You Are In Control leads the way for future music conferences
Running parallel to the 10th Anniversary of Iceland Airwaves, Reykjavik also hosted the first year of You Are In Control, the first international music conference of its kind, gathering together some of the most forward thinking business people and entrepreneurs in the music industry.
Hosted by Iceland Music Export, YAIC set out to examine the current state of the music industry and how it could move forward by looking at innovative existing models and working together on new ones. Digital marketing plans from speakers such as Laura Search from Ninja Tune, and new ideas on how to monotise music from the likes of Terry McBride, founder of Nettwerk management, gave the international audience of 300 delegates practical advice and ideas with which to create new models.
Jane Dyball, Head of Business Affairs from Warner Chappell also exclusively revealed the results of Radiohead’s ‘In Rainbows’ ‘pay what you want’ experiment, in her keynote presentation.
Despite being downloaded free of charge to hard drives and iPods all over the world, In Rainbows has sold more physical CD copies than their previous two albums.
“...the CD version of In Rainbows has racked up 1.75m sales to date. Contrast this with sales figures from 2001's Amnesiac and 2003's Hail to the Thief, which as of late last year had sold 900,000 and 990,000 copies respectively, according to Hits Daily Double. In fact, even before In Rainbows was available in shops, Radiohead had already earned more money from its online sale than they had earned – in all formats combined – from Hail to the Thief. Radiohead have sold 3m copies of In Rainbows, according to Warner Chappell. This number comprises physical CDs, box sets, and every download (even £0.01 ones). 100,000 of the purchases were the £40 "disc boxes.”
Anna Hildur, Managing Director of Iceland Music Export, and the conference organiser commented:
"You Are In Control was a great success. Our international delegates loved it and felt that the debate was both useful and forward looking. We will develop the concept of looking into DIY models and the digital developments with more workshops and brainstorming sessions next year.
“Iceland has never had a major structure so it is perfectly suited to host a platform which leads us into the future on how to nurture new business models in the creative sector through the digital space."
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