March 29, 2007

Full albums for $1 per trade
1.8 million titles available
Artists receive 20% contribution

Lala plans on creating a registry where artists can come and identify themselves and claim ownership for each album they've been a part of. We'll ask for certain forms of identification to make sure the individual is who they say they are, and then do a basic check using industry databases. Once registered, artists will receive 20% of the $1 lala fee every time one of their CDs is traded.

March 27, 2007

Is the CD dying as a commercial product? Sure. But it's got a lot of dying left to do. And in the meantime, there's still money to be made selling discs loaded with the music of Josh Groban, Alban Berg, and Rod Stewart.

March 26, 2007

Last year, digital singles outsold plastic CD's for the first time. So far this year, sales of digital songs have risen 54 percent, to roughly 189 million units, according to data from Nielsen SoundScan. Digital album sales are rising at a slightly faster pace, but buyers of digital music are purchasing singles over albums by a margin of 19 to 1.

At the same time, the industry is straining to shore up the album as long as possible, in part by prodding listeners who buy one song to purchase the rest of a collection. Apple, in consultation with several labels, has been planning to offer iTunes users credit for songs they have already purchased if they then choose to buy the associated album in a certain period of time, according to people involved in the negotiations. (Under Apple’s current practice, customers who buy a song and then the related album effectively pay for the song twice).

March 24, 2007

So I called Rhino customer support and after an 8 minute wait spoke with a representative. She informed me that the files were indeed copy protected so that I could only play them on specific music players, most notably not iTunes.

"You don't understand," I said, "These files were not copied or pirated, I actually purchased them."

"Well" she responded, "You didn't actually purchase the files, you really purchased a license to listen to the music, and the license is very specific about how they can be played or listened to."

Now I was baffled. "Records never came with any such restrictions," I said.

She replied, "Well they were supposed to, but we weren't able to enforce those licenses back then, and now we can."

March 23, 2007

After reading all this MP3 stuff it occurs to me that a probably far worse thing than downloading MP3's is buying second hand promo CDs and LPs, which is something that possibly makes up about a quarter to a third of my record collection. Not only does the artist not get anything for their work when you buy a promo, but if the promo was issued by a major, the artist probably paid for the record himself. This means that not only did the buyer not put money in the artist's pocket, he actually took money out.

March 21, 2007

The music industry has been banking on the rise of digital music to compensate for inevitable drops in sales of CDs. Apple's 2003 launch of its iTunes Store was greeted as a new day in music retailing, one that would allow fans to conveniently and quickly snap up large amounts of music from limitless virtual shelves.

It hasn't worked out that way -- at least so far. Digital sales of individual songs this year have risen 54% from a year earlier to 173.4 million, according to Nielsen SoundScan. But that's nowhere near enough to offset the 20% decline from a year ago in CD sales to 81.5 million units. Overall, sales of all music -- digital and physical -- are down 10% this year. And even including sales of ringtones, subscription services and other "ancillary" goods, sales are still down 9%, according to one estimate; some recording executives have privately questioned that figure, which was included in a recent report by Pali Research.

In our tests, Apple TV is a pleasure to use. Setup was stunningly simple. We just plugged the unit in and hooked it up to the TV with a single cable (not included). The unit found and connected with Walt's Wi-Fi network almost instantly. To link to each computer, we just typed into iTunes on that computer a five-digit code number the Apple TV put up on the TV screen. This needs to be done only once.

March 20, 2007

As a consumer, I was pretty damn impressed with the system. It installed flawlessly in Firefox (only tried under Window). I downloaded the album at 600kps and it came with an m3u and 500x500 album art. I didn't bother burning it or sending it to my portable [hell, I have the mp3s, I can do it later]. For the album I bought (hellogoodbye's zombies aliens vampires dinosaurs), the tracks were high quality VBR mp3s. I payed 9 bucks and couldn't be happier.

March 15, 2007

NPR will lead an exploration to develop a multi-genre, digital music service that will build distributed value for NPR, producers and stations and reinforce public radio’s role in defining and presenting music. The new service will make it easy for the audience to find, audition, explore, share, store and purchase music in all its forms. This plan will be collaboratively designed with key partners during the second half of 2006 and executed in early 2007.

The Director, NPR Music creates and executes the strategy to launch NPR Music as a premiere online music discovery destination; builds on the principle of aggregating valuable music-related assets not only from NPR but also selected NPR stations around the United States and other trusted sources; plans and launches products for online and on-demand delivery; leads a team in developing, delivering, and constantly improving a music discovery service that is relevant in the lives of NPR listeners and new audiences.

