Midroll Media announced the launch of a new podcast network called Wolfpop. The company is an end-to-end podcast production outfit which formed earlier this year through the merger of the Earwolf humor podcast network and The Mid Roll advertising service. The new network is curated by actor and comedian Paul Scheer. Continue Reading
Brief news items and worthy reads from around the Web: Digital vs vinyl music infographic; explaining the podcasting Renaissance; studying the evolution of pop music; Amazon Fire TV stick arrives. Continue Reading
Google announced that its Play Music service has rolled out in several more European countries. The music store and the related All Access subscription streaming platform are now available in 14 more EU nations. Google has been making a march across the globe with its Play Music services over the course of 2014. Continue Reading
Pop princess Taylor Swift remains one of the most visible holdouts on Spotify and she has taken a bold action in the ongoing fight between artists and streaming platforms. She withheld her much-anticipated album 1989 from Spotify upon its initial release on Oct. 27. Today, she has chosen to remove her entire back catalog from the platform as well. Continue Reading
Forget connected cars, Apple is now taking Beats Music to a connected airplane. The tech company announced a partnership with Southwest Airlines to make a library of hundreds of playlists available for free on WiFi-enabled aircraft. Also in Beats Music news, Trent Reznor discussed the streaming service in an interview with Billboard. Continue Reading
Mark Mulligan of MIDiA Research wrote a blog post with his insights about the current price issues for streaming music. He highlighted the apparent either/or choice facing listeners – pick a totally free platform or pay $9.99 a month for a subscription – as a problem for the music industry to solve. Continue Reading
Radionomy announced that it will work with Nobex to create mobile apps for its most popular stations. Through the partnership, 650 of the online radio platform’s stations will receive free apps that will be made available on both the Apple App Store and on Android’s Google Play. Radionomy has made headlines several times this year for its partnerships that furthered the resources available to people who create stations under its banner. Continue Reading
Many in the advertising world think of Big Data as a damper to the creative process and the cause of the “wind tunnel” effect. What they don’t realize is that Big Data is more likely to become marketing’s biggest ally than its mortal enemy. Guest column by Bret Kinsella of XAPPmedia. Continue Reading
What song best evokes the spooks and scares of the Halloween season? SoundExchange has posted a graphic of the top ten scary songs of digital radio. The list is based on data collected for October 2013 from non-interactive digital radio sources, including satellite radio, Internet radio, and cable TV music services. Continue Reading
Nordic nations have 8 million streaming music users. That’s one of the takeaways from a survey conducted by the Polaris Nordic Alliance, a coalition of music collecting societies. The poll covered the roughly 17.8 million Internet users between the ages of 15 and 65 in Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Denmark. Continue Reading
Media technology company WideOrbit announced the hiring of Brian Burdick as EVP of Digital and Programmatic. Burdick will step in as head of WO Central, the company’s buying and selling platform, as well as recent acquisitions Fivia, Abacast, and Admeta. WideOrbit is investing aggressively in acquisitions and talent. Click through for details. Continue Reading
Spotify is launching a television ad campaign in the UK that ties in with talent competition X Factor. There will be two spots airing each week until the end of November. The first will tell a story about people listening to music, and the second will be related to the weekly theme of the singing show. Continue Reading