Gadgetory

good Monday morning it is the 13th of februari in his episode 178 of the 359 podcast at Roger Cheng Ben Fox Rubin and Joni salzman all crammed into this tiny little podcaster yeah okay happy monday is it is it happy yeah sure we'll make it happy that's right happier now that we're on this podcast and we're talking about some weird stuff today not weird and weird i'm on the grammys very topical right we're gonna be talking about chance the rapper why what has wind is so revolutionary and then we'll for the rest of time talking about verizon surprisingly jumping into an unlimited data plan and Roger gets to eat some crow yeah I know by the way they were just touting their five big plan like a week ago like you don't need a limited you just need five gig so not just me I think there's also since either i know a lot of this huh 5g they're everywhere everywhere everywhere I know I know a lot of good kind of it is for the dude that's going up an escalator and getting into an elevator and just kind of walking around with his phone everywhere yeah he seems to have his life he's ago it yeah he definitely has a life together every commercial though there's like one part of it where it's like him and a girl and they're in an audience and they're both looking at their phones except there's nobody else the audience except for like one of the person sees like excuse me can I get by and they feel like stand-ups letter by letter like everything around them and something I hate that guy that guy is not a nice guy the guy that's walking through all right all right let's uh sure we've broken down the topic if you have any questions as always leave them in the comments section Brian will will pick out the best we will try to answer them in four minutes or less alright let's get this recording out away here we go for the 359 podcast episode 178 in three two welcome to 359 when we talk about the top tags of the day and only the crap we want to throw in I'm Roger Jen I'm Ben Fox Rubin & I'm Joanie salsa so congrats to chance the rapper who won big at the grammy's last night he won for Best New Artist rap album and rap performance and that's despite the fact that he's never sold an album or track so we've got media maven Jones also here to talk about why this is such a big deal so break it down for us all right so this is the first time that an artist who pretty much exclusively streams his music doesn't sell it as a CD or as a download has not only been nominated for Grammy but one in some epic categories for ya um so it's interesting I think the fact that chance the rapper has reached the level of popularity that he has without being on a label and about selling anything with traditional ways that you make a name for yourself in the recording industry that's right we were talking about this before like it's kind of mind-blowing that like he hadn't sold anything that Ben was kind of surprised that he could just download the song is like where where's ya better there are days I where do I pay for the where I pay I'm super how do I grouper although I get it I didn't I didn't even realize this i was trying to buy same drugs last week and i couldn't find it anywhere find it on itunes now reckon I I ended up opening soundcloud eventually like David and was just like okay here's here's where it is but forgive me but like you are maybe getting it illegally if your client soundcloud are no I just like I never thought I'd really fun at all I i purchase know and and so now I'm like using soundcloud more because that's a way for me to like actually find it stuff do you think you're aiming service do you think chance to shout out to SoundCloud yesterday will have any kind of seconds like SoundCloud and he's a bum they can right now they're not really people don't really know what sounds funny well it depends it's kind of like YouTube with older people versus younger people like okay like younger people if you say like the comment like nobody really knows what's on cod is like well yeah like no being under 30 would really agree with that ok which I have done which is none of us yeah unless you're on a media beat and therefore you do know those right them but but what's interesting about like even the the the Grammys had to twerk their own that's worked week their own I've got rap in my head they had to tweak their own rules to let chance even be eligible so dr. that he's been on like a billboard charts like his albums on the village or like 33 weeks in a row without ever selling anything in a store or on iTunes it's just by having streaming equivalents produção much streaming that it manages to get charted for the majority of the time it's released in the year its release and most of the time these songs who are up there usually had this huge machine behind them yeah and he doesn't have machine other than the fact that he like BTW like it's the pavement and he tours a lot and he builds up an audience by actually like communicating with them we do you think you'll see more doing this way for it would be amazing to see more artists doing it display and getting recognition for it because there are a lot of artists that do it to play and have a hard time making a living off of it gotcha yeah um you put on a lot of a lot of work and he also is an incredible artist like he also writes really great write it helps with the song yeah actually good so dumb all right that would be interesting to see like it would it would be more a gal therrien in the music industry for sure if people's talent is what memes day becomes a couple the internet