Browsing all posts in July, 2008.

Queensland Exports

Queensland is a state in the Northeast part of Australia. It is named after Queen Victoria of the UK after she visited in the 1800′s. With a population of over 4 million people, it has a thriving economy with tourism and mining being the cornerstones. But that’s not really what interests me. Recently, the government [...]

Streaming Copyright Costs

I wanted to write a quick blog about the cost for websites to stream live music. Earlier this year, the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) set the following performance rights license per play rates (also applied retroactively): – 2006 – $0.0008- 2007 – $0.0011- 2008 – $0.0014- 2009 – $0.0018- 2010 – $0.0019 So how does [...]

Rawrip Startup

Another day, another music website start-up. This one, called Rawrip, allows independent artists the ability to take home 100% of their download royalties. Artists can create widgets to post on Facebook and Myspace to sell their songs. On Rawrip’s side of things, they foster music discovery. Upon entering the Rawrip website, you are given the [...]

Best Buy Live?

Best Buy, the electronics retailer, is setting aside space in 85 of its stores to sell musical instruments and equipment. This is an interesting brand extension although one that I don’t quite understand. I get it from the point of Best Buy expanding into other electronics. But you are also talking about a completely different [...]

Delhi Dogg

Snoop Doggy Dogg is expanding to India. Snoop will be featured rapping on the title track of a new Bollywood movie called “Singh is Kinng.” The song mixes rap with the bhangra style of Indian music commonly found in Bollywood movies. Snoop didn’t actually go to India. His part of the song was recorded not [...]

Puerto Rico Mobile Contest

A Puerto Rican mobile company named Centennial is going to hold an “American Idolesque” contest over cellphones. Contestants will call in to sing a song from a list of songs. Votes will be taken by the public, of course via their cell phones, and a jury will pick the semi-finalists. This is brilliant on the [...]

Digital Music Sales Predictions for 2012

eMarketer, a research group, has released more predictions for digital music sales for 2012. Last year, digital music sales revenues were $2.4 billion which translates to roughly 15% of total music sales (physical albums & digital). eMarketer predicts this number to skyrocket to $13 billion by 2012. What is really astonishing is that eMarketer predicts [...]

Artistic Expulsion

Here is some encouraging news from the country about to host this big international event called the olympics. In an effort to preserve national dignity, unnamed country about to host the olympics has decided to ban all foreign artists and entertainers if they have ever taken part of activities that “threaten national sovereignty.” So some [...]

iLike Promotions

iLike, the social networking site with a music focus, invites its users to “discover new music with friends.” In addition to helping search for new artists, they also have a great platform for letting users know about upcoming concerts in the area. And now, for its 30 million registered users, iLike is beefing up their [...]

Mobile Media

Since purchasing the iPhone about a week and a half ago, my internet use has changed drastically. I now check my email more on my phone than on my laptop. I open links on my iPhone. I am discovering new music on this device. And I am interacting with media on a screen smaller than [...]