We saw a wave of startups looking to combine music and social media in meaningful ways back in 2014-2015. Now, a fresh crop of entrepreneurs is looking to apply social networks to podcasting. The latest startup to try this combination is Goodpods. Continue Reading
Bumpers is the newest mobile app exploring the podcast space. It allows people to record their own podcasts directly on their phone. The company secured $1 million in seed funding and its app is currently available on iOS. Spark Capital led the round, and Twitter co-founder and Medium CEO Evan Williams is involved as a strategic angel investor. Continue Reading
Entertainment Intelligence is a music data company that’s putting playlist analysis tools into the hands of rights-holders. The business is creating a set of apps for other music and entertainment companies, including one to track playlist performance. Continue Reading
Comedy has been part of music services for years, though it doesn’t get much trade ink. While you can listen to tracks from comedy albums in music services, there are problems which combine to under-serve comedy fans. A new startup aims to fix those problems with a dedicated comedy streaming service that has unique technology under the hood. Continue Reading
“Do you want to spend hours sorting and building playlists, rather than being served songs you love?” That’s the question posed by the soon-to launch new music wearable Aivvy. The product is a set of headphones bundled with the company’s own streaming music service of 50 million tracks. Continue Reading
Serendip announced that it will cease operations on Sept. 22. In an email to its members, the company said the costs of processing all the posts and serving up playlists on both web and mobile apps were more than the small team could handle. The Israel-based startup was designed to be a music service with a social angle. It pulled music recommendations from a person’s connections on Facebook and Twitter to create playlists. It also had a lean-back radio listening component. Continue Reading
Brief new items and worthy reads from around the web: Google execs join Spotify; blue notes for jazz and classical; new musical startups; UK’s anti-piracy program Continue Reading