This is more of an enquiry than claim: is Soundbuzz the backbone of BigPond Music? I just read a post over at TechCrunch claiming that Motorola has acquired Soundbuzz. It mentions that Soundbuzz has partnerships with Hutchison 3, Motorola, Airtel, SingTel, M1, Optus Zoo, Telstra/ BigPond Music and Microsoft.

I believe copy protection on audio CDs is pointless. Here is my rationale:

I don’t think for a moment that music should just be given away, not at all. But I also don’t believe that consumers should be restricted in their behaviours because of the bad guys. I feel that by not allowing people to upload the albums they pay money for to their MP3 device of choice, encourages illegal behaviour.

I don’t mean to turn this into a music fan blog but I’ve just started to read a report of academic interest, Ecological Footprint & Carbon Audit of Radiohead North America Tours, 2003 & 2006. This report looks at the carbon footprint of Radiohead’s 2003 and 2006 US tours. One surprising find is that fans traveling to the gigs accounted for the largest percentage of emissions.

Update: I have now added the link to the .zip file that holds the PDF of the report. Now you can enjoy this report wholly.

Yes