March 14, 2007

There you have it, then. Social psychologists (two of them, at least) have jumped head first into the waters of music research, learning that our music says a lot about who we are, and that we can make pretty accurate judgments about what people are like based solely on the music they like.

March 12, 2007

"These are niche products and they're not for the casual fan," said Danny Goldberg, president of the artist management company Gold Village Entertainment. But Internet marketing and online stores have made it easier and less expensive to reach fans, and Mr. Goldberg said that he was considering buying a catalog of live recordings, even though he might acquire the rights to release only a fraction of them.

At a time when music sales are declining, many expressed frustration that it was so complicated to find a way to make money on these kinds of recordings. In an odd twist, material by older artists is especially desirable, since their adult fans tend to buy music rather than download it illegally.

"At some point it becomes irrational not to figure out a way to exploit this stuff if the parties involved will benefit," said Greg Scholl, president and chief executive of the Orchard, a digital distribution company. "There's no question this stuff is more saleable than it was."

March 09, 2007

Yet Ms. Allen, the young British singer behind the hit "Smile," complained during the recent radio interview about Apple's tactics. "They won't advertise your album unless you give them extra material," Ms. Allen said. She said iTunes pushed her to quickly turn out a version of a song, so she planned to give them a "rubbish remix." Ms. Allen said she would offer a better version free on her MySpace page. Apple declined to comment on Ms. Allen's remarks, and a spokeswoman for her label, EMI Group's Capitol Records, said the singer and her manager weren't available to elaborate.

Apple isn't under as much pressure to squeeze profits from iTunes because of the money it makes on iPods. In fact, it earns little from iTunes after paying fees for the music and credit-card processing. ITunes typically pays major labels about 72 cents a track, while it pays most independent labels around 62 cents.

March 08, 2007

Total albums in the top 25 at iTunes: 52

Also available from Amazon.com: 43

Same price for both stores: 18/43 or 42%

Lower price for iTunes version: 15/43 or 35%

Higher price for iTunes version: 8/43 or 19%

And two exceptions: One album was priced the same in both stores for one week, but higher in Amazon in a subsequent week. Another was cheaper in iTunes before a Amazon price reduction undercut the iTunes price.

March 07, 2007

"I'd just done this lute album that was more successful than I could have ever imagined. I could do another but that would be painting myself into a corner."

March 06, 2007

March 02, 2007

Week of Feb 27th 2007

Rank--Artist--Album
1 Deerhoof-- Friend Opportunity
2 Of Montreal-- Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?
3 The Apples in Stereo-- New Magnetic Wonder
4 The Shins-- Wincing the Night Away
5 Deerhunter-- Cryptograms
6 Ghost-- In Stormy Nights
7 Peter Bjorn and John-- Writer's Block
8 Explosions In The Sky-- All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone
9 Menomena-- Friend and Foe
10 Clap Your Hands Say Yeah-- Some Loud Thunder
11 Beirut-- Lon Gisland
12 Marnie Stern-- In Advance of the Broken Arm
13 Camera Obscura-- If Looks Could Kill
14 Andrew Bird-- Armchair Apochrypha
15 Fujiya & Miyagi-- Transparent Things
16 Loney, Dear-- Loney Noir
17 BARR-- Summary
18 MV & EE with the Bummmer Road-- Green Blues
19 The Six Parts Seven-- Casually Smashed to Pieces
20 Dr. Dog-- We All Belong
21 Do Make Say Think-- You, You're History in Rust
22 The High Llamas-- Can Cladders
23 Lavender Diamond-- The Cavalry of Light
24 Dead Meadow-- Dead Meadow
25 Bloc Party-- A Weekend in the City
26 Clinic-- Visitations
27 P.G. Six-- Slightly Sorry
28 The Broken West-- I Can't Go On, I'll Go On
29 Love of Diagrams-- Love of Diagrams
30 Eluvium-- Copia
31 Busdriver-- RoadKillOvercoat
32 Julie Doiron-- Woke Myself Up
33 Antibalas-- Security
34 David Vandervelde-- The Moonstation House Band
35 Los Breastfeeders-- Les Matins de Grande Soirs
36 Aqueduct-- Or Give Me Death
37 Hella-- There's No 666 in Outer Space
38 Arboretum-- Rites of Uncovering
39 The Earlies-- The Enemy Chorus
40 Psychic Ills-- Early Violence