We had heard about SoundCloud’s skippable audio ads, and were on the prowl to see one in action. We struck gold in the new Gimlet Media site. There, we found the unique ad technology used by SoundCloud to present a 30-second pre-roll audio ad. Continue Reading
Are lyrics the new hip feature for music services? Hot on the heels of Deezer announcing the addition of Lyrics to its streaming service, Google is now displaying the words to certain songs in its search results. For the tracks getting the lyric treatment, a large number of the lines will appear at the top of the hits with a link to the full lyrics on Google Play. Continue Reading
Pandora has entered the ring to defend itself against the lawsuit filed by the Turtles, which seeks royalty payments for songs dating to before 1972. The online radio company filed a response in California, claiming that the lawsuit infringes its freedom of speech and asking that the court block the band’s demands. Continue Reading
Media management company WideOrbit has acquired the audio/video publishing platform Castfire, adding a new dimension to WideOrbit’s ad-insertion solutions. WideOrbit plans to position Castfire with its Abacast Clarity product, which it obtained with the Abacast acquisition in June. Continue Reading
British streaming music platform 7digital announced a technology partnership with Meridian Audio, and is the launch partner of Meridian’s MQA high-res audio format. MQA stands for Master Quality Authenticated, and delivers high fidelity audio in a streamable file size. We spoke to 7digital CEO Simon Cole about the importance of streamable high-res music. Continue Reading
In a leaked internal memo published by Billboard, CEO and Chairman of Universal Music Group, Lucian Grainge, promised a continued commitment to artist development, and pledged to “re-design business models” as necessary. The memo comes at a time when major labels are engaged in publicized contract renewal discussions with Spotify. Continue Reading
The best-of lists continued today with an installment from Adweek. The magazine polled its readers on the top apps of the year for a range of industries, and iHeartRadio was chosen as the Hottest Music App of 2014. iHeart secured 44% of the votes to top the list. Continue Reading
When Taylor Swift and her label chose to remove the pop singer’s latest album and back catalog from Spotify, they unintentionally sparked the emergence of some fascinating data about online music listening habits. First came Nielsen’s discovery that Swift’s YouTube streaming counts ballooned from the moment her audio streams dropped. Second, we now have data showing that she added the most subscribers on the video network during November. Continue Reading
Ready for an antidote to the ordinary? The extraordinary All-Transistor Radio, a project of Magic Transistor, is the answer. More eccentric than college radio, All-Transistor Radio is programmed by a disparate affiliation of music collectors around the world. Continue Reading
In an interview with “Mad Money” host Jim Cramer, Neil Young revealed that Pono Music will have an automotive angle. He said the company is working with Harman to give Pono access within the 2016 Lincoln Continental. Tesla is also expected to bring Pono into its digital dashboard once the music store is ready. Continue Reading
We learned that Aupeo is readying an update and re-branding of its Personal Radio product, soon to be re-named Personal Radio by Aupeo. Stay tuned for details during CES week in January. In the meantime, we spoke with CEO Holger Weiss, who Skyped with RAIN News from his Berlin office. Continue Reading
Most true music aficionados will always have a soft spot for the tradition of the mixtape. As more of our listening migrates onto computers and smartphones, our old tapes and CDs can start to seem like relics from a bygone time. Sure, you could turn to an online playlisting service, and many of them are quite good, but thus far none of those platforms has recaptured quite the same experience of making a mixtape for somebody. Today we took a look at Tapely, a site that aims to tap into that classic mixtape activity. Continue Reading