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Not long ago, walking into a brick-and-mortar music retailer was a vibrant human experience. The unmistakable aroma of vinyl records, rows of colorful album covers, the hum of distant speakers, all combine to create a unique sensory experience.
In addition to an immersive sensory experience, music stores provide meaningful public interaction. Record shops and music stores are places where fans gather, discuss, debate, find new tunes and dig through lost tracks together. These are places where passionate salespeople share wisdom and take fans on a journey of musical discovery.
However, with the breakthroughs in technology like social media over the past few decades, the music industry has suffered (RIP, MTV News). Brick-and-mortar music retailers and their accompanying music store culture have faded with the advent of digital streaming, the most influential technology in recent memory.
That’s not to say streaming doesn’t bring benefits. This technology is important to the industry as a whole, increasing the accessibility of music globally, making it easier for smaller artists to distribute their songs, and eliminating much of the music piracy. While these benefits are significant, it’s important to be honest about some of the downsides of streaming (in this case via analogy!) so that we can make changes and continue to improve the industry.
Here are three music store analogies that can help improve the streaming experience for the benefit of all music fans.
Ending the silence of the digital channel
Today, browsing a streaming platform feels like walking into a music store, albeit with one major twist—you can’t talk to anyone.
Just as people once wandered the aisles of retailers, now they scroll through endless digital playlists and artist profiles. In the music store scene, the search for the next beloved album or artist often leads to lively conversations and discussions, celebrations or debates. However, within the streaming service’s virtual channel, there is only silence because each application cannot communicate with each other internally.
It may seem like a simple tool, but streaming services like Spotify, Apple, and Tidal all lack chat functionality. The lack of this basic feature dampens the excitement of discovery, prevents users from instantly and freely exchanging their ideas for music, and overall creates a more isolating experience. In the analog era, going to a record store was a social activity. Here you can chat with other music lovers, share your latest discoveries, and maybe even win an argument. Today, those encounters seem like a distant memory.
A simple chat feature can reinvigorate the sense of community that music stores foster and encourage.
Please provide cross-platform functionality
We’ve found that sharing or discussing music with others using the same streaming service can be frustrating. Taking it a step further, trying to share music with someone using a different streaming service can sometimes feel impossible.
With multiple streaming platforms like Apple, Spotify, Tidal, Amazon, etc., music fans can choose their favorite service based on a variety of factors. However, since each service relies on its own unique programming, even sending a link to a song or artist via text message or iMessage is futile as the links will lead to dead ends for people using different streaming platforms. The digital music world has become a series of walled gardens, and the once seamless act of sharing music has been hindered by these tall digital walls.
solution? Share the song by sending a screenshot (back in the dark ages?) or a link to a YouTube video. The process is the equivalent of finding an album in a music store, spotting your friend in another store across the street, and then frantically crafting a handmade sign to stick in the window urging your friend to check out the album.
Let’s remove the barriers between music services and enable cross-platform functionality.
Allow listeners to provide feedback to our guide to artificial intelligence
The decline of record shop culture isn’t just about the loss of interaction between friends and other enthusiasts.It’s also about the way we discover music and the role of artificial intelligence
In the heyday of vinyl records and CDs, enthusiastic store clerks would eagerly offer advice based on people’s tastes, introducing them to new artists and genres they might have never explored. These experts create vital connections between music and listeners, enhancing the overall experience.
Today, streaming platforms use algorithms and artificial intelligence to curate playlists and make recommendations. While these algorithms have the advantage of having a large library of functions at their disposal, there is a distinct lack of personal touch. Algorithms often get stuck in feedback loops, and listeners lack the ability to provide detailed feedback, which often results in poor recommendations.
Giving users tools to prompt their discovery algorithms and provide instant feedback on suggestions and insights into their musical tastes (not just a thumbs up or down) will create a more satisfying experience.
In the age of digital music streaming, the sense of community, excitement of discovery and human touch that defined record store culture have been lost. While the convenience and accessibility of streaming is undeniable, we must recognize the profound impact it has on our musical experience.
Now is the time to reimagine how to reintroduce these elements of connection and discovery into our digital music landscape.
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