RAIN Summits are famous for their thought-leadership discussion panels. Since the in-depth, industry-expert discussion panels go without saying, we’ll say no more about them here. Five other reasons to register for RAIN Summit West if you’ll be in Las Vegas this weekend. Continue Reading
Our Infinite Dial studies have been tracking usage of online radio since 1998, and we have asked about ‘monthly usage’ since 2000. In a recent meeting I made the comment that if one superimposes the graph showing growth of smartphone ownership over the monthly online radio usage one can see a strong correlation. Continue Reading
Playlist radio service 8tracks is opening its first in-house music library today, in partnership with CD Baby, INgrooves, and indie labels. The initiative promises to streamline playlist-building for 8tracks “DJs,” while tightening its ties with the independent artist community. Continue Reading
The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) has released A Digital Audio Buyer’s Guide, a free, 29-page explanatory overview of the streaming audio advertising ecosystem. The guide promotes digital audio’s high-growth, mobile-friendly attributes to marketers. Continue Reading
SoundCloud has entered into a partnership with content identification service Zefr. The deal appears focused on monitoring what tracks get played and when. Although neither SoundCloud nor Zefr have disclosed much detail about the nature of their new partnership, it’s likely a step in SoundCloud’s push into monetizing its platform. Continue Reading
Webcast listening rose 5% month-over-month in February, and 40% year-over-year, according to the Webcast Metrics Top 20 Ranker just released by Triton Digital. Click through for historical trend charts. Continue Reading
The Department of Justice has been engaged in a review of consent decrees for more than a year. These rules govern the blanket licenses that performing rights organizations negotiate on behalf of music publishers. Billboard has a piece on the changes the department is reported to be considering, according to its unnamed sources. Continue Reading
In a far-reaching agreement, iHeartMedia and its subsidiary Katz Media Group have partnered with Jelli, the automated radio advertising platform, for programmatic ad-buying of broadcast radio inventory. RAIN News spoke to Jelli CEO Mike Dougherty. Continue Reading
The Download on Podcasts is a weekly feature sponsored by PodcastOne.
One house. Five radios tuned to one station. One person time-shifting everything on mobile devices. When a radio show is also a podcast, where is its identity? Nowhere, which is a good thing. Why everyone wins when success doesn’t depend on the platform. Continue Reading
Pandora will be available on the Apple Watch from its debut on April 24. According to the press release, Pandora will offer intuitive interactions for listeners, even within the smartwatch’s space and size constraints. This participation with Apple’s latest mobile offering is part of Pandora’s mission to be a ubiquitous listening option. Continue Reading
Once a clearly defined term, podcasting now encompasses any kind of on-demand Internet program. As such, there is an opportunity for radio stations to jump into on-demand streaming in parallel with live webcasting. A new production application offers radio stations a tool to quickly turn live broadcast content into archived on-demand audio for streaming. Continue Reading
Intellectual property attorney Angus MacDonald examines the 2014 royalty collections by SoundExchange, and Pandora’s earnings reports, to determine that Pandora accounts for more than half of all SoundExchange revenues distributed to artists and labels. What does the future look like as the Copyright Royalty Board prepares a ruling of webcaster royalty rates for 2016-2020? Continue Reading