ABSTRACT
It is no secret that the twenty-first century has thus far not been kind to the recording industry. Declining sales, a series of public relations misjudgements (not least of which involved suing their own customers), superstar defections, shrinking retail space and the sorry tale of EMI have all contributed to the impression of an industry in serious difficulties and struggling to adapt to the pace of change in an online music environment. Indeed, some have argued that the twentieth-century model of the recording industry is no longer relevant as ‘the commercial value of providing access to an individual track is infinitesimally close to zero’ (Wikstrom 2009: 6). It is easy to find many pronouncements that the major labels in particular have entered a terminal decline (for example, Williamson and Cloonan in this volume).