supposed to be about right yeah man maybe I don't know next up verizon is back on the unlimited bandwagon color me genuinely surprised and wrong I thought I thought they weren't going to do this but they they had actually scoffed at the notion of a limited for quite a while now but you know this new plan eight dollars a month will just price you the what t-mobile and Sprint offer but they say that you get full HD streaming video which the other two don't offer for this plan bet you're a verizon customer is there something you'd be interested in we would definitely look into it but I think eighty dollars a month seems pretty expensive I think we get 16 gigs now for whatever deals our eyes and threw at us recently so why we would switch over to that I'm not really sure it's also interesting to see like t-mobile if you get four lines it's like forty dollars yeah that's it yeah so eighty dollars for one line I don't know how competitive that is it doesn't at first glance it doesn't seem that good to me well keep in mind with the plan of for i believe is there is actually a discount to it right so for one line at seventy dollars a month i guess it up ahead of time okay sprint it's like fifty dollars a month no no right verizon offers oh really cooperate yeah well I'm still like totally confused about all these plans like they're all like it's very complicated that's kind of like doing your taxes oh here it is it's a doll to the first line and then each additional line is $45 okay no I don't know yeah yeah I do a lot of math I'm we're probably going to stick with what we're doing now but it's nice that they finally decided to become somewhat competitive so yeah but I think it's really over that's what it came down to it it's not the fact that their network valves on is great it can handle limited it's more like that t-mobile Sprint and even eighteen t off are limited and they just saw the writing on the wall they decided okay we've gotta do this too yeah so all right four more of these stories check cuz I've seen it I'm Roger Cheng I'm Ben Fox Rubin Joanie soften banks will sitting not much going on in the chat today I have a quick question that we didn't get to so Joan how how concerned is like the music industry about the fact that chance the rapper was it was random yeah how threatening is a said that he was able to actually be successful doing this I mean I don't think that it's threatening I don't think it's right thing because like what would the threat of him be because these may be the threat would be like if on math artists are like through you music labels I'm not going to sign with you and you dangle all these big checks in front of me like Universal come still dangle really big check in front of people you know like to get them to sign and then owned their soul and own their their music so in that sorry that made me son really down on the music labels but that's like the perspective that was fiercely independent artists like chance the rapper would have liked this coven l just to like you can start to make it big on their own like is that yeah what it's like sell anything at all those all the videos are free what the YouTube stars though it's much more that's more threatening to main like traditional television because ads out like traditional television makes its money from advertising and from cable subscriptions rice and if people decide they don't really need to pay for cables description scriptions anymore then they lose money there and if advertising dollars start going towards YouTube instead of going to TV budgets but it's certainly there with music it's a little bit different because like chance rapper he subscribed to like the idea of a subscription service like he puts his music on Spotify which has that premiums here come on Apple music I believe an Amazon music unlimited yeah so he's not he's not hardcore singh like it needs to be only free he just happens to offer a free option yeah and so that's not really retina because otherwise me has the music and he doesn't really have an advertising based model and here in it so it's not certainly what that needs to go away what's threatening is the fact that there are these services like YouTube which he's not on but like YouTube where the only money that's the music industry debts from YouTube is through supported share ad revenue share sorry so that gets complicated but basically YouTube is a lot more threatening to the music industry and chance the rapper is like if those are threatened streaming it's from YouTube as an institution and a place where lots and lots of people listen to lots and lots of music then like one person who was really dedicated dreaming really getting successful then why was it YouTube red and subscription play into this well the public YouTube red is that not very many people subscribe to it not yet not yet I'm sorry like they haven't disclosed any numbers and usually what that means is they're not know to brag about yeah yeah but if they had a number to brag but usually they brag about it and it's hard to reach number you can brag um yeah it's a weird landscape I mean I used soundcloud he's a multitude of different stuff soundcloud mixes go go place spotify pretty much eliminate don't really use it itunes good why is my way no i mean occasionally when that's the only place to get something I want y'all go there and buy it but I'm not using that one Apple music yeah as far as like my listening regular habit right I don't like SoundCloud a lot though with with chance my other question is like how much money is he