Let’s Give This Week A Variety

by Mandi Lynn

Last week’s top 20 contained many of hits that were overplayed on the radio. Clearly my music this week may have been inspired by those who listen around me, and even my mood. However, it looks like old school and new school made my mood very interesting for this week. Let’s take a look and see what this weeks top 20 has to offer (bold songs are favorites).

Top 20 for 5/28:
1. Casual Sex – My Darkest Days
2. Somebody That I Use to Know – Gotye ft. Kimbra
3. Wish You Were Here – Pink Floyd
4. Happiness Is A Warm Gun – The Beatles
5. What the Hell – Avril Lavigne
6. Welcome to the Family – Avenged Sevenfold
7. That’s All She Wrote – T.I. ft. Eminem
8. Who Dat Girl – Flo Rida ft. Akon
9. Check It Out – Nicki Minaj ft. will.I.am
10. F.C.P.R.E.M.I.X. – The Fall of Troy
11. We R Who We R – Ke$ha
12. The Motto – Drake ft. Lil’ Wayne
13. Call Me Maybe – Carly Rae Jepsen
14. Letters to Danielle – Kalliko
15. Little Talks – Of Mice and Monsters
16. Glad You Came – The Wanted
17. It’s Time – Imagine Dragons
18. Feel So Close – Calvin Harris
19. All I Want Is You (Acoustic) – Kalliko
20. Sex In The Lounge – Nicki Minaj ft. Lil’ Wayne & Bobby V

Again, this weeks playlist turned out to be quite interesting from last weeks. Until next week, check out any songs that you don’t recognize.

Good Afternoon! NMS, EDMbiz, XLR8R, Collins, FB, Pandora, Turntable.fm, WMG, MegaUpload…

by Sheme Jobs

* Like CMJ, but better? New Music Seminar (NMS) is now morphing into a festival, starting in New York. The action runs June 17-20th, and features 17 venues and 150 bands (more here: http://goo.gl/3xY48).

* Even closer to the present, EDMbiz in Las Vegas is right around the corner. The pre-EDC executive conference has cemented its lineup, with most of the action starting Wednesday (more here: http://goo.gl/0Psoa).

* Also on the topic of EDM, Buzzmedia has just acquired electronic-oriented blog (and once physical mag) XLR8R. The official announcement is slated for this (Thursday) morning, according to the genre-diversified blog umbrella.

* Genesis legend, 80s fixture, and American Psycho accomplice Phil Collins is unfortunately now suffering from a series of health complications. Displaced vertebrae, hearing loss and nerve damage are making drumming difficult, and part of a broader reason to step away from the industry. But why the hate? “I’m sorry that it was all so successful,” Collins recently told FHM, while strongly hinting at retirement. “I honestly didn’t mean it to happen like that. It’s hardly surprising that people grew to hate me.”

* Facebook (FB) is starting to look like a certified dog, with retail investors forced to clean up the mess. The stock got taken for another walk on Wednesday, landing at the lowly $28.19. Deeper questions continue to hover around Facebook executives, brokers, and the constellation of Facebook-connected, IPO-lusting companies.

* Actually, that cluster of companies includes Pandora (P), thanks partly to a shared challenge of mobile monetization. The issue has been touched upon this week, and part of a robust, internet-focused presentation issued by KPC&B’s Mary Meeker at D10 on Wednesday. And basic gist is this: mobile is commanding a stronger share of usage every day – ie, around 70 percent of engagement for Pandora – and a lower amount of monetization. It’s just less effective than the bigger PC screen; though this sounds more like a challenge than a near-term Wall Street worry.

* Still burning! Let’s see how the recovery goes, though Turntable.fm is actively recruiting several positions for its NY-based startup-y location.

* And, there’s high-level employment drama at Warner Music Group, at least according to the New York Post. That includes plans to sunset current CEO Stephen Cooper. The temporary hatchetman could be going the Edgar Bronfman route, which involves a temporary warming of the Chairman seat before an eventual kick. The status of the well-compensated, Hamptons fixer-upping Lyor Cohen also seems highly uncertain.

* MegaUpload is now asking District Court judges to toss the piracy case brought by the US Government. Lead litigator Ira Rothken has deftly pointed to serious procedural and due process problems. “This is an experiment in stretching US criminal law well past the breaking point,” Rothken alleged, echoing the sentiments of many observers. Separately, a New Zealand judge has ordered American authorities to hand over critical evidence to allow a proper defense.

