Radio
Sawa is currently being broadcast in the Middle East, and in the fall,
Charneski says, her team will go back to conduct research on a television
component.
Back in 1997, Charneski decided to leave her position at Voter News Service in New York City and take the job as project coordinator at Edison Media Research, then a small start-up, only two years old with just five people. “It was a big gamble career-wise,” she says. “Several of my former co-workers had gone on to work at some of the big, name-brand marketing research firms.” But joining a small staff had its perks, she says. “I had to run projects from start to finish, deal with clients along the way, and then put presentations together. My former co-workers were only responsible for a small part of each project. I was basically thrown into the research deep end because we didn’t have the staff to do it any other way.”
Today, headquartered in Somerville, N.J., the company employs 20 people, has offices in London, Buenos Aires and New York City, and has been featured in USA Today, Radio & Records, Business Week, Advertising Age, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Boston Globe and on ABC, CBS and CNN. Charneski says laughingly, “When I first started with Edison we used to joke about becoming a ‘real company’ someday.”
“When I’m in Philly and listen to Y100 or hear an Alanis Morrisette album I think to myself, “Hey, we had a role in that.’”
Crediting her success with Edison Media Research to Albright, the psychology/business major says, “Taking research & design classes as a psychology major totally set me up for what I’m doing now – looking at numbers as they apply to music, attitudes, tastes and trends.”
Smiling enthusiastically, Charneski says, “Working at Edison has been beyond what I would have ever imagined. When I’m in Philly and listen to Y100 or hear an Alanis Morrisette album I think to myself, “Hey, we had a role in that.’”
And meeting celebrities like Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler and Jane's Addictions’ Dave Navarro is just an added bonus.
Music Sales are Slipping – Is Illegal Downloading to Blame? Ever since Napster, the electronic file-sharing brain-child of Northeastern University student Shawn Fanning, started the downloading craze in 1999, music sales have taken a downturn. Some say it’s because artists aren’t producing quality music. Others blame it on the changing demographic of buyers and their lack of passion for music. But according to a recent national survey of 12 to 44 year olds conducted by Edison Media Research, downloading and burning are clearly the most potent problems facing the music industry today. And it’s the heaviest downloaders, vice president Jayne Charneski ’95 says, that have the most negative influence on sales. “Our study should put to rest the notion argued by some surveys that say downloading actually helps sell records,” Charneski says. “While some people do indeed say that they have learned about music and gone on to buy CD’s because of downloading, the gains are more than negated by lost sales due to people downloading music or burning (making digital copies of CD’s).” The study reports that among those who have downloaded more than 100 music files (about 16 percent of 12 to 44 year olds), the purchase of CD’s has dropped an incredible 61 percent in one year. Seventy-one percent of heavy downloaders say that they have burnt someone else’s copy instead of buying a CD. Forty-eight percent of them say they no longer have to buy CD’s because they can download music for free over the Internet. “Today’s heavy downloader tends to be the same person the record industry has relied on in the past to be the heavy purchaser,” says Charneski. On the positive side, the study also shows that people are beginning to change their attitude toward downloading free music. In fact, as of May 2003, some 50 percent of Americans between the ages of 12 and 44 believe downloading music for free from the Internet is morally wrong, up from just 39 percent in 2002. “I think we’re seeing some evidence that the anti-piracy campaigns waged by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the record labels are starting to change the hearts and minds of consumers when it comes to file-sharing services,” she says. The RIAA, who managed to sue Napster out of business (although new illegal sites such as Kazaa, Morpheus and Grokster have popped up) has launched a multi-year effort to educate the public about the illegality of unauthorized downloading and the many companies that have made vast catalogues of music available to dozens of services to help create legitimate, high quality and inexpensive alternatives to online piracy. In a recent statement from RIAA president Cary Sherman, he said, “The law is clear and the message to those who are distributing substantial quantities of music online should be equally clear —- this activity is illegal, you are not anonymous when you do it, and engaging in it can have real consequences.” According to an April 4, 2003 USA Today article, the RIAA has filed legal suits against college students at schools such as Princeton, Michigan Tech and Rensselear Polytechnic Institute. And since then, students on at least 15 campuses including UCLA, Brandeis, Rice and Syracuse have pulled down their sites. Jason Hoerr, administrative computer support specialist at Albright, says approximately 70 percent of the traffic to the Internet from the residence halls is file sharing downloads. However, Dan Falabella, director of information technology at Albright, says the College is taking proactive steps to minimize the problem. “Over the past year we’ve purchased tools that will allow us to monitor and control what’s going on in the dorms,” Falabella says. “If a student is found to have taken an illegal action, they can be brought to the Electronic Communication Utilization Committee (ECUC) and a decision to either warn the student or shut down their account will be made.” — Jennifer Post Stoudt |