Get Ready for the Next Revolution After 30 Years
When the digital age dawned, the independent music community faced a massive, invisible wall: Market Access. This was the core obstacle that founders like Scott Cohen sought to dismantle, recognizing that the burgeoning World Wide Web offered the key to giving independent artists global reach.
In the mid-1990s, alongside Richard Gottehrer, the goal was clear: build a company that served as a catalyst for structural change in the music industry, ensuring that independent artists could connect with fans in ways previously unimaginable.
Thirty years later, that fundamental access is now a given. Independent artists reach listeners globally effortlessly. But as the music landscape has exploded in value, a new, fiercer battleground has emerged—the question of compensation.
The Value Disparity
Many still operate under the old assumption that royalties are the full measure of compensation. However, the system itself was built to reward the usage of music, not the immense economic value that creators generate. The value of music has skyrocketed, with songs building empires worth billions, yet the artists, composers, and rightsholders remain largely excluded from the proceeds.
This disparity is not an accident. It is the system working exactly as designed, treating the royalty as a ceiling rather than the floor. But recent financial, technological, and structural shifts have only amplified this imbalance, making the disparity too large to ignore.
The journey of disruption began with distribution. In the nineties, gatekeepers controlled physical shelf space, blocking access to global audiences. The initial shift came when online CD stores emerged, offering unlimited shelf space and worldwide shipping. This was the first wave of online music, paving the way for massive expansion.
The Orchard leveraged this opportunity, quickly becoming the exclusive supplier of independent music to major online retailers. As those stores evolved into download platforms and then streaming services, the floodgates opened, and the impact of this digital revolution became undeniable.
What the experience taught was that challenging the established order is difficult, requiring tenacity and relentless effort. But it also proved that collective belief can move mountains. Change doesn’t happen overnight; it requires a willingness to fight against powerful interests.
The gatekeepers have evolved their power. They no longer control shelf space; they control enterprise value, deciding who owns the businesses built on artists’ work and who simply receives a fraction of the payment.
Today, we stand at another inflection point. The convergence of technology and industry dynamics is creating fertile soil for a revolution that promises to redefine how creators are compensated. The time for change is now. The next phase requires those willing to bet against the establishment once more.
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