David Emery Online
Spotify takes the axe to its free service – can it now claim to slash music piracy?
However, this feels like a bad move. In one feel swoop Spotify is reducing its ability to say, with much credibility, that it is out to reduce the amount of piracy. If you can only listen to 10 hrs, and then only five times to one track, how can Spotify claim that it can significantly eat into the massive amount of file-sharing out there?
Obviously there’s little positive to be drawn from this move, but it was inevitable that Spotify was going to have to make some concessions to be able to launch in the US. The success they’ve had in Europe has made those discussions pretty difficult I imagine, as you’ve got the majors trying to weigh up whether they want to let the genie out of the bottle again.
Personally, I think that the limiting hours aspect of this makes sense, but I’m less keen on the pre-track limits as it just makes the whole offering a bit too complicated from a consumer point of view – I can see the 10hr limit making people upgrade, but the per-track limit making people just listen to something else.
Visit ➔Lockers vs Streaming Services
I don't get the idea of music locker services like the one Amazon just announced. If I'm going to stream music from the cloud, why should I continue to buy files and collect them? I've been a Rhapsody subscriber for something like 11 or 12 years and although it has taken a while to get used to, I vastly prefer subscription streaming services over file based music. I've just stared using rdio on my Android and on the web and I love it too. I've used Spotify and it is also excellent (once it is fully licensed in the US).
Amazon’s service is certainly interesting, but if you’re going to pay for a cloud-based music service why not use Spotify?
Personally right now – and this makes me sound pretty backwards, I know – I’m quite content with neither; having music on my iPhone which I have with me all the time eliminates the need for a locker-style service, and I pretty much just listen to new music so Spotify isn’t that useful.
Visit ➔The Universal Sigh
The Radiohead album ‘The King of Limbs’ will be available for purchase in all good record stores everywhere on Monday 28th March, except in the United States of America and in Canada, where for reasons beyond the purview of this writer it will be available from Tuesday 29th March. On VINYL! On COMPACT DISC! As a DOWNLOAD!
To commemorate this momentous occasion, Radiohead have produced a newspaper which will be given away, free, gratis, without cost to the consumer by accredited vendors from a multitude of locations WORLDWIDE!
This is what I’ve been working on for the last few weeks.
Should be a lot of fun on Monday – I’m particularly excited to see how the photos element turns out. I’ll blog about it in more detail in due course…
Visit ➔Rebecca Black Means The (Internet) Fame Game Has Changed
Earlier today I had lunch with a musician friend who was lamenting the trouble her band was having booking shows in San Francisco. When I asked her how she planned on getting the word out she said, “Get a publicist, or have a video go viral.”
I love the way it’s just ‘have a video that goes viral’ as if that’s something you can just ‘do’. The only thing you can control is whether the video – or your music, for that matter – is any good, so how about focusing on that?
Visit ➔Piracy doesn't fund the mob or terrorists
A scholarly report funded by the Canadian government and the Ford Foundation investigates the alleged link between copyright infringement and terrorism and finds none. Basically, counterfeiters can't compete with free, and so there's no money in it.
I imagine that the counterfeit market is far more price sensitive then the legitimate market.
Visit ➔Web Developers Will Now Be Able To Tap Into the Power of Rdio
If you’re a developer interested in integrating music with a social bent into your web apps, start your engines: Super-social music subscription service Rdio is opening its Rdio.com API and affiliate program to developers.
Seems very nifty – certainly more expansive then Spotify’s API. Although, with Rdio’s lack of a free, ad-supported option a little bit less interesting as well (do you really want your user to have to have a $4.99/m account to be able to use your app?).
Visit ➔It Started With A Click: How to Spawn A Viral Hit
This think tank will inform and inspire those looking to understand how to make music go viral over social media. Lifting the lid and debunking dogma about how to create a viral hit, this illustrated session will combine panel-led debate with open round table discussion providing all with pointers, next step suggestions and an eye on how music will broken in the future.
Come and hear me witter on in person about all this music marketing malarky on Thursday. Hopefully I will have figured out by then how on earth you do make a “viral” hit…
Visit ➔Island Def Jam Partners With The Echo Nest To Create Opportunities For Developers
In what the companies are calling the first-ever alliance between a major label and the independent app developer community, Island Def Jam and The Echo Nest are partnering to make the label’s catalog available to developers who employ The Echo Nest’s API. [...] As part of this agreement, the label is rendered the publisher of the app, giving it control over distribution and making it privy to a portion of the revenue (the rest goes to the dev and The Echo Nest). In turn, IDJ will market the app and pay music publishers when need be.
Amazing work here – use Island Def Jam’s API and they effectively own your app. I can’t see any serious developer being interested in this.
The idea of being able to access label data through an API is an interesting one – we’re actually mid way through developing one ourself – but I wonder how interesting it is when it’s on a label by label basis; most of the time you’re going to want a much larger range of content I would have thought.
Visit ➔