Technology News

'Rotten Tomatoes' Web Site Moves to TV

Source: PC Magazine
February 24, 2009

"You get your friends around and it's fun to trash the hell out of a movie," Brett Erlich begins. “But it's also fun to disagree with people. A lot of people loved Benjamin Button. I, for one, wanted to kill myself at many points during that film. If it was four hours, instead of three hours and 45 minutes, I might have done it." David Fincher-induced suicide threats aside, it's a fairly apt summation of Erlich's new gig. The Current ...

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Have Licensed Music Services Flunked Out?

Source: PC Magazine
February 24, 2009

College campuses were once a prime spawning ground for new digital music services. Those days appear to be over. Closing the book on the role of campuses as digital music laboratories is the recent demise of Ruckus—an ad-supported music download service that was available for free to students at 200 universities through direct content deals, as well as to anyone else with a .edu e-mail account. The closing came after Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment dissolved their Total ...

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AOL Adds 'Lifestreaming' to Bebo, Enters Classifieds

Source: PC Magazine
February 24, 2009

AOL on Monday enhanced both its classifieds offerings as well as Bebo, its social networking service. AOL added a “lifestreaming" feature to the latter, allowing a user to post stream-of-consciousness photos and other comments. The move is an attempt to bolster the popularity of social network Bebo, which the company picked up in March 2008 for $850 million. The social network, which remains one of the largest such sites worldwide, has thus far struggled to gain a foothold in the ...

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Teens Prefer Music to Sex and Have No Intention of Paying for It

Source: HypeBot
February 24, 2009

Forget free love. Today's teens are far more interested in free music. A new survey of 1000 UK youth showed that 70% of 16-19 year olds would rather go without sex than music for a week. Broaden the age group to 16-24 and the go without sex group only falls to 60%.

61% of the same age group don't feel they should have to pay for the music. Narrow the survey to 15-19% and the “Why should I pay?" crowd ...

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Daily D.I.Y. - Local and Regional Sponsorship

Source: HypeBot
February 24, 2009

Ever wonder how that new indie buzz band got a sponsorship from Red Bull? Forget about it. They had a label, agent or sponsorship guru hook them up, and that's unlikely to happen to your project. But that doesn't mean that sponsorship is out of reach for you; even if your tour consists of your hometown and three neighboring colleges.

Think local. Instead of chasing a national brand, what local retailers fit your with your fan base? Whether its a ...

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Despite Ringtone Slide Mobile Music to Hit $14.6 Billion by 2013

Source: HypeBot
February 24, 2009

A sharp fall in ringtone sales will be more than offset by growth in full track downloads, streamed music services and ringback tones, according to a new report from Juniper Research which forecasts that global revenues from mobile music services will reach nearly $14.6 billion by 2013.

The report found that many of the key hurdles to mass adoption of full track services have been significantly reduced in recent months. Memory constraints and data costs have slowed adoption. These factors ...

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The Digital Natives: Online Fandom and Community (Part Four)

Source: HypeBot
February 24, 2009

Kyle Bylin, Associate Editor

Digital Community With the almost staple experiences behind me as music fan, these interactions with technology provided the necessary building blocks for me to take my next step into the digital world. At this point, I found that I had a passion for writing poetry and lyrics. Favoring a word processor over the traditional notebook, the Internet ran in the background, and with it, I was exposed to Rhymezone.com, which ...

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The Digital Natives: Youth Culture (Part Three)

Source: HypeBot
February 24, 2009

Some of the earlier experiences that I've had with music seem more easily related to than those that I've encountered in recent years. After getting my first boom box stereo, of course, one of the first things I found, either through my own inquiry or (perhaps) someone else's example, is that I could record songs off the radio. With a bit of patience, luck, and timing, this enabled me to listen to songs on my demand. From where I lived, ...

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