CÜR Media has raised $2 million in financing led by Intuitive Venture Partners and Katalyst Securities. This funding will go toward paying the company’s content providers. “I’m pleased to have completed this financing and to move our company one step closer toward the launch of CÜR Music,” Founder and CEO Tom Brophy said. Continue Reading
With the recent wave of music industry organizations worldwide releasing their data for 2015, two distinct trends have emerged. One of them is a growing dissatisfaction with the flow of money through ad-supported streaming services. Some reports just imply frustration, while others have centered on YouTube as the symbolic scapegoat for their anger about the amount of revenue generated by that type of media platform. Continue Reading
Milk Music has launched in China. The Samsung-owned streaming service will include a library of 1 million tracks in addition to multiple Chinese radio stations. Samsung and its streaming platform have been the source of some industry speculation of late. Continue Reading
Brief news items and worthy reads from around the web: Radio defense from down under. Tech catches up to high-res audio. Continue Reading
A new survey reveals that Canadian podcast listening in cars has continued to rise. The results showed notably more podcast consumption among the 18-34 age group at 17%, compared with 8% for ages 35-54 and just 2% for the over 55 group. It was also most popular among university graduates compared with other education levels. Continue Reading
After some early rumblings of label licensing drama for YouTube, the video platform has successfully inked a deal with at least one publisher. The company has expanded its licensing agreement with Downtown Music Publishing to include performance rights for streaming its tracks in the U.S. Continue Reading
NVPI, the Netherlands’ industry organization, announced the figures for the Dutch music sector’s performance in 2015. The music industry grew 12.5% to €136.9 million last year. All digital revenue totaled €72.2 million. Continue Reading
Leading spoken-word platform audioBoom announces today that Thomas Mancusi is taking the newly-created position of Vice President, Sales and Development. In this job, Mancusi will develop premium marketing campaigns around audioBoom’s most successful and high-profile programs. Continue Reading
Facebook has launched a Rights Manager tool to help monitor and protect copyrighted content on the social media network. The main focus of the discussion is “freebooting,” in which videos are easily ripped from the content creators and shared by Business Pages to grow their own online audiences to the loss of the original sources. At first glance, this isn’t an obvious musical development. But the comparisons between Facebook’s Rights Manager and YouTube’s Content ID programs are obvious and point to the broader consequences of this initial action by the social media company. Continue Reading
RAIN Summit West is this Sunday in Las Vegas, and there is still time to register before the price goes up. Here, a complete rundown of the day’s agenda. Continue Reading
Gen Media Partners announced the hiring of Jim Brandt as its new senior vice president of digital. In this position, Brandt will be tasked with capitalizing on revenue opportunities in digital platforms ranging from radio and streaming to TV and mobile. Continue Reading
SoundCloud has tightened its integration with Twitter. The online platform’s audio cards can now be embedded into tweets that appear in Twitter Moments. Continue Reading