Dear Songza: Idea, great. Execution, not so much. An email promotion of Songza’s “brand new music” playlists introduces a terrific idea — new releases in 59 categories. We found 18 of them. Hope turned to sorrow. Continue Reading
For those focused on music and online audio, it’s easy to forget that Apple is not a music company, but a hardware vendor. iTunes Radio is just a feature in a network ecosystem of products and services. And…not mentioned in yesterday’s earnings call. Continue Reading
A social manager gone rogue? Drunk tweeting? We don’t know, but Mashable was keeping a sharp eye on Spotify’s Twitter feed during the couple of days last week when Beats Music was down and out with connection problems. Continue Reading
Patrick Reynolds is Chief Strategy Officer of Triton Digital. A forward-looking strategist, he has written articles for Forbes, TechCrunch, and Technorati, and has spoken at SXSW and NAB. We welcome Patrick to RAIN News as a regular guest contributor. Continue Reading
In December we reported revenue declines for CBS-owned Last.FM. Now the company has cut costs with a new video-music player powered by YouTube. The Scrobbler function, which has been Last.FM’s distinguishing feature, connects to the new player. Continue Reading
As the Copyright Review Board gears up for the two-year royalty rate-setting process, we spoke with attorney David Oxenford, about what was special about this royalty cycle, and whether the seven-year process can keep pace with a fast-changing streaming market. Continue Reading
It seems like a done deal, as Nielsen quickly started integrating Arbitron into its operations after a September acquisition, setting up the Nielsen Audio division and making small changes to ratings measurements. But a second part of the deal starts now. Continue Reading
John Popper, best known as the front man of Blues Traveler, clearly did his homework to prepare for questions about Pandora and streaming music. In a video interview on CNBC, when asked about songwriter royalties, Popper delivered a history lesson. Continue Reading
Although the deal closed last year, the news is breaking only now: SoundCloud scored $60M of new funding from Institutional Venture Partners (IVP) and the Chernin Group. Investors call SoundCloud the YouTube of audio. Isn’t YouTube already that? Continue Reading
In a frank and concise interview with Hollywood Reporter, Spotify founder Daniel Ek volleys a series of questions about his competitors. He denigrates Beats Music, and makes a mistake about Pandora, but, more interestingly, defines Spotify in a meaningful way. Continue Reading
The 56th annual Grammy Awards have reportedly chosen Rdio to power its official app. No musical streaming is happening in the app now, two days before the ceremony. Get the streams flowing! (You can hear nominee streams within the Rdio app, furnished by TheGrammys profile.) Continue Reading
Amazon might start an online TV service, competing with cable companies. Amazon Prime has over 20-million subscribers, a huge number by the standards of music plans. Will Amazon ever get into music streaming? Continue Reading