Music Singles catch up with the rest of the world

The music industry is a bit archaic. When you look at the written word, photo’s and even videos, content is released as soon as possible onto the glorious network we call the internet. But music, particularly singles, doesn’t work like that. Many new songs are played for months on the radio before their official release. But that’s all about to change.

Universal and Sony have both agreed to a new ‘On Air, On Sale’ scheme which sees singles being released to the public the same day they are first played on the radio. This means that songs wont seem ‘old’ by the time we finally get our own copies of them.

The decision has most probably been driven by piracy, after all, it’s not exactly hard to record a high quality version of a song off the radio these days. This has also been tried for TV shows with many American imports being shown in the UK just days after their debut across the pond.

But whatever the reason behind the decision, I’m just pleased it has finally happened. We live in an instant world where we expect everything as soon as possible. It seems silly to have to wait weeks to download a song that we can hear on a daily basis courtesy of national radio. I’m not saying there isn’t a place for hearing songs on the radio, there is of course, but now we can finally download that catchy tune the moment we hear it (even if it is as awful as Black Eyed Peas ‘The Time’).

It’s another industry waking up to now and changing it’s old fashioned ways. Now how long will it be until digital radio switchover again…