actually making if he's only pursuing streaming right like I've read that you know most of the money that he makes is off of merchandising and touring but if he's not signing with a music label he's not selling physical copies of his music missing out on like millions of dollars in sales um I mean that's a really theoretical question because part of the reason that he is he's reached the level successfully has because he has the kind of independence that he does without being on a label like he doesn't have to like answer anybody's notes he can release to music when he wants you can do things that he that are responsive to his audience but he knows is working and so it's hard to like say would he be making billions of dollars and like millions of dollars if he was on a label it's just hard to say because so much comes down to what you're contracted with your label like he doesn't have to like label contracts with artists the amount you get paid for what you stream is the same for every artist basically when it goes to the artists like chance or to the label and then your contract that the label is where like you start to lose its arts degree like the label starts taking it's like you basically gets a full do you guys good full cut and he has total control over where things go and so he's not making money on streaming that he didn't wouldn't have to have it there but he's thinking about it in like a 21st century way where the recording isn't the product he is the product touring is the product that's how he makes money like it's a 21st century way of thinking about recordings as not being the thing that you sell but being your own advertising speaking of that Nicholas from Sweden in the chat says seems to me like chance the rapper simply ahead of the curve this way of spreading a music will probably be common practice in the future I think we all agree with that i gotta agree with that I mean whether or not you up yeah on a regular basis is I think that's on the artist right okay actually have to put out good stuff right right there's a lot that's not yeah but but John that also makes a lot of central you said is that like everything's moving towards streaming anyway so like you said like folks in the industry don't seem threatened by him because you know physical yeah physical CD sales and digital downloads like those are all going down so the fact that he in the streaming means like yeah like like this guy just said these he's slightly ahead of the curve he's just doing it much more as a pure-play as opposed to what other folks are doing yeah where they're trying to make money in all these other ways as well yeah yeah he definitely has more of a sort of LA it's like part of his his philosophies not he's not like golden mean very like philosophical about all put a little bit here a little bit here and he found a thing that worked for him and his audience before anybody else I'm really reached a lot was able to reach a level success but he has reached so he's kind of the first in that regard he is the first in that regard um but there been other people who have been the icing the online things yeah just I mean look back myspace yeah we're laughs that no love that site was music and it's still hung on to it it's actually really i mean like i don't i don't know nearly as much about the music industry as you do but it is pretty interesting to think about how long it took an artist to really reach this pinnacle yeah yeah it's like well i think that speaks of the reason that they had to change the rules to let him reach that pinnacle like you don't reach that pinnacle unless the people who decide who's allowed to climb the mountain let you climb you know like preach what is the same time where there's somebody behind chance the rapper like a precursor chance the rapper so we don't know about that like could have potentially won a Grammy if they hadn't changed the rules um I don't know I honestly don't know it's possible but I think that it is part of a progression in the fact that the Mesa going to have been undergoing this progression worth starting to accept the fact that streams future more and more still like the fact that it's a progressive thing that Nielsen and billboard would start to include streaming equivalents in charting and so therefore you're able to measure that he was on the Billboard 200 charts coming but was on the Billboard 200 chart for 33 weeks out of the year for an album came out May so the fact it's like it's kind of like push and pull oh the Recording Industry accepting the fact that things are changing and not allowing people to rise to the definition of what like a pinnacle is well under the audience but also took someone who is successful is oh yes to enlarge the industry to go this way right yeah yeah definitely have a chicken and egg thing yes yeah be curious to find out if anybody in the chat what other streaming services you are a fan of what had you think works for you like I said I use Spotify and SoundCloud mixcloud google play and even you know some of our subscription affiliates like stitcher Wow sure but that's really not a place for my shepherd except for my face yeah that's more tradition like that's kind of a forward step on that and talk radio than it is music right as a Sarah ya know the podcast the way the future kind of thing yeah which horse it is I don't know those an aside but I love that they're called podcast although nobody like iPods aren't means made anymore right like I love it there regional offices are meaning of it XOX price yeah because I mean it's a pity