Columns

Whatever it turns out to be, it will be greater than zero, which may give Creation Records' founder Alan McGee pause for thought. McGee recently announced that, after the Charlatans failed to secure a deal for their new album, his company would make it available for free from the website of radio station Xfm. The singles from the album will be available first, followed by the album.

ADVERTISEMENT

McGee believes that the era of record companies and artists making money from recordings is over and that they should focus on concerts and merchandising.

That view is shared by Prince, who this summer gave away his latest album to readers of the Mail on Sunday, resulting in litter bins stacked high with that newspaper one Sunday after fans bought and binned it to get the free CD. Prince also gave a copy of the CD to fans who bought tickets for the 21 concerts he played at London's O2 Arena.

The success or otherwise of Radiohead's experiment may give both Prince and McGee reason to change their future plans.

Whether Universal and Warner succeed in taking on iTunes, or artists take control in the way Radiohead and Prince have done, Apple's dominance will be vastly reduced. That's no bad thing for the industry and the customers, and it won't necessarily be a bad for Apple, which only got into the music business in the first place to sell more iPods.