chris_lee’s posterous

Greetings to all in the Kingdom of Huronia!

Okay, maybe it’s Huron… and not a ‘Kingdom’ per se, but those of us fortunate enough to work at the Huron Business Development Corporation do have TWO monarchs that we can call our own: Queen Elizabeth II of the House of Windsor (www.royal.gov.uk/) AND Queen Pamela of…er, the Stanleys’ House?

Perhaps it’s the rapidly approaching May 2-4 weekend that has me thinking about royalty—it IS a celebration of Queen Victoria’s birthday after all and not simply a bonanza for The BEER Store! But I digress, so without further ado, on with the show! “Overture, curtains, lights; this is it, the night of nights. No more rehearsing and nursing a part, we know every part by heart!”

I read something curious today. Actually, two things—Yes! That means I’ve read my quota for the year!

Yikes! I forgot to mention why you’re reading this in the first place…but I bet you’ve already figured it out. Welcome to another edition of the fastest-growing newsletter subscription in all of Huronia. Oops! I meant HURON: Small Business Success!

Okay, I have no data to back that statement up but how could it not be true? J

So, back to my readings. One of the newsletters to which I subscribe (www.emarketer.com) reported today that music sales in North America fell 18.6% in 2008. Typically, most would respond and say that it’s because of all the free downloading (ie. music piracy) going on. At the same time, eMarketer reported that sales of music through legal downloads (eg. Napster, itunes, etc.) increased by 16.5%. The article went on though to inform that fewer people are buying music—both digitally online and in conventional CD format.

Okay, that brings us to the second item I read. I also subscribe to a service called, ‘Urban Word of the Day’ which in fact, should probably be re-monikered as simply, ‘Modern Slang’. In any case, the word of the day was, ‘Autotune’ and is defined as “Pitch software specifically for vocals that makes up for a lack of natural singing talent. 90% or more of all ‘professional’ recordings use this software.”

Hmmmm… Anyone see a connection here? Better question! Anyone NOT see a connection here? The free downloading of music (ie. piracy) becomes a major problem as quality, authenticity, originality and the artistic merit of modern music evaporates. In other words, the issue isn’t illegal downloads—it’s that ‘artists’ are making CRAP! And who in their right mind pays top-dollar (or even bottom-dollar) for ‘CRAP’?

Now, we can laugh because we love to hate the big corporations that make millions of dollars from us each year in such areas as: music, banking, oil and communications. It looks good on them, right? But, and this is the really, really tough part, ask yourself why your own sales have dropped! The recession can’t be blamed for everything since the vast majority of people remain gainfully employed.

Enjoy our newsletter and don’t just file it away under useful tidbits—take the time to implement its ideas. You have only success to gain!

“Th-th-th-that’s ALL folks!!”