word for it well it has no real look at television anything that's on demand there is you got to go with yeah yeah and you need a tissue you need a Kleenex yeah no one really actually it's always about that brand familiarity and if they can like sneaky there and there yeah all right it really is like Apple just made like 27 cents cuz we all said podcast like well because right that's wrong cameras are for apple can be like yo Chris wesley says i love soundcloud in google play spotify i don't remember the last time i bought music yeah yeah I understand way more than a few times where is a really indie artists and doesn't have like a distribution deal kind of thing you're not going to find them on a major platform yeah everything on demand yeah you might have to go to a band camp and I do that more often than not because that's literally the only way I'm gonna be able to get some from them at the same time you can oftentime just listen directly from that bandcamp page if you don't even necessarily pay to download it and keep it but it's right take it to go you got a pain download it and then the only song are only album was downloaded the last couple years to say you to one that Apple force the phone and whether you had no choice or by Tears update oh by the way you also got this holding you to album yeah I was like oh alright I've got this big now didn't want it but i reset my phone a while ago and it popped back up Mike you son of a bitch how dare you give me pre beautiful SI so bi music i just bought the bruno mars album and i really like it I mean how I listen to music I listen to the music industry loves you I listened to the same stuff over and over and over again so like streaming doesn't really work for me so much I'll be the curve annuit no that's ok like well that's the great thing is that when there's more choice I mean it means more consumer choice if you like to alone your measly just literally same thing over again you don't have to worry about paying a subscription to have it available offline when you're trained visitor like you just have it yeah and that's great for you radio like let's not discount the fact that as we're talking about streaming and how important that is for like finding things like band camp finding audience but like radio is still the best like than a number one way that people discover new music it's just funny I seem auto archaic right yeah but it's totally true and then maybe that'll maybe that'll change as cars become smarter yeah like you don't have to rely on these airwaves that have been around since you know whatever letter carrier by a hard drive in your trunk well you know what else revving cars that's not good Blair off yeah that's not that far off right but that but I think that kind of also speaks to the fact like it's the mega stars and the Beyonce's and the adults that are backed by huge label like they're not going away until yeah um radio disappears like there's always going to be like a lowest common denominator yes all those all those channels play basically the same 50 popular songs in a common yeah lots and rotation yeah yeah can help but to be like hooked into it rosalina says I used to use our do to listen to full album rest in peace yeah I got absorbed by what Rhapsody and then that whole thing went down right well from our do what's going out of business if I remember I star do is going bankruptcy going on business and Pandora bought like the assets for it the library yeah well not the library but like but it was like an almost like an actual higher like I bought it in tech and bought its staff but yeah are do is one of those like beloved that was kind of pre Spotify like that yeah there things like you're going to go shopping there not necessarily have it as much curated like a Pandora type thing and it was a Pandora's kind of going that route as well I got a lot of great accolades for its interface and being like technologically having the most user-friendly and the easiest and a lot of people love that that service but it's hard it's tough especially because no streaming services make any money but I'll lose money it's been really hard business none of them are absolutely you can make fair arguments in favor of so many of their so subjective Carlos says they all had different things to offer are you Spotify for playlists and quality sound Apple music for curated playlists and radio soundcloud and tune in yeah they're pretty much do a relay station for actual physical broadcast radio stations as well as online only extremes but that's not the kind of thing where you're going and going fishing through a bank of assets they're providing you a program right yeah yeah that's cool Carlos very cool you know you like that's cool also what was the what was jay-z's one called I forgot their big thing which I don't hi and that I mean whatever you go for this audio file yeah I mean the sheer quality of sound that's their bore firmly now for Sprint customers or or some a clue may or may not even realize they have the service in their system and that'll be kind of an interesting thing to see how that's going to skew the market is when exclusives really start to weigh in you know like people I want a netflix subscription because I like Marvel shows and yeah amazon originals i like transparent i got to get on Amazon subscription if music starts to go that way with an artist well is that going to cannibalize the industry so it's enjoy because there's a lot of push and pull with exclusives are now Spotify dogged Lee against having taking exclusive at all