A new website is promising to put the Music Industry on its’ head. DanceFreeway.com is a new site dedicated to offering dance music fans free legal mp3 downloads in an easy to use environment. There’s no registration required, and no maze of pop up ads and “special offers.”
“So what’s the catch?”, asked Ron HIrsch of DanceFreeway.com. “There is no catch. Yes, you will see ads on the site, but they won’t interfere with your ability to stream or download music…all at no charge.”
The site is actually the brainchild of record label, Act 2 Records. So why would a record label design a site to give away their music and others’? Isn’t that counter productive to making money? I asked this question to Act 2’s President Ron Hirsch. He said that “the Economics of the Music Industry have changed so dramatically, that it has forced us to re-evaluate how people value music. Clearly people still enjoy music, but they’re just not going to pay $16 for a CD anymore. And frankly, 99 cents or lower for a download is a good deal for the consumer, however it’s too small a margin for a label to sustain itself.”
So then what is the value of music? Mr. Hirsch believes that “music has value as a promotional product. And that the Music Industry’s future will more closely resemble other mediums like radio and television. Specifically, we will offer a free product (ie music), and sustain ourselves by selling advertisements.”
DanceFreeway.com was launched in May 2008 with 2 sister sites (HipHopFreeway.com & RockFreeway.com) launched in June. Mr. Hirsch states that “so far the amount of traffic and the amount of downloads hasgreatly surpassed our most aggressive estimates.”
But not everything’s free on the site. The basic premise for the site is that in exchange for Artist’s offering songs for free, they will be allowed to post additional songs that people can purchase and they will receive 100% of the net proceeds.
“It’s really a win-win-win & win concept”, says Mr. Hirsch. “The User wins by getting free downloads in an easy to use legal environment. The Artist wins by getting exposure to new fans and incremental revenue. The Advertiser wins by getting a targeted consumer. And we win by creating an additional stream of revenue for ourselves.”
Mr. Hirsch goes on to say: “It’s really a fun process. It’s like the old days again. We help new Artists’ get exposure, (recently having one get signed to a major record deal), and we also get to turn people on to some great new music. What could be better?”
Artists may “Get On The Freeway” by submitting an application on line at one of the three current sites. Futuresites include CountryFreeway, IndieFreeway, LatinFreeway, ChristianFreeway and others.