Spotify is reportedly in talks with China’s Tencent Holdings about a potential swap of stakes in advance of both companies’ planned public listings. The possible development first appeared in the Wall Street Journal (paywall), which reported that the two businesses trade stakes of up to 10%. Continue Reading
Mobile app Stationhead is bringing more music into its platform. The service lets users try their hand at DJing, turning playlists into a radio-like broadcast on the app. It launched using Spotify’s API, but has now added access to Apple Music. Continue Reading
Last year, Spotify tapped into its data troves for a clever marketing campaign. This year, it’s back in action, all themed around resolutions for 2018. The push is dubbed “2018 Goals,” and it again highlights some of the unusual factoids and data points from Spotify listeners. The campaign was developed and executed in-house and covers 18 markets. Continue Reading
In what could be described as the Kerry Trainor era of SoundCloud, starting when the Vimeo ex-CEO took over the Berlin-based streaming platform, a quickened pace of product development seems to be in progress. It’s good news for the creator/uploader community which pays a lot of SoundCloud’s bills via subscriptions for cloud storage of tracks. Continue Reading
Indie label group and distributor Merlin has entered a deal with Dubset Media to open up new revenue streams. Under this arrangement, Merlin’s catalog will be added to MixBANK and MixSCAN, Dubset’s platforms for identifying music samples used in remixes and DJ sets. Continue Reading
Amazon shared some insights from its sales over the Thanksgiving weekend, including Black Friday and Cyber Monday. The Echo Dot was the top-selling product on Amazon, regardless of segment or manufacturer. Amazon didn’t reveal any specifics of sales numbers for the Dot, but they likely numbered in the millions. Continue Reading
With the holiday shopping season now upon us, the top tech toys are in position to make a lot of sales. The smart speaker niche seems likely to be a strong performer at the end of 2017. Jacobs Media Strategies, jācapps, and Sonic Ai have collaborated on a survey into consumer sentiment toward voice-activated smart speakers going into December. Continue Reading
iHeartRadio has announced two new integrations for its listeners. First, its podcasts are now supported on the Apple CarPlay. The second development is a partnership with Comcast that will roll out iHeartRadio on the Xfinity X1 set-top box. Continue Reading
Spotify is getting into the festive spirit with a playlist of some exclusive holiday songs. The tracks are all from sessions of Spotify Singles, where performers record a few songs in the streaming service’s studios. Now, Spotify has a collection of these exclusive songs highlighted in the Holiday section. Continue Reading
Podcast platform RadioPublic announced that public media company WGBH is now an investor. The company led a strategic investment that also included Companyon Capital, former Groupon CEO Andrew Mason, and Third Sector Capital founder George Overholser. RadioPublic has raised $2.8 million in seed financing to date. Continue Reading
The Copyright Royalty Board has issued its cost of living adjustments for royalty rates in 2018. The new rate for ad-supported, non-subscription music streaming services in 2018 is $0.0018. Paid subscription services will pay $0.0023 per performance. The previous rates were $0.0017 for ad-supported and $0.0022 for subscription. Continue Reading
iHeartRadio announced the debut of a new podcast, which also marks the official start of Bobby Bones’ Nashville Podcast Network. The new show, Good Company with Jake Owen, is part of the new podcast network launched by iHeartMedia’s nationally syndicated radio host Bobby Bones. Continue Reading