because they think it's bad for the artist think it's bad for this nervously think it's bad for consumers because how frustrating is it when Connie has a new album and your huge Kanye fan and you have to sign up for title yeah and then you're like I don't want to be signed up for title because through week later you're just gonna put on your website which he did and then like I mean that's a very Connie a specific the guy he's an island even island yeah um but uh the nicest word about her I know sorry dr. Frank Ocean did his kind of switcheroo so does so you know about this no all right so the the quick background about Frank coach the Frank Ocean was signed to universal to single biggest label in the world or to one of their stuff labels I can't remember but ultimately like universals the people that owned hizzle so he took a really long time so Cecilia's contract he drops like a visual album on Apple music on like a Thursday and then the following Friday once he had completed his contractual obligation to Universal he's like I'm going to actually release my real album be to have it be independent and after that happened that's the best blonde it's Baldy yeah that that's the one that actually went gangbusters yeah and so after that happened the head of universals like we're never we're not good for no none of ours can do those exclusive anymore because they got burned so bad on that so who knows if it continues Apple Apple really loves it title really loves exclusive Spotify is like they're not cool we're not playing that game yeah yeah and so the interest and now the interesting thing is is the most powerful biggest label in the world is like that's not cool when I playing that game because it's got it you know screwed over yeah it'll be interesting to see those forces like very strange force was competing against each other about whether or not that should be something that happened you got to appreciate people like be skeptical in the chat he says I'd buy music on itunes for bands I want to financially support a good idea was dreaming them doesn't give him their fair share you know what I would agree to that there's been a few occasions where it's like no I want you to have my money take some money yeah no I'm never that generous like I mean I don't got a banjo matter with Lana right either yeah there's some who I don't know put me on the spot the clash well then I gotta be seeing much of that money there wait who said that in the chest be skeptical so be skeptical one thing you may want to consider I think that's a really great impulse I have friends that do that to that want to support support artists that they love by actually like just paying for their music but also consider like if they're on bandcamp there's like places with some artists do tip jars and things does that mean what's going to when you buy their merch if you stream all this stuff and spend the exact same amount you'd spent on album it's been on the merch they're going to get a lot more than money like a lot more it totally depends on what artist you're talking about their own like connect their own contract with their label if they have a labels they don't but the best one you can like get money in their pocket is to like buy merch guy their t-shirts and posters yeah not use cos ah ha ha anyway hahahaha last on the pan come on throwing back I feel like the same way i like the idea of being able to contribute as much as I came like I'll sit around and Spotify and poke around and find something oh this is great and it's like I really fall in love with it have some money yeah I kind of like that but now I know thing was young we should be buying no that's buying t-shirts yes it's really helpful for them too I mean buying them because that's how if they aren't a label that's how their beds like the metric were they like their bosses are the ones that they have to answer to you for like yes your investment in me was worth it selling music is really important for that measure but if your instinct is like I want to give them my money if that's what you want to help them on then like actually then going to shows and buying merges yeah always going to shows was always the best way to ya no matter what I'm gonna go to one in a couple weeks finally gonna see at the drive-in okay / that's driving yeah I had not banned I fell in love with 0 through like yeah you're high and I had me back to college I'm low and yeah David they went away for a while another back and I'm cool I need to go see em and I'm really stoked Ryan mom yeah that in coheed and cambria oh yeah man you're taking back to my like I go to shows kids stays well they're playing their sophomore album and its entire not sophomore there Junior album in its entirety on the 15th anniversary really Jordan nearly alcohol unfortunately has a go to terminal 5 for both of these let the pros not in New York that's not a great i need figurative price you have to pay ya worth it that sucks does it really suck that that I am NOT a fan I haven't been there sir sound as we hear is that good okay but that's just me in my role of the producer guy with the headphones on I once got a great from a musician friend of mine like if you go to a show and like you have to say something but like a friend of yours plays a show and they're terrible and you have to say something complimentary because they're your friend you have to be like man to mix was awesome I could hear everything yeah right that's cuz you give them go on to say i love heart rates off stage by X or whatever family because it mixes us the next