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Posted: |
Oct 23, 2010 - 2:38 AM
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By: |
John Smith
(Member)
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Lukas did his math and produced a product aimed at a target market he estimated would lead to a certain number of sales.
The people he hoped would snap up the set apparently haven't done so. People here can write all they like about other people being to blame, and post young girls' addresses or Facebook pages etc, but that's a red herring. It doesn't address why the product isn't selling in hoped-for numbers to regular FSM customers who have never file shared in their lives.
Let me try to address this problem. I don’t want to indulge in a string of generalizations because that would serve to obfuscate rather than clarify the matter. I will speak exclusively for myself and explain why I have not bought the Ron Jones Box.
I am a longtime soundtrack collector and spend roughly $250 a month on CDs. I am a regular FSM customer and have in my sizeable collection all the earlier FSM boxes and all but a dozen of Lukas’s regular FSM and Retrograde releases - approximately 200 CDs.
However, I am not only a collector but also a listener. In fact, an album’s “listenability” invariably takes precedence over its “collectability”. I never buy a limited edition CD unless I know I will enjoy the music. In fact, I have a simple rule of thumb: I must like at least 50% of an album to justify purchasing it. That’s why, for example, I never bought FSM’s The Omega Man CD, even though I had ample opportunity to do so at the regular price and was certain that it would sell out. (Incidentally, I have never bought a CD just to resell it at a profit.) I listened to the extensive samples of TOM (Lukas used to make entire albums available for pre-listening purposes) and decided that the listenability quotient was simply not high enough.
The same is true of the Ron Jones Box.
Frankly, the Ron Jones Box holds little appeal for me. I have the music from all the Star Trek films and all the released music from the first Star Trek series. Like many people here, I would buy in a heartbeat a box which contained all the remaining TOS music. Maybe it’s a shortcoming in my musical education, but I just can’t warm to this style of music. I have listened repeatedly to the samples and have just finished rewatching all the Ron Jones episodes of TNG on DVD. I still don’t feel enough of a connection with the music to want to have the box. Let me stress that money does not constitute a limiting factor here at all.
Should I buy the box just to support FSM? I don’t think so. After all, I am sure that, eventually, the box will sell out (in spite of the price) and I wouldn’t want to deny a more sympathetic soundtrack fan the pleasure of listening to this music. Since I am legally not allowed to copy the box for such a person, the CDs would just gather dust on my shelves.
To be absolutely honest, I have to admit my rule of thumb is frequently broken by the completist within me. I hate synth scores yet I have every one of Jerry Goldsmith’s CDs. I dislike funk yet I have McQ because it’s by Elmer Bernstein. And so on.
Unfortunately, Ron Jones is not on my very short completist list.
Should I force myself to listen to the box in the hope that I will undergo a "Road to Damascus"- like epiphany?
Perhaps, but I tried with Maurice Jarre at Lukas’s instigation many years ago and, after countless listens, ended up disliking Jarre’s music even more.
The fact is that the soundtrack community is highly compartmentalized, musically speaking. Some of us will buy absolutely everything and others will confine themselves to a select few CDs within a particular genre of music or from a particular composer.
And there are hundreds of permutations in between.
The size of the pressing may play a deciding role here, as may the price. However, these two factors are not the be-all and end-all for all soundtrack fans, as I hope I have demonstrated above.
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LUKAS, CRUSH THOSE BASTARDS!!!!
I've been out of the loop for the last two weeks and didn't realize all the discussion going on about those pirates at FFShrine. I haven't had time to read all 860 posts in this thread, but believe me, in time I will.
I'm mad as hell right now. I just got home a few hours ago from Moscow only to find out that FFShrine has our Fahrenheit 451 CD up there as well. Bill, John and I didn't just spend two weeks in the studio working our asses off on more recording so these losers can steal it for free. IT TRULY BREAKS MY HEART!!
Without becoming a member I'm not able to do a search, so I have no idea how many more of our Tribute CDs they've got up there.
I do want to say it makes me happy to see so much support from many of you on this board who can appreciate and understand the many months of labor and $$ us small labels go through to get our albums released. We put our blood, sweat and tears into these recordings and we do it because we're fans too. Most of us aren't getting rich doing this, we're just hoping to break even.
