Musicians and the Creative Commons: A survey of artists on Jamendo

Piracy and the peer-to-peer diffusion of music deprive artists of income and constitute a challenge to music industry. Many consumers, especially in younger age groups, consider that is normal not to pay in order to listen to music yet artists have intellectual property rights. The reconciliation of these two features of the music market is increasingly difficult within the traditional business model of the music industry. This paper uses an original survey of artists whose music is diffused freely on the online platform Jamendo (the largest of its kind) and which uses Creative Commons (CC) licences rather than copyright firstly to examine why so many artists would adhere to such an approach and secondly what the artists feel about CC. Age is clearly a factor in the choice of CC licence type, as well as whether artists derive income from their music. The choice of CC over copyright is also found to be related to its greater flexibility, its role in the development of musical creation and its function as means of sharing. It can be seen as a basis for an alternative business model in the music industry, in which sales of albums no longer constitute the main source of artists’ remuneration.