adStream is a journal of ad-stalking and interesting commercial sightings in online audio services.
Pandora has spent resources building a local ad-sales network working in over three-dozen markets, and deploys algorithmic tools to target ads by location. But in our ad-stalking experience, we don’t notice many location-specific commercials in our test account. We caught one the other day, though. Continue Reading
eMarketer reports on survey data collected in march by B2X Care solutions, investigating how consumer ages 16-65 use their smartphones. The report is slanted toward online map use. But we noticed that music use was at the same usage level in the original research. Continue Reading
If the steady throb of 60-beats-per-minute dance music helps power you through the day, Club Fusion is a pureplay you need to know about. (www.fusionradio.fm).In today’s high-energy listening to Club Fusion we’ve heard Tiesto, Chromeo, Antillas, Kiesza, Cascada, and others. Continue Reading
Coleman Insights has completed its guidance research for the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) and Emmis Communications, the developer of NextRadio. The study’s first part was about how consumer consume radio generally. This second part examines consumer reaction to the NextRadio app. Continue Reading
This weekly podcast is a quick and concise catch-up of must-know news in streaming music and online audio
This week: Swell Music shutters … Vevo looks for a buyer … Pandora releases earnings … NPR reinvents radio, again … Sirius and Radionomy have news. Continue Reading
RAIN founding editor Kurt Hanson is reporting from Tokyo, where he is surveying the tech, culture, and audio landscapes. This is his fourth report. iPhones are popular in Tokyo, but there is a peculiar exception. Continue Reading
This week National Public radio released the brand new NPR One mobile app, which site side-by-side with the previously launched NPR News app. The first was a reinvention of the NPR listening experience. The new app reinvents that, with simplicity and style. RAIN reviews. Continue Reading
Brief news items and worthy reads from around the web: Rhapsody exec says labels gave YouTube too much power; Journal and Scripps merge; Lyric sites sued by NMPA. Continue Reading
On Monday we reported a possible sale of Swell Radio to Apple for $30-million dollars, citing unnamed sources talking to Re/code. That rumor has been substantiated now by thoday’s shutdown of the Swell site. The iOS app fails to connect to Swell servers, except for a brief audio message thanking listeners for using Swell. Continue Reading
Internet radio service Radionomy announced today that its platform of independent stations have been added to Sonos, the wireless speaker system. Sonos represents an important new distribution angle for Radionomy, and is also a win for Radionomy’s station owners, and Sonos users. Continue Reading
Ryan Farish is an electronic-music composer and producer, a pioneer of the EDM (Electronic Dance Music) genre which is surging in popularity, and a Grammy-nominated songwriter. He coined the defining sub-genre of his music as Positive Chillout, a category now in use by other musicians.
Farish will be featured onstage at RAIN Summit Indy, September 9 in Indianapolis, in a panel titled “EDM: Streaming a New Path to Success.” In anticipation, RAIN spoke with Ryan Farish by phone, asking about how his star career unfolded without the traditional leverage of broadcast radio or a major-label deal. Continue Reading
On April 30, 2012, Rick O’Dell was fed up. WLFM in Chicago switched away from the Smooth Jazz format (to Alt Rock), leaving the city’s terrestrial listeners without a station for that shiny genre. It had happened before, in 2009, when Clear Channel’s WNUA abandoned Smooth Jazz for Spanish-language programming. O’Dell saw an opportunity, and started a localized Smooth Jazz Internet-only station. Continue Reading