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Hi I’m Veronica Belmont from Mahalo Daily
A lot of you out there love music and you probably also love technology. What if you had a job
that combine those two things perfectly?
Well we know a guy at Warner Brothers Records who has just that job. And I think I kind of want to steal it
Let's go talk to him
We’re here with Ethan Kaplan, who is the vice president of technology at Warner Brothers Records
And so what is your average day like as VP of technology?
What does that mean?
My standard day basically consists of
making sure
all of our, you know, sites and everything keeps running properly, but the role of our department is to keep
this company ahead, and not
how it happened to the record business which is they got way behind him and then had a reactionary
response. The department was created by our CEO so that
we were driving technology rather than running from it or fearing it. So getting back to artists again
what are some of their favorite tech gadgets, or what are some of their favorite
sites that they visit that you’ve picked up on
Every artist is different, I spend more time with some artists than others
um
a lot of artists
read the same stuff we do
Techmeme, and Digg
Every artist I’ve met in this company is a Mac user
Very interesting
But they’re into the same stuff we are, they like looking at assumption news, they like looking at
Youtube, and they like looking at lost.fm
This stuff that kind of peaks the interest of the average music fan, most artists
if they’re worth their weight
and music, are music fans to begin with What artists off the top of your head are really interested
in interacting with their community on their websites or over social networks?
uh...
A lot of the newer artists are actually, like Tyler Hilton, he’s an emerging artist that we have
He’s in here all the time He’s always on this site
He’s super into what his sites doing the guys in REM
who we just released
A record for next week, are totally into technology
So what do you think is going to be the future for the music industry online
in terms of DRM or in terms of
the sharing of data? I think that if you can tap into interest, wherever interest is
to figure out how to convert that into a value exchange that has a monetary figure
attached to it
in some cases maybe in some cases it doesn't
then that’s where the music industries going
If there's anything I can do as a technology guy who works in the music industry
it's to actually help
figure out a way or figure out how to get
an artist to actually make a living doing what they do
Everything about value digitally is about the value of experience not the value of the artifact
What we do as a department here is how do we create valuable experience for
an artist using their website, using fan clubs
and merchandise
The experience of going to concert and how do we use technology to create that value of experience
It’s a very difficult thing but what we try to do every day
Do you mind if we go take a look at the… what else is going on in the office?
cool
So if someone were to steal your job what would they need to do and how did you get
this job anyway? I got this job in an interesting way actually, I’ve worked at REM’s
fansite since I was sixteen
There was the first site for REM
out there, and I was looking on Craigslist and saw this job
it was director of technology at the time
and I decided to apply
without telling anybody at REM or anybody here that I knew from the
REM staff
I didn’t tell REM till my second interview and they put in a good word, which was nice
I think what it comes down to is if you like something
and you want to work hard at it
you’re Newton, you could make it happen
but I think that
you don't get bogged down in like
thinking about the latest trends or anything
because honestly it wasn't a huge trend to be making fansites for REM at
sixteen
when I was sixteen. In high school it wasn’t the hippest thing to do
so I mean
there's a lot of places that technology and if you’re into technology
where I can take you. I just figure, it’s everywhere at this point, so if you like music, if you
like film, if you like publishing, if you like
art, whatever you like, and you like technology there's a place for you in
that place. And where can people learn
more about you? You can learn more about Warner Brothers at ww.WBR
.com
Or Warner Bros Records dot com
and about me at www.BlackRimGlasses.com From Mahalo Daily I’m Veronica Belmont see you next time