The Evolution Of Home-based Distribution

By Author: Mingki Tsui
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In the last 10 to 15 years, we have witnessed a real revolution, or perhaps a few different ones rolled together, that has changed how we create, distribute and use the printed word, recorded music, motion pictures and all other media. Following the introduction of cassette tapes, CDs and the Internet, record labels said they'd be destroyed. The VHS recorder was going to doom both the metroplex and the movie studios. The latest victims of progress's creative destruction are newspapers, which are hard pressed to make a go of it whether they print ink on paper or pixels on screens.

There's one thing common to all of these doomsday scenarios (and the happy digital destiny that seems to eventuate instead of doom). That thing is home-based distribution. It hasn't destroyed anything, either. Like the record companies and movie studios before them, newspaper publishers will find a way to deal with changes in both its business model and technology. Of course, no one says it won't be messy. If anything, progress is messy.

Goose and gander

Perhaps the first instance of home-based distribution having headline-grabbing ...
... impact was the birth of "desktop publishing" (DTP) in the mid-1980s. Armed with nothing more than a laser printer and a PC-in the counterculture memory, that's an Apple LaserWriter and a Macintosh computer-lots of folks thought they would "put the First Amendment into overdrive," or so said computer guru-ess Jan Lewis in her once-influential Silicon Valley publication, Computer Insider.

Although the DTP revolution bloated existing landfills with a whole lot more garbage it was, at least, 300-dot-per-inch garbage. Truth be told, a number of publishers did get their start with PageMaker and a Mac or Ventura Publisher and a PC. When the Compact Disc (CD) debuted, the record labels loved them, because the audio quality was a whole lot better than anything else available, plus they were cool, silver and futuristic. Then something awful happened.

Progress is blind sometimes

CD technology was fine with Columbia Records and Elektra and the rest of them when you had to buy hugely expensive replicating machines to "burn" audio CDs. After all, there was no music piracy being committed by people with plastic-carving record production equipment. Music piracy? What's that?

Then the bomb went off. Firms began manufacturing CD burners, mostly for computers, and the 1990s saw Macs and PCs powerful enough to "rip" CD-Audio files from discs and create CDs of their own. By the time the Fraunhofer codec for mp3 audio arrived on the scene, followed by digital music players using files instead of discs, the battle was on. When the same thing started happening with movies and DVD burners, the battle went intergalactic.

An uneasy peace

There are still battles being fought over intellectual property (IP), copyright law and so on, but at present there is an uneasy peace on the digital homefront. The fact is, that with printed matter, recorded music and movies, content owners-meaning creators and legit licensees-have every right to control production, manufacture and distribution. The distribution channels can be physical (for CDs, DVDs, etc.) or virtual (for music mp3 files and movie mpeg files), and the home computer, personal disc publishers and other equipment is helping these content owners control their own fates.

Today, you don't have to burn one CD or DVD at a time for distribution on your PC, and stick inkjet-printed labels on them. Of course, for very low volumes, some people are doing that. However, the price of a great standalone disc printer/burner has fallen to about a grand, a little more or a little less depending on features and capacities. There are record-only models with two, four or more burners in a tower, and there are robotic printer/burners that can roll through a stack of 25, 60 or 100 CDs or DVDs while you're writing prepping jewel cases and printing liner notes. There are lots of routes to home-based distribution.

Don't forget the net

Of course, one of the major home-based distribution models is the Internet. You can offer up your latest documentary on Valley Girls as a download or stream, or put an album's worth of music on your site and charge for single tracks. As long as you have all your copyright ducks in a row, and are creating all the material that you are selling, neither the Recording Industry Association of America nor the Motion Picture Association of America is going to bother you one bit.

Artists are motivated to spread their creations, however they can, and any technology that makes that easier to do is going to end up in their toolkit. Far more than at any time in history, writers, composers, painters, filmmakers and other creative folks have the ability to take charge of their media and its distribution. Along with that comes a need either to master the new high-tech tools and methodologies, or find someone who will (for a paycheck or a percentage). Some pundits predicted that artists would turn into technoweenies (a technical term, actually), but that has not happened.

What has happened is this: Creators of stories, songs and movies have been able to steer clear of the "corporations" (or, better, form their own) and control the fate of their creations. Home-based distribution is the main reason why. As the tools continue to develop, the control will improve, choices will expand and quality-well, that will still be in the eyes and ears of the beholder, as ever.
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