Television: It’s Still 20 Times Larger Every Internet Video Channel (Combined)…

by Sheme Jobs

Of course, ‘MTV’ means something entirely different in 2012. But if you’ve got a shot at traditional TV – whether Fuse or football – you should probably take it. Because despite the disinformation otherwise, TV (broadcast, cable, satellite) remains an immense platform.

But just how immense? Here’s a quick comparison: YouTube counted a trillion views for 2011, and Research & Markets attributes 38.4 percent of that activity to music videos.

…but when it comes to hours viewed, the couch-potatoing masses are still consuming a lot more content. That is, roughly twenty-times the amount, and in far more concentrated doses (ie, the Grammys, The Voice, etc.) According to the Research & Markets data, aggregated online video hours accounted for just 5.2 percent of total TV views.

Labels Respond: ‘Google Is Merely Perpetuating the Fraud on Copyright Owners…’

by Sheme Jobs

Transparency? Ridiculous, according to the volley of words now coming from the major labels. Just days after Google opened its books on copyright takedowns and DMCA compliance, the RIAA is roundly calling BS on the exercise. “Knowing the total number of links to infringing material available – and the limitations Google imposes on rights owners to search for infringements – reveals how meager the number of notices is relative to the vast amount of infringement.,” blogged RIAA anti-piracy czar Brad Buckles.

“After all… search for any major recording artist’s track and the term ‘mp3,’ and you’ll find that most of the very first results offered by Google direct people to infringing material. Unfortunately, one sees similar results when one searches for any popular creative content followed by the words ‘free download.'”

That’s just the beginning of the lengthy complaint. In fact, Buckles rattled through a fairly detailed set of ‘facts’ to discredit Google’s copyright-friendly representations. And they are (in his words, trimmed a little)…

“1. In order to notify Google of an infringement, you first need to find the infringement. But Google places artificial limits on the number of queries that can be made by a copyright owner to identify infringements.

2. You can’t notify Google about the scope of the problem if it limits the notices it will accept and process through its automated tool. And that is what Google does. On top of the query limitation, Google also limits the number of links we can ask them to remove per day.

3. One needs to consider these numbers and Google’s activities in context. Google says it received requests to remove 1.2 million links from 1,000 copyright owners in one month. But consider that Google has identified nearly 5 million new links posted in just the last month in searches for free mp3 downloads of just the top 10 Billboard tracks.

4. Google’s ‘transparency report’ calculates the percentage of a site that is infringing – but this data is flawed and of little value on its own. Specifically, Google claims that the DMCA notices it has received for a site represent less than .1% of the links it had indexed for the domains at the top of this list.

But this number is misleading given the constraints imposed by Google on a copyright owner’s ability to find infringements and send notices to Google.

5. Google’s data shows why its interpretation of the DMCA makes it ineffective. Let’s take a step back for a moment. Everyone – including Google – knows that the worst sites are repopulated with links to infringing files of the same content as quickly as links are taken down. For example, in a recent one month period, we sent Google, and the site in question, multiple DMCA notices concerning over 300 separate unauthorized copies of the same musical recording owned by one of our member companies. Yet that song is still available on that site today, and we reached it via a search result link indexed by Google.”

“This highlights the futility of the exercise: if ‘take down’ does not mean ‘keep down,’ then Google’s limitations merely perpetuate the fraud wrought on copyright owners by those who game the system under the DMCA,” Buckles continued. “Clearly the current process is not working.”

It Was a Radio Player That Actually Removed Ads and Deejays. And It Failed…

by Sheme Jobs

Imagine: automatically removing deejays, commercials, and other interruptions from traditional, broadcast radio. Would you listen then?

If your answer is still no, then you’re not alone. This was actually the premise behind Abbee Radio, a self-contained stereo system that automatically removed ads and talk from various radio stations, and built music-only collections for anytime, on-demand access. And, a product that has now been discontinued after just a few years on the market.

Here are just some of the features, first presented at CES a few years back.

* 500 song storage capacity.

* Base stereo unit with built-in FM tuner and recorder.

* Portable player syncs collections for anywhere access.

* Patented ‘Popcatcher Technology’ isolates the music and strips out the rest.

* Automatic, customized recording and download capabilities.

* Skip, pause, fast forward and rewind options.

