while ago, and now carries three of them.
  To display a piece of music you can usually apply to the copyright holder for a license - this is typically very expensive, with prices set by negotiation according to the purpose & frequency of the intended display and the audience size.
  For the pieces in your survey which I have copies of, I paid whatever was the standard retail price at the time, but that spans ~16 years in different parts of the world. Sometimes music purchases felt expensive, at other times I was able to buy more than one album at once, but more often than not music purchases were plain out of reach. If I had to replace my whole collection now I doubt I'd bother, as I don't really listen to music anymore, but if only a few albums got damaged I'd probably be ok replacing them at current retail prices.
  Doubt I'd pay more for as-yet-unreleased work than for music which is already out there.

13 comments