As indie music platforms like Bandcamp deteriorate, artists must cater to a single, powerful streaming platform.
I’m a big fan of Discogs. I use it primarily to keep track of my music collection. Hopefully this article and the work they are doing there can turn the organization around.
How Discogs built — and broke — a community of diehard music fans and sellers.
Source: Discogs’ vibrant vinyl community is shattering – The Verge
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Rindge Leaphart
KKR turned around a struggling door company and sold it for 10 times its investment—giving factory workers a life-changing cut of the returns. A case study by Ethan Rouen and Dennis Campbell offers lessons for companies trying to instill an owner’s mindset in employees.
If Amazon doesn’t care, I sure do! Welcome back Barnes & Noble.
Barnes & Noble is the US’s largest remaining book chain but, under James Daunt, each of the 600 stores is meant to run like an independent bookstore
Source: ‘Amazon doesn’t care about books’: how Barnes & Noble bounced back | Barnes & Noble | The Guardian
Record spending on manufacturing construction heralds a made-in-the-U.S. rebound, stoked by green-energy incentives and concerns about foreign supply chains.
Source: America Is Back in the Factory Business – WSJ
This an absolutely fantastic animated chart. If you have 30 seconds and have any interest in music sales, then you will enjoy this animation.
50 years in music has seen consumption change from vinyl and cassettes to CDs and streaming. This video highlights sales of music formats over time.
Source: Animated Chart: The Rise and Fall of Music Sales, by Format (1973-2021)
Rindge Leaphart
While I am under no illusion that manufacturing in the United States will ever return to previous levels, it is good to see articles like the one below. There will always be a place for domestic manufacturing companies that are both nimble and innovative.
Factories have added 467,000 jobs in the last 12 months, as production jumped to its highest level since 2008. But manufacturing remains a much smaller slice of the U.S. economy than it used to be.
Source: U.S. factory production highest in 14 years, even as interest rates rise : NPR
I recently invested the time to watch the video below from Harvard Business School. The subject was quite interesting at this stage of my life and the professor was quite engaging. There was, as you might expect, a plug for the professor’s book, which I look forward to reading. If you have the time to invest (50 minutes or so) and are interested in a lively discussion on Happiness and Purpose, then I highly recommend the video.
From Strength to Strength: Finding Success, Happiness, and Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life
All the best,
Rindge Leaphart
Refreshing to know that my physical library is not yet extinct. I have nothing against e-books, but give me a book store or library with books I can see and touch. The gems I have discovered wandering around the bookstore are numerous.
When e-books hit the mainstream in the early 2000s, many predicted they’d eventually make print books obsolete. So far, print has prevailed.
Source: The Staying Power of Print Books
Rindge Leaphart
Brief, but decent article on labor shortages in trucking, that I suspect is applicable to most industries suffering from lack of workers. However, I think the article overlooks that even with rising wages, there is a shortage of workers. Salary is obviously important, but not the only factor keeping workers on the sideline.
The US has plenty of licensed truck drivers, but there’s a shortage of well-paying jobs that would entice them to stay in the trucking industry.
Source: There is no truck driver shortage in the US — Quartz
Rindge Leaphart
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