Neotune Entertainment: Fall and decline of an empire

     Do you guys remember the great bands Neotune Entertainment had back then? Bands like Wock Til You Drop, Sticks N Stones and Yes Boy Ice-Cream? Remember how they dominated Neopia to the point where they sold out concerts in 3 minutes? Remember how they set the standard for all the other bands in Neopia to be measured up to when it came to popularity and talent? Remember when they used to sell 2 million singles easily with each release? The war of Tyrannia would symbolize a lot of things for Neotune Entertainment. To many people, it symbolized the end of the mighty empire that is Neotune Entertainment. Over the past few years they have tried to cling on to what made them great before the war of Tyrannia instead of recognizing its flaws and moving on with the times. They are doing anything to remind themselves of their glory days and trotting out the same sort of music over and over again.

     Neotune Entertainment promoted from within to replace Sklar the Grarrl with Uggie the Techo. Unfortunately to say Uggie the Techo is an incompetent CEO is a complete understatement. Fans of groups such as Wock Til You Drop, Sticks N Stones and Yes Boy Ice-Cream want him gone immediately. So when did Neotune Entertainment become the laughingstock of the music world in Neopia? In order to answer this question, we have to find the moment where the company jumped the shark.

     For this, we have to go back to the times when the war of Tyrannia just finished. Sklar the Grarrl was not feeling well and his mother Ryulla took over from day to day operations. The company had a rising star as a producer who produced some songs for the bands but not the title tracks. You may have heard of him before. His name was Tekcha the Chia, a young prospective producer who was loved by everyone in the company and played a major role in producing a few of the best songs to come out of Neotune Entertainment. He produced songs such as Tyrannia's Cry which was one of Sticks N Stones best sellers and Rise From The Ashes which was Yes Boy Ice-Cream's song that was loved by music critics the most.

     Tekcha who sensed that his time would not come with Neotune Entertainment, accepted a position as the new CEO of JN entertainment who houses Philharmonic and Jazzmosis. Say what you want Tekcha but he turned JN entertainment from a small company into a well-known one. Philharmonic sold 1.5 million singles the last time they promoted and Jazzmosis sold 1.8 million copies with their most recent jazzy single. Sklar's mother decided to promote Uggie the Techo to CEO of Neotune Entertainment because he was simply Sklar's right hand man all this time. Right there! That was the moment when Neotune Entertainment jumped the shark.

     Remember when the Yes Boy Ice-Cream members complained about getting overworked? Let us not promote them for 2 years because they did not stroke Uggie's ego and therefore lose all the popularity they once had! A combination of competition from other emerging bands and their hiatus resulted in them losing a lot of their fans. They only sold 100,000 singles once they came back from their hiatus, which was a massive drop from 500,000 the last time they promoted. Who knew that the lack of fan engagement would result in this sort of situation for Yes Boy Ice-Cream and the company!

     Remember Leo the Shoyru who we kicked out of Yes Boy Ice-Cream because he was not charming and talented enough? Turns out he has learned from this lesson and is massively popular now with Twisted Roses! Let us badmouth him at every opportunity and every interview and show how jealous we are of his success and eventually get into trouble for defamation! That would help the popularity and reputation of our bands!

     We cannot have Mike the Blumaroo from Sticks 'N Stones leave! Who is going to be our frontman? We have to prevent our young prospects from replacing him! Forget about introducing fresh blood and youthful enthusiasm to the band! Lets give him 10 million Neopoints per year for the next 5 years for his next contract and destroy our profits once and for all!

     So none of the acts from Neotune Entertainment sold over 200,000 singles in over 2 years. Maybe they will realize that their excessive overspending will lead to financial disaster for the company. But that would use too much brainpower! Well Cody the Shoyru seems like a nice addition to Yes-Boy Ice Cream! Let us pay him 7 million Neopoints per year for the next 3 years!

     Let us only make some slight modifications to one of Sticks N Stones' old singles and release that as our next title track because we need to save money. Getting a top notch producer would be too expensive! We are going to use the same 4 chords! That would give their fans something to be excited about! Lets do that again next year with our title track! The band did not even sell 80,000 singles and they sold only about 70,000 the next year. Clearly this strategy has not worked out. Even Captain Obvious would have figured that out!

     Oh and let us also rip off an old Grunndo track from 7 years ago and make it sound very similar to Wock Til You Drop's next single. Talk about plagiarizing someone else's work and getting in trouble with another company again! That would help their financial situation!

     Neotune entertainment pleaded guilty of plagiarism of the old Grunndo track and was forced to hand Grundo-Kreludor Entertainment 4 million Neopoints. Neotune Entertainment's financial situation was already bad enough by the time this lawsuit came around but this just made it worse for the company. Yet nothing was done to change the way Neotune Entertainment was run. Uggie was still the CEO all this time.

     Sadly, it gets even worse with Neotune Entertainment to the point of disaster. Sklar the Grarrl who founded the company and made the bands popular is gone. This is another symbol of the fallen empire. Like in many companies, Uggie is nothing like Sklar. He only cares about himself and his ego. He did not have the passion for music and success like Sklar did. Neotune Entertainment has done something indescribable. They went from the envy of all music companies in Neopia to the laughingstock of the music world.

     Turns out that promoting Tekcha to CEO would have been the right move all this time. Imagine Tekcha making the right business decisions and Wock Til You Drop, Sticks N Stones and Yes Boy Ice-Cream still selling 1.5 million copies each these days. Neotune Entertainment would have still been going strong had Ryulla decided to promote Tekcha instead to replace Sklar as the CEO of the company. Instead, their dominance seems like a distant memory these days for them. At this rate, the company will be left with nothing but memories and debts.

     To all Neopians who think I am being too harsh on the Neotune entertainment, here is my take: nobody is questioning the legacy of Wock Til You Drop, Sticks N Stones and Yes Boy Ice-Cream. Regardless of the low popularity these bands have these days, they will at least be remembered for years to come. Neopians believe those bands are tragic figures. This is the harshest lesson to learn in the music world. Everyone has an expiration date. One day the world will be moving on and music bands will become obsolete and irrelevant. New technology and new ways of doing stuff will emerge overtime unless you can adapt to a new era of music quickly you will disband and die out. So what happens when you do not adapt to the new age? You get Neotune Entertainment in its sorry state. You get a company which is mired in debt. This is a lesson to all companies in Neopia. One day you have to move with the times, while the times moves you.