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iTunes Counts Down To 10 Billion Sold, Unveils All-Time Bestsellers

Further cementing its position as the dominant music retailer of any format, Apple has launched a countdown to the nearing milestone of selling its 10 billionth song.

To commemorate the event, Apple will award the person buying the record-setting song an iTunes gift card worth $10,000. Apple, additionally, listed for the first time the most downloaded songs on iTunes of all time.

Guys Hands Wants To Break Up EMI

Court documents filed on Friday by EMI lender Citi reveal that financer Guy Hands has been advocating for the separation of EMI's struggling recorded music group from its more lucrative publishing arm for more than three months.

Google löscht Musik-Blogs

Die zum Internetkonzern Google gehörenden Blog-Plattform Blogger hat einige populäre Musik-Blogs offenbar nach Beschwerden über angebliche Urheberrechtsverletzungen gelöscht. Die Betreiber der Blogs Pop Tarts Sucks Toasted, Masala, I Rock Cleveland, To Die By Your Side, It's a Rap und Living Ears waren von Blogger informiert worden, ihr Blog sei nach einer weiteren Beschwerde und wiederholten Verstößen gegen die Nutzungsbedingungen gelöscht worden.

The Key To Making Free Music Services Work

Free music services such as Spotify make premium rental services such as Rhapsody and Napster increasingly irrelevant. Why pay $9.99 for unlimited on demand streaming music when you can get it for free? It seems that Warner Music’s chief executive Edgar Bronfman Jr. has had enough, stating that “free streaming services are clearly not net positive for the industry” and adding that WMG will no longer license to such services.

Nimbit Shares Mighty Mighty Bosstones Case Study

Formed in 1983, the Mighty Mighty Bosstones are often credited with the creation of the ska-core genre, a form of music that mixes elements of third wave ska and hardcore punk. The band released seven full-length albums, three EPs and a live album while touring continuously before their announcement of a hiatus in December 2003. They reunited in the fall of 2007 and performed at Cambridge’s Middle East club.
At the beginning of this project, the Bosstones had no fan database, an inactive (fan run) Facebook page, and had not released an album in seven years. As part of a relaunch campaign, the band partnered with direct to fan music marketing and sales platform provider Nimbit.

The five most crucial points for any new artist just starting out...

The following was copied from the interview pertaining to Music Think Tank Andrew Dubber and Bruce Warila gave to the BBC.

Topspin Shares Impressive Music Marketing Study

Perhaps more than any existing modern music marketing and sales platform Topspin is based on data. They collected it from the beginning, have done enough diverse campaigns to see the trends and have a team to understand the patterns. At a recent MidemNat presentation Topspin co-founder Shamal Ranasinghe shared the most in depth overview of their findings to date.

Lost luggage: How Bad Data Cost Recording Artists and Record Labels Suitcases of Cash

Imagine you’re at a busy metropolitan airport. The luggage carousel goes around, and people stop by, check the luggage tags, and pick up their belongings. As the day wanes, though, there are still lots of suitcases left on the conveyer belt with no luggage tags and no one to claim them. Now, what if I told you that those suitcases are all filled with cash – stacks of bills totaling millions of dollars – and some of it might be yours.

EMI kämpft mit Zahlungsschwierigkeiten

Dem Musikverlag EMI steht das Wasser bis zum Hals. Nach einem Milliardenverlust warnte der britische Traditionskonzern am Donnerstag vor Zahlungsschwierigkeiten. Im März stehen demnach Verträge über insgesamt 2,6 Milliarden Pfund (2,9 Mrd. Euro) Schulden zur Überprüfung an.
Dadurch komme es zu einer "wahrscheinlich bedeutenden Deckungslücke", erklärte das Haus, das Weltstars wie die Beatles, Robbie Williams und Depeche Mode im Angebot hat.

Content 2.0: 'protection' is in the business model not the technology (thoughts on the future of selling content)

Fueled by the music industry's ongoing turmoils and, finally, books going digital at a very rapid pace, there is a lot of debate on how to deal with the fact that many people habitually share i.e. redistribute digital content without any of the upstream users making their own payment. How can you monetize content when the copy is free?