Streaming Saves

Because of the cost of bringing Western artists to Asia and the relative purchasing power of local fans, Asian concert promoters have considered presenting live streams of shows.

If the idea hasn’t caught on in a big way yet, as Errol Tan, the manager of KittyWu Records in Singapore, told ZDNet Asia News, it may be due to the perception that it’s more expensive than it sounds.

“Pay-per-view would work only in the case of providing audiences an alternative to attending the actual concert due to geographic distance of conflicting schedules,” he said. Making sure the quality of the feed is good enough to replicate the concert experience would be a headache and require a separate video crew, which would add to the cost.

To confirm whether streamed concerts were as good as the real thing, ZDNet went to one by 30 Seconds to Mars in Singapore and asked a fan.

Samantha Leong said she was satisfied by the experience, finding it not only “economical and practical,” but also more interesting since the live stream included a tour of the backstage preparation for the show for people who showed up early.

Nevertheless, she confessed that the experience lacked the “sense of community” one feels when the artist is actually in front of the audience.

Tan added that the energy of a live show cannot be “translated into digital bits and bytes.”