Quick Bytes: (Give It To Me Baby) Digital Royalties Lawsuit Against Universal Music to Proceed, Tunecore Launches Publishing Admin Service & More…
A federal judge is permitting a class-action lawsuit against Universal Music Group to move forward that involves a group led by Rob Zombie and the estate of Rick James. The issue at hand is digital royalties and the difference between treating downloads purchased at digital retailers like iTunes as a “sale” or a “license” as is relates to the artits’ split. This case follows similar litigation involving UMG and Eminem recordings, which was settled last year… Tunecore has launched a new songwriter publishing administration service that will register copyrights, collect royalties and issue licenses for users. The new service is among other recent entrants to the previously absent sector of expanded publishing admin for independent artists. More info can be found here… Spotify user numbers might be skyrocketing with the new Facebook integration, but it isn’t the only one – monthly users at MOG have quadrupled following the pairing up with the social network… Meanwhile, some are asking where the native Facebook music player app has gone, and what this means (if anything), for future music apps after it disappeared from the site this week… RIM will be launching its new BlackBerry Messenger music service this week… And Apple missed the ‘late October’ launch for its new iTunes Match service that was announced back in June, with no word from the company as to when it can be expected. [UPDATE: It appears that iTunes Match is still in the 'testing' phase.]
Digital Round Up: New Music Economy, Steve Jobs Bio Reveals iTunes Dealings & more…
swimming upstream
An article on Rollingstone.com has been getting passed around this week, as magazine contributor and author of music biz treatise, Appetite for Self-Destruction, Steve Knopper, took a stab at outlining the “new economy” of music sales. Streaming-music services in particular are a hot topic recently among artists, record labels, music-tech start ups and those who observe and comment on all of their goings-on. Among the choice quotes from the piece includes one from Jeff Price, founder of TuneCore, who commented on the confusing nature of streaming royalty rates, saying “It is beyond complicated. It took me literally three months to understand this thing,” while MOG founder David Hyman chimed in on the record labels distribution of streaming royalties to artists, “Once they get that wad of money, how do they distribute it internally? I have no idea”… The biography of Steve Jobs and its contents has been another widely discussed subject recently, with various story lines that cross into the music industry sector as well, including the Jobs experiences dealing with major labels. A New York Post item today points to Apple’s iTunes negotiation with former Sony Music boss Andy Lack, as particularly difficult, with Lack asking for royalties on each iPod sold, and Jobs criticizing him for not understanding his own business. Meanwhile, other more obvious iTunes related revelations are made, such as the reason that The Beatles only recently appeared in the digital marketplace was due to ongoing and unresolved contractual issues between the group and EMI… Elsewhere, Twitter has made its first specialized music hiring, in former Disney Music Group marketing manager Tatiana Simonian… AOL SVP of business development Jared Grusd is reportedly heading to Spotify… In a surprising move, Coldplay has opted to not make their new album Mylo Xyloto (pronounced “@&*%^$”) available on streaming services like Spotify, Rdio, MOG, Rhapsody and others, in what could be seen as a stance similar to holdout artists whose material still isn’t available on iTunes and other digital retailers… And more clues about Google’s upcoming launch of a music store comes this week with evidence of an expanded Android mobile landing page for the new Google Music service.
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In Case You Missed It: Reading Recap – Ping, MySpace’s New Content Chief & Mulve
Is Mulve digital downloading's "nightmare scenario"?
It’s been almost a month since Apple revealed iTunes 10, which included Ping, the new ’social’ feature that connects iTunes Store users through fan and following features. While the addition of artist profiles to Ping was slow-going initially, things have picked up, but the reason for the sluggish start may have been that the labels weren’t given details about the new feature until the very last minute, as reported on Fast Company this week. Indie aggregators like CD Baby and Tunecore are also now getting in on the Ping artist-profile action too, with limited abilities to submit artists into the program as well… Following the recent launch of an American Idol audition platform on MySpace for the upcoming 10th season of the show, it was revealed yesterday by the Hollywood Reporter that MySpace is also getting a new content chief in Andy Marcus, who will oversee the company’s entertainment initiatives, including the new Idol partnership… Sub Pop has a new distribution deal with Australia’s Inertia, a result of financial woes for the Seattle label’s former distro partner Stomp, an inevitably tipped by our own Cool Hand Luke in a recent missive from down under… And many people are talking about Mulve, the new entrant into the digital downloading arena. But what is it? It’s not P2P, it doesn’t pull song-files from search services and it’s not BitTorrent based. Whatever kind of creature it is, people are interested, as the site crashed shortly after reports of the service first surfaced – as of this morning, it appears to be back up…
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Scion presents Music (Less) Music Conference
Scion Music(Less) Conference in Hollywood
Scion presents a Music (Less) Music Conference at the Renaissance Hotel this Thursday and Friday in Hollywood. Ditching the typical day panels + evening showcase format, the conference will have no live performances and instead features keynotes, panels, workshops and debates geared at an audience of young artists and individuals looking to get a start in the music industry. The list of speakers and panelists includes DJ A-Trak, Jon Phillips of Silverback Management and Tunecore’s Jeff Price among many others, while panel and discussion topics include issues like Bloggers vs A&Rs: The Smackdown, Integrity and Selling Out in 2010, Is Touring Still Worth It?, Why is Now a Good Time to Get Involved in the Music Industry? and a long list of others….
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In Case You Missed It: Reading Recap
One Million + Sold
The clock is ticking for Terra Firma to come up with enough funds to keep control of EMI – recent reports indicate Guy Hands has rallied some of the investment firms’ largest backers in an effort to raise the minimum needed by the fast approaching deadline… Apple announced at the start of the week that they have already sold one-million iPads, that’s less than half the time it took to sell the same amount of iPhones… Elsewhere, Warner Music Group reported a 15% rise in digital revenue in its most recent quarter… Tunecore delivered stats from 2009 that included a total of $35-million in download and streaming income for artists… And The Register takes an interesting look at Beggars Group in an interview with indie label-group head Martin Mills…
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In Case You Missed It: Reading Recap
Hulu launching in UK with new 19 Entertainment series
Continuing with their recent string of announcements, MySpace Music revealed a new deal with digital-media distro service TuneCore to allow independent (unsigned) artists to have their music included in the MySpace Music on-demand streaming service for a flat fee (Epicenter)… EMI is taking legal action against video site Vimeo, claiming that while the site may feature original video content created by users, many songs under their control are used in such videos throughout the site without a license (ars)… Can a scientific formula detect radio payola? A researcher at University at Buffalo says yes (Science Daily)… More from the Terra Firma-EMI saga, as it appears that Citigroup made a bid for the music company just prior to the investment firm’s recent legal action against the bank (FW)… And Hulu prepares to cross the Atlantic. The popular online TV and movie streaming site prepares to launch in the UK early next year, but with just one show, a new 19 Entertainment reality series, If I Can Dream (MediaMemo)…
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In Case You Missed It: Reading Recap
MOG launches All Access
This week saw the launch of MOG’s new All Access $5/month music service, see an overview and some initial reactions here… Tunecore announced a new campaign with radio promotion company Unleashed Music to provide a to-be-selected unknown artist with a 6-week commercial radio campaign… The Sunset Strip’s Key Club has closed its doors, but hopes to reopen early in the new year… And SideoneDummy recording artist Audra Mae was featured on MTV.com discussing the song she wrote, “Who I Was Born to Be,” the only original tune on Susan Boyle’s chart-topping album I Dreamed a Dream…
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