Product failures are often complicated stories, but perhaps trying to make something less sucky is a bad approach. Because underneath all the chatter and painful commercial breaks, traditional radio is still guilty of massive repetitiveness and tiny playlists.

This was actually getting pitched as a convenient, computer-free solution – and seemed to be getting targeted towards an older audience. But ultimately, maybe the type that will spend $200+ for a radio workaround will just as quickly jump into Pandora or figure out their smartphone. Which means the way to fix traditional radio may be to avoid it entirely.

I Run an Indie Music Site. And Yes, I’m Totally Disillusioned With Digital…

by Sheme Jobs

The following comes from Tyler Hayes, a music enthusiast and owner of indie-focused site Liisten. He’s hit a digital wall.

“I’d like to think I was optimistic rather than naive, but call it what you will. Digital music, in its raw form of audio files, was supposed to liberate artists from the shackles of onerous label contracts and filler albums promoting one single. Digital music, with the internet as the distribution channel and almost free reproduction, could’ve single-handedly changed the music industry, or so I thought. I used to think bands didn’t need labels, that all the tools and resources were right in front of everyone and so all it would take was some good music to make it as a musician. So far, that’s not really happening.

In hindsight, seeing digital music as the independent artists’ savior was a little like writing down your escape plan on paper, never trying it in real life and then expecting everything to go as planned. It makes sense in theory, but in practice there are still only a handful of artists, proportionally, that really make it. Same as it ever was.

If there was ever someone who wanted the internet and digital music to be a gold rush for good bands and good music it was me. I even started a site (Liisten.com) that promotes some of the best independent music out there. But the success stories are few and far between. And it gets tough trying to defend stories that show 99.9 percent of independent bands aren’t making minimum wage, or that in 2008 only something like 15 independent artists sold more than 10,000 albums.

That’s just the beginning. There’s Lady Gaga earning $167 from one million Spotify plays. The fact that every band you’ll talk to will tell you making money is still incredibly hard. It started to get to my optimism.

I used to think that record labels were the problem. With their failing business model and poorly structured investment to profit framework, fully embracing digital music would fix their problems and save the industry. Simple enough. Crunching numbers shows that investing $20,000 in a small artist, and then selling digital-only albums for $7 would mean that you don’t even have to sell 3,000 [~2,875] copies to break even. Sell an additional 3,000 copies and you’ve doubled your investment.

But ultimately, that’s assuming the stars line up with good promotion and good music. It’s rare.

There are advantages, I suppose. I love being able to buy a song on my phone when I’m out, have it automatically show up on my computer when I get home and move it around with ease. But beyond a few magic tricks like that, digital music shouldn’t be fooling anyone. Distribution, reproduction and even low costs can’t make people pay for music, they can’t promote a quality song, and I’m finally starting to see that by themselves, they can’t save an entrenched industry.

Good Afternoon! Filestube, iHeartRadio, Jambase, British Clubs, Soul Man, No Doubt, Facebook, VEVO, Viki, Pepsi…

by Sheme Jobs

* Filestube.com, heard of it? Well, the recording industry has: according to stats just released by Google, Filestube has been the subject of the most takedown notices yet (in search). That is, more than the Pirate Bay and Hulkshare, among others.

* Big screen, small audience. On Tuesday, iHeartRadio announced an expansion into Google TV, a move that shifts the 800-plus station selection onto a much larger interface. Separately, the Clear Channel-owned app has also expanded into the Nook.

* Jambase has just launched a Facebook app, one designed to connect lots of concerts with lots of friends.

* “The frequency with which smaller venues are closing is scary,” NME editor Krissi Murison just told the Guardian in a rather dour piece about British club closings. “There’s the Charlotte in Leicester, TJ’s in Newport, I could go on and on. It feels like not a week goes past without more closing.”

* Sam Moore, he’s the ‘Legendary Soul Man’. But does that mean he can sue a film studio for making a movie that loosely arcs his life story (called, Soul Men)? No, according to a federal court ruling just issued, which found that the Sam & Dave soulman wasn’t infringed by the Weinstein Co. biopic. Or, damaged by libel or unfair competition, among other allegations.

* And, on the topic of barbed legal entanglements, there’s a new development in the long-running dispute between No Doubt and Activision. No Doubt argues that their avatars were misused without adequate warning in Band Hero; the group’s lawyers have just been granted the right to argue in front of a jury.