Anna,
If you try to become a member, they'll probably block and ban you. And if you complain, they'll probably just accuse you of whining. It's frustrating.
That said, if you complain to the moderator, I believe she will add you to the list of labels people aren't allowed to upload. Not that there should be a list, of course. All uploads of copyright material should be banned.
Incidentally, I adore your F451 CD and I play it all the time. The official CD, of course!!
Cheers
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Posted: |
Oct 23, 2010 - 6:05 AM
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By: |
Moonie
(Member)
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I hope Lukas & others get satisfaction with this site, I take it there are laws about this sort of thing. But what I can't understand is the 5000 copies of the Ron Jones Box. TV music is a niche market within a niche market, & people are really looking at what they spend these days. There's been so many releases, & a lot of multi-disc releases from FSM. Delivered, this box is a lot of money. I would have thought 1000-1500 was more like it. The prices of so many other things are dropping, I've just bought the Blu-ray Lord Of The Rings Trilogy for £18 delivered, that's what a single soundtrack from the US would cost me! These aren't fantastic times & I have to realy want something before I buy it these days.
and the market is real tuff right now , many including me are out of work, no money and you have to eat, hehe, I was able to get this by selling some of my cds on ebay, but Im a Star Trek nut I had to have it.
and in saying , most Star Trek , Trekkie's or Trekkers who just love the show dont know squat about the music.
I worked with some at one time who couldnt tell me who even wrote the theme music, but they could tell you how many hairs were on Spocks head.
5000 to me right now at least is a bit overkill. I mean lets get real here, and I love the set but we are talking about 160 (give or take with postage ) dollars for 14 cds of Star Trek music , a Deal for me or you but not most people.
At another time awhile ago someone was selling a set of scores on ebay or amazon saying he or she thought they were buying the movie or tv shows, got home put it on and said what the blank is this??
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Posted: |
Oct 23, 2010 - 8:36 AM
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By: |
John Smith
(Member)
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But what I can't understand is the 5000 copies of the Ron Jones Box.
I get the impression from the incredulity expressed in some of these posts that people suspect Lukas plucked the figure of 5,000 out of a hat!
Or do posters think that Lukas’s greed got the better of his judgement?
Yes, 750,000 dollars (the maximum possible revenue) seems like a lot of money to the average wage earner. However, I am absolutely convinced the box cost a truly phenomenal amount of money to produce. Licensing fees, musicians’ fees, production costs and vendors’ profits will, undoubtedly, swallow up most of the sales income generated.
As for a pressing of 1,000, which some of you consider realistic in terms of potential sales, well, I’m sorry, but anyone who thinks it’s possible to produce a 14-disc set of this calibre for $150,000 and still have change left over for bed and board, is living in cloud-cuckoo land. Of course, Lukas could have made the box a limited release of 1,000 units and raised the price to $300 or $350 to offset costs, but imagine what the outcry would be on this message board…
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Posted: |
Oct 23, 2010 - 8:58 AM
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By: |
CinemaScope
(Member)
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But what I can't understand is the 5000 copies of the Ron Jones Box.
I get the impression from the incredulity expressed in some of these posts that people suspect Lukas plucked the figure of 5,000 out of a hat!
Or do posters think that Lukas’s greed got the better of his judgement?
Yes, 750,000 dollars (the maximum possible revenue) seems like a lot of money to the average wage earner. However, I am absolutely convinced the box cost a truly phenomenal amount of money to produce. Licensing fees, musicians’ fees, production costs and vendors’ profits will, undoubtedly swallow up most of the sales income generated.
As for a pressing of 1,000, which some of you consider realistic in terms of potential sales, well, I’m sorry, but anyone who thinks it’s possible to produce a 14-disc set of this calibre for $150,000 and still have change left over for bed and board, is living in cloud-cuckoo land. Of course, Lukas could have made the box a limited release of 1,000 units and raised the box price to $300 or $350 to offset costs, but imagine what the outcry would be on this message board…
I agree, 1000-1500 copies is probably financially a non starter, but it's one thing to releases 5000 copies & quite another to sell them!
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Last night, I had a turkey sandwich and some cole slaw at Brent's Deli.
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BTW, I didn't share any of it.
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