There are few industries under siege as much as the music industry. Ever since Napster introduced the concept of peer-to-peer file sharing to music fans around the world in 1999, music CD sales have been plummeting.

Apple has managed to successfully offer a legitimate avenue for music fans to buy and download songs through the Internet. However that service is not available everywhere. Malaysia is a case in point. Until today it's not possible to buy music online from Apple's iTunes store.

To make matters worse, some artists - including big names like The Rolling Stones and The Beatles - initially refused to make their songs available to online music stores.

Music fans reacted by making their songs available for free download on file-sharing networks.

The recording industry has managed to shut down some of the bigger file-sharing networks like Kazaa and Limeshare. But it's still possible to trade files via services like BitTorrent, which offers a more distributed form of file-sharing and thus is harder to shut down.

Still living in denial

The emergence of hosting services, such as Rapidshare, Hotfile and Filesonic, has also made it easier for people to share music with others. The result is that illegal music sharing is still as rampant as ever.

Some artists like Prince are still living in denial. Last year when he launched his album 20Ten, he famously declared, "The Internet's completely over", and refused to make his music available through online music store.

You can, of course, find his music online. It's just not a legal version but it's completely free.

However, instead of dismissing the Internet, some artistes are embracing it and trying out very innovative ways to market their music in an effort to keep their offerings commercially viable.

A few years ago, Radiohead released its seventh album, In Rainbows, via the band's own website under a radical scheme.

NONECustomers were allowed to set their own price, including choosing not to pay. It was only a few months later that a CD version of their album was released.

Lady Gaga, one of the biggest acts in the world right now, has just launched her new album with a marketing blitz that would make an new media guru proud.

She did the usual TV appearances and gave magazine interviews, as would be expected of any major artist releasing a new album. But she also did many other things online that could pave the way for the way music is marketed in the future.

The most notable one is the deal she struck with Amazon.com which sold her Born This Way album for just US$0.99. That's not for one song but for the whole album! The special offer was so irresistible that the flood of orders temporarily disrupted Amazon's servers.

This is no mean feat given that Amazon is a major cloud services provider which offers industrial grade hosting services. For its own servers to crash meant the traffic must have really been on a scale totally unexpected.

NONEBy early afternoon of the launch day, Amazon's servers stalled and the company Tweeted a message announcing the glitch: "We're currently experiencing very high volume. If you order today, you will get the full @ladygaga album for $.99. Thanks for your patience."

Another non-traditional partner Lady Gaga teamed up with was Disney Mobile, the publisher of the very popular Tap Tap Revenge game. Lady Gaga fans were given full access to the entire album and additional content if they buy the game "Born This Way Revenge" for US$4.99.

It's significant because it's the first time the company has sold an entire album worth of songs with a game for such a low price.

Amazing use of the social media

One of the reasons they decided to do this was the immense following Lady Gaga has via social networks like Twitter, where she has over 10.5 million followers and Facebook, where some 36 million fans like her official page.

"I've never seen anything as powerful as when Gaga hits her social media channels compared to anyone else that we've worked with," said Tim O'Brien vice-president of business development at Disney Mobile. "I've never seen anything like it in terms of how she's utilising social media."

NONEOne of the most popular games on Facebook is Farmville. Zynga, the publisher of that game has teamed up with Lady Gaga to offer Gagaville. As its name implies, this is basically a Lady Gaga-themed farm with quirky elements like unicorns and sheep riding motorcycles.

Gagaville fans will be encouraged to listen to songs from "Born This Way" and those who purchase a Zynga game card worth US$25 from Best Buy will receive the new album for free. Players will also have the chance to win concert tickets and an autographed copy of the album.

Other digital tie-ups include a partnership with Starbucks, which besides selling her physical CD also launched a digital scavenger hunt for Lady Gaga-themed items; Google Chrome, which created a commercial with Lady Gaga featuring track from the album; and Gilt Groupe, an online fashion vendor that sells Lady Gaga-themed clothing.

"It was really about expanding the distribution on this album and going into as many non-traditional retail partnerships and non-traditional marketing partnerships as possible," Lady Gaga's manager, Troy Carter, told Associated Press.

"Just with the diminishing music labels, you want to find quality partners where you know you can reach new audiences and being able to push boundaries as well."

Perhaps Prince could learn a thing or two from Lady Gaga.

 


OON YEOH is managing editor of a local publishing house. You can follow him at www.twitter.com/oonyeoh