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Music Industry

Nielsen Ratings at Odds with RIAA's Claim of 'Lost Sales"

Source: Moses Supposes
January 13, 2011

In April of 2004 I was working on a piece for Keyboard magazine about bar codes. I was trying to determine if the “free" barcode many CD Replicators provide is a real added value to the indie artist, or just a bogus premium. But what evolved was a much bigger and more important story. Talking to SoundScan revealed a massive mistruth disseminated by the RIAA about the reality of declining record sales. Soundscan (owned by Nielsen) uses the barcodes on ...

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Music Industry

Report: Piracy Sites Attract 53 Billion Visits Yearly

Source: HypeBot
January 13, 2011

A report from security firm MarkMonitor states that 43 sites identified for piracy attract 146 million visits daily for a total of 53.29 billion a year. 67% of those 43 sites are hosted in North America or Western Europe and according to the study the 3 largest—RapidShare, MegaVideo and MegaUpload—collectively get 21 billion visits each year. To be sure, some of the named sites also host legal content and a only fraction of the unauthorized content is music, but these ...

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Music Industry

Luke Lewis: "Streaming Will Stop Looking Like the Future - Which Means Piracy Will Flourish."

Source: HypeBot
January 13, 2011

This grim end-of-the year forecast comes from NME Deputy Editor Luke Lewis. He starts off his article of digital music predictions for 2011 by saying that, “Streaming will stop looking like the future... which means that piracy will flourish." His reasoning: “Spotify lost £17 million last year, and key albums keep getting yanked from its library. Last.fm has never turned a profit in eight years," he says. “Last year, Sky Songs died, and We7 scaled back its unlimited on-demand ambitions." Sure, ...

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Music Industry

Here's a Better Version for Free - How One Band Responded to Their Song Getting Leaked

Source: HypeBot
January 13, 2011

These days songs leak out. And if you have rabid enough fans, they'll start listening to, downloading, and postings such songs before you intended. But how do you respond? Threaten to sue. Say damning things. Maybe even quit music—forever. This band, not so much. Once Eisley found out that their new song “Smarter" had leaked - after having debuted on a podcast - they were excited. Fans had cut their song out of the podcast recording and started to post it everywhere. Rather than ...

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Music Industry

In Defense of Ultimate Chart - It's More Than Hype

Source: HypeBot
January 12, 2011

After comparing the hype surrounding Ultimate Chart with the result, Richard MacManus, the Founder and Editor of Read Write Web, felt underwhelmed. Numerous publications and music industry thinkers, including myself, proclaimed Ultimate Chart to be nothing short of a game changer and a Godsend. So why, after all this publicity and enthusiasm, does Ultimate Chart look vaguely similar to Billboard's rankings? That's what MacManus wants to know. Well, because they're not supposed to look THAT different. Overtime, some of the artists ...

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Music Industry

If Major Labels Are Bleeding so Badly, Why Are They Still Creating the Biggest Artists?

Source: Digital Music News
January 11, 2011

Do we have to talk about the demise of the major label system again? Perhaps this is just a four-car pileup that demands a slow-down and stare. The lights are dimming at EMI, political upheaval is tainting UMG and Sony, and WMG is often considered 'next' for the wolves. But if the majors are bleeding so badly, then why are they still creating the biggest artists? And, perhaps more importantly, why aren't indies and DIYers even close to taking the ...

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Music Industry

Jazz News: Huge Music Donation to the Library of Congress

Source: Riffs on Jazz by John Anderson
January 11, 2011

Universal Music Group has made a huge donation of treasured recordings from its vault to the Library of Congress. The material, dating from 1926 to 1948, includes music from Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Bing Crosby, and Billie Holiday. Here's the story from the New York Times: Library of Congress Gets a Mile of Music By Larry Rohter The Library of Congress has begun taking possession of a huge donation of recordings, some 200,000 metal, glass and lacquer master discs from ...

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Music Industry

Skyline Music Launches Book a Band / Plant a Tree

Source: HypeBot
January 11, 2011

Hypebot and Music Think Tank's parent company, booking agency Skyline Music, is kicking off the new year on a green note with the launch of Book A Band / Plant A Tree and a challenge to other music companies to join in. Every time a promoter or venue books one of Skyline Music's exclusive clients, who range from jazz legend Arturo Sandoval to social media darling Zoe Keating (3 million+ Twitter followers), and accepts contracts and promo email, a tree is planted ...

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