James Cridland’s Future of Radio is a column by the Australia-based radio futurologist. A podcast app accepts advertising, how Radioplayer Car works, smart speakers are the interactive radio for everybody, a snooty podcast piece, and much more. Continue Reading
“It’s clear that streaming is taking over,” a Nielsen spokesperson notes when sending us the Q1 Music Report. The quarterly update of music consumption across all platforms shows a 35% gain in number of streams, compared to the first quarter… Continue Reading
The chief officer of the BMG label issued downward sentiment when he talked about the prospects of a music industry revival powered by streaming. “I am very cynical about the view that the good days have returned,” said Hartwig Masuch as quoted in Financial Times. Streaming drives the music industry now, and artists are set to demand a bigger cut from their labels. Continue Reading
BuzzAngle unceremoniously released its first-quarter 2017 music industry consumption numbers today — and only the numbers, without comment or executive summary. No problem there, as the numbers tell a clear story. Continue Reading
Yesterday the Wall Street Journal broke anonymously sourced news (e.g. rumor) that Spotify is planning an “open listing” method of becoming a publicly traded company. In the ensuing media swirl, that method has been termed an IPO-less IPO. Media reactions range from “weird” to “logical.” Continue Reading
The latest PodcastOne content partnership is with the renowned Geffen Playhouse in Los Angeles, and results in the launch of Geffen Playhouse Unscripted podcast. The new show dropped its first episode this week. Continue Reading
The battle of the bills continues in Washington, as over-the-air radio’s music royalty exemption is again under scrutiny by the 115th Congress. In the latest development, Congressman Darrell Issa (R-Calif) has introduced a new bill with a new solution which gives artists the right to forbid airplay of their music without payment. Continue Reading
One of the highlights of the recent Radiodays Europe conference in Amsterdam, attended by more than 1,500 public and private broadcasters from across much of Europe (see Part 1 of my report here) was an update on Norway’s current year-long, region-by-region shutdown of the FM band, designed to move listeners to DAB+ channels. RAIN News Publisher Kurt Hanson’s “Part 2” from the conference. Continue Reading
Research firm Morning Consult has released results of a consumer survey which queried over 2,200 adults about how they use virtual assistants. In framing the results of this study, it’s important to understand the scope of “virtual assistant” in this report. Continue Reading
Brief news items and worthy reads from around the web: Beta tests in India for YouTube Go. Music services become memes. Continue Reading
Canada’s Bell Media has entered an exclusive music publishing and administration deal with ole, an independent rights management company. The arrangement covers the in-house music library of the telecom. Continue Reading
Kanye West’s album The Life of Pablo has achieved platinum certification just based on streaming performance. The album, which was released in February 2016, has reached 1.5 billion streams in the U.S., enough to attain platinum certification from the RIAA. Continue Reading