The battle of the bills continues in Washington, as over-the-air radio’s music royalty exemption is again under scrutiny by the 115th Congress. In the latest development, Congressman Darrell Issa (R-Calif) has introduced a new bill with a new solution which gives artists the right to forbid airplay of their music without payment. Continue Reading
One of the highlights of the recent Radiodays Europe conference in Amsterdam, attended by more than 1,500 public and private broadcasters from across much of Europe (see Part 1 of my report here) was an update on Norway’s current year-long, region-by-region shutdown of the FM band, designed to move listeners to DAB+ channels. RAIN News Publisher Kurt Hanson’s “Part 2” from the conference. Continue Reading
Research firm Morning Consult has released results of a consumer survey which queried over 2,200 adults about how they use virtual assistants. In framing the results of this study, it’s important to understand the scope of “virtual assistant” in this report. Continue Reading
Brief news items and worthy reads from around the web: Beta tests in India for YouTube Go. Music services become memes. Continue Reading
Canada’s Bell Media has entered an exclusive music publishing and administration deal with ole, an independent rights management company. The arrangement covers the in-house music library of the telecom. Continue Reading
Kanye West’s album The Life of Pablo has achieved platinum certification just based on streaming performance. The album, which was released in February 2016, has reached 1.5 billion streams in the U.S., enough to attain platinum certification from the RIAA. Continue Reading
ASCAP announced that it collected revenue of $1.059 billion in 2016, breaking the billion-dollar revenue mark for a third year. The performing rights organization distributed more than $918 million to its members over the course of the year, up 5.6% over the year before. Continue Reading
When was the last time you saw 20 influential thought-leaders in a dynamic and fascinating industry gathering, and got back to your office after lunch? If that seems implausible, you haven’t been to a RAIN half-day conference on digital audio advertising. Click through for details. Continue Reading
Nielsen’s Total Audience Report for Q4 2016 placed a focus on news. The results showed how much of a role radio plays in news consumption for U.S. adults. The weekly gross amount news consumption on radio in PPM markets rose from 10.5 billion minutes in 2015 to 11.5 billion minutes in 2016. However, radio did top the share of weekly listening in 2016 among U.S. adults. Continue Reading
Streaming is on the rise among Canadians. According to Solutions Research Group in Toronto, 62% of all online Canadians use a streaming service. The total audience of paying subscribers in Canada was estimated at 1.9 million as of October 2016. Continue Reading
After two years of negotiations, Spotify has broken through with a major label deal. The two companies had been operating on a month-to-month basis while working out a longer-term arrangement. They have been in on-again-off-again negotiations, but now they reportedly just need the sign-off from both CEOs to become official. Continue Reading
When Beasley Media acquired Greater Media in November, Steve Meyers — Director of Digital Operations for Greater — slid into the same position for the combined group under the Beasley brand. Now Caroline Beasley announces a promotion in which Steve Meyers rises to Executive Vice President of Digital. Continue Reading