The New Black: Mos Def’s T-Shirt Experiment…
The worlds of fashion and music dabble with one another from time to time, though musicians now have more incentive than ever to embrace the runway. The reason is that traditional music sales and promotional channels are often vacated, and newer channels are often hopelessly fragmented.
Jelli: Crowdsourced Radio, On the Big Tower…
Traditional radio is bleeding, thanks to a sunken advertising market and a myriad of entertainment options.’Distractions’ like mobile phones are also draining listening hours.But some of the downfall hype is simply overblown. Just ask any artist benefiting from big-station spins, or any of the millions of listeners lured by the total simplicity of the experience. But many of these same [...]
Royalties measure rocks Congress
It seems like a chicken-or-egg sort of argument. Do musicians make more money because radio stations play their songs, or do radio stations make more money because they play the artists’ songs?
Twitter Begins Verifying Accounts… Sort of
Following some bad press, a fight with Kanye West, and a recent lawsuit from Tony La Russa, manager of the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team, whose identity was abused on the site, Twitter is now testing “Verified Accounts” — its appropriately named method of determining that some user accounts are authentic. However, while it’s early days yet for Verified Accounts, [...]
The Other Recording Royalty Battle… In Europe
Stateside, the recording industry is fighting for performance royalties from terrestrial broadcasters. But in Europe, traditional radio stations already pay that royalty – but only until the copyright expires fifty years after creation. “The vast majority of creators benefit from having their works protected by copyright throughout their lives plus seventy years thereafter,” stated Fran Nevrkla, chairman and CEO of [...]
Vinyl: Still Totally Cool, Still Totally Niche…
The nostalgia-fueled vinyl resurgence has been totally unexpected and completely feel-good. But the numbers still show a niche market, at least for now. At present, vinyl accounts for less than one-percent of broader album sales in the US, according to Nielsen Soundscan, though sales are expected to grow another 50 percent this year.
Virgin Media, UMG Mint Unlimited Streaming, Download Offering…
UK-based Virgin Media and Universal Music Group are now planning an all-access, unlimited streaming and download service, according to details shared with Digital Music News early this morning. The plan is to give Virgin broadband subscribers unlimited streams and MP3s, without strings attached, in exchange for a monthly subscription fee. “The music will be theirs to keep forever,” an executive [...]
Craigslist Revenue to Climb 23 Pct to $100M
Associated Press June 10, 2009 – SAN FRANCISCO — Craigslist, one of the Internet’s top sites for classified ads, is thriving while newspapers and other marketing-driven media are reeling from huge revenue losses, according to a report to be released Wednesday. Launched as an e-mail list in 1995, Craigslist’s revenue is on pace to rise 23 percent this year to [...]
SAG Members Ratify 2-Year Hollywood Movie, TV Contract
Associated Press June 10, 2009 – LOS ANGELES — After a year of nasty infighting, members of the Screen Actors Guild decided by a large margin that the show must go on. The Guild said Tuesday that 78 percent of voting members decided to ratify a two-year contract covering movies and prime-time TV shows made by the major Hollywood studios.