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Albums may now be released on Fridays around the world
The plan is to combat piracy on a huge scale
by Ed Keeble
According to reports from Billboard, the music industry may finally incorporate global release dates in a bid to combat piracy - potentially on a Friday.
Reliable sources have informed the publication that executives have taken note of Beyoncé's surprise release last year. The stealth drop of the self-titled album in December 2013, may result in albums dropping worldwide on Fridays - rather than on Mondays in the UK, Tuesday in the UK and at random in the rest of the world.
Piracy was no doubt a key factor in Beyoncé's consideration of how to release, and it was a strategy that seemed to work very well - resulting in excellent sales worldwide. It is believed that adopting this strategy will drastically reduce the bootlegging process, thanks to synchronicity. For example, Australia which is the arguably the home of piracy, sees it's releases drop on Friday, often before the rest of the world. A global release date would undercut that process.
The main hurdle to moving release schedules comes from retailers of physical media, who take issue with going straight into the weekend after a big release. However with digital's lead on music stores ever widening, it is unlikely this is going to be of any concern.
This leaves the proposition as pretty much a done deal, which will take close to a year to implement. Expect to see global release dates beginning from July 2015, and in the meantime let's have some more surprise albums please.
Below: Who will be the next big artist to drop a surprise album on iTunes?
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