* Ouch! Facebook keeps tanking… this time to $28.84 by the Tuesday bell. That’s a near-10 percent one-day drop, spurred by negative bets.

* And, that already appears to be dragging an ecosystem of Facebook-connected businesses, including VEVO. The video upstart has been rumored to be pondering an IPO. “A jump into the shark-infested IPO waters right now would destroy all the momentum [Vevo] has created for itself,” a source just told the New York Post.

* They speak your language! Viki, an innovative TV play that relies on crowdsourced lyrics translations, has just inked licensing deal with Warner Music Group.

* Pepsi is unwrapping aspects of its music campaign on Twitter. The action starts with free downloads this week, then progresses towards streaming ‘pop-up concerts’ with heavy ‘crowd’ participation.

Amanda Palmer, Kickstarter Millionaire…

by Sheme Jobs

But can this be done again, and again, and again? Or are we just ogling at another lottery winner?

This was the scene on Amanda Palmer’s Kickstarter campaign on Tuesday.

Backers: 20,822
Pledged (of $100,000 goal): $1,000,000
Hours to go: 58

Good Afternoon! Anghami, Rhapsody, Gaga Censorship, Palmer, ToneMedia, Annie+Jay-Z, Facebook,

by Sheme Jobs

* Spotify is spreading into multiple continents, but not the Middle East (at least not yet). Which is where Anghami steps in. The on-demand, mobile-leaning service is targeting Middle Eastern countries and audiences, with a blend of Western and local music.

* Opt-ins, T&Cs, free trials, and other dangerous internet weaponry. In response to lingering consumer complaints in Washington, former Rhapsody owner RealNetworks has now created a $2 million compensation fund to settle user complaints of unfair and deceptive charges. “Deceptive pre-checked boxes and fine print obligated consumers to not-so-free trials for subscription services they didn’t want in the first place,” Washington State Attorney General Rob McKenna told Reuters.

* Point, censorship. Lady Gaga has now cancelled dates in Indonesia, based on stepped-up threats from Islamic extremists. That follows word from Gaga manager Troy Carter that the show wouldn’t be toned down. “With threats if the concert goes ahead, Lady Gaga’s side is calling off the concert,” Minola Sebayang, an attorney for promoter Big Daddy told the Associated Press.

* Amanda Palmer’s hyper-successful Kickstarter campaign now kicking towards $1 million, easily a record-smashing result. The question now is, can this be done again – and again – and again…?

* Music-focused advertising group ToneMedia has just named Cliff Paulson as its new EVP of Sales and Marketing. The ToneMedia ad platform contains more than 100 online music content and lyric publishers.

* Annie, the remake? Emma Thompson is now writing the updated film version, with Jay-Z fittingly overseeing the music and contributing original tracks. Willow Smith will play the lead, with Will Sr. producing.

* Facebook is redoubling its efforts at creating a smartphone, according to a weekend report in the New York Times. Engineering teams are being assembled, and a release by next year is planned, according to various sources.

There Are 200 Million Music Buyers. And 7 Billion People…

by Sheme Jobs

Are we just doing it wrong? The downer argument is that price-points are careening towards zero, scarcity has evaporated, and monetization is a lost cause. But what about all the vast number of passives? The group that isn’t engaged, isn’t paying, or just hasn’t been approached the right way?

Here’s the take from ‘Tommy Boy’ Silverman, a fabulously successful executive in the old model, and someone with some interesting questions about the new. He just made these comments in a broader interview with Musician Coaching.

………..

“The number I’ve heard recently is that there are about 200 million music buyers in the world. And there are about seven billion people in the world. So, if we can make that 200 million grow to 250 million, we can make a little bit more money. But that would only take the net world music business from $16 billion to $20 billion. It won’t take it back to its peak in 1999. It will just make it a little bigger.

If we can get the people who are buying music to buy more music, maybe we can push it a little further than that. And if we can get them to spend a little more money, we might be able to take it even further than that.

But none of this will take us to a $100 billion worldwide business. The only way we’ll get there is by finding a way to monetize passives. Because, the passives outnumber music buyers – there are six billion passives vs. 200 million music buyers.

There are six billion activated cell phones in the world. And there are 1.2 billion smartphones activated now, which means smartphones that are actively being used, with active subscriptions that have been paid for.

The trend everywhere is moving towards smartphones. The entire world is going to open up to that level of accessing music.”