Q. Explore the impact of digital technologies on your selected industries [30]

A.    In recent years, downloads on Itunes and websites such as spotify and amazon have arguably taken over the music industry. The question prolongs, do artists need record labels anymore? There is much evidence to support the view that, due to the rise in digital technology, record labels are no longer needed. RadioHead is one artist that were on the books of a record label, then went independant and released their ablum 'The King of Limbs' only for download from their website. 240,000 copies of the album were sold via download of their website. Then within a month, the £33.00 special edition viral copy was available. Yes, these figures of sales are lower than what Radiohead had when under their record label previously, however, with no money needed to pay out to record labels who 'own' them and therefore claim most of the profit, they were making more money without a record label and this is purely down to the use of the internet and digital technology.
      As for Lady Gaga, experts argue a third of her fortune comes from the Twitter account and is predicted to earn her £30 Million. Lady Gaga creates parasocial interaction between her and her fans in which she refers to as her 'little monsters'. The constant interaction she has to her fans via Twitter and Facebook make direct interaction and builds a relationship and this continues her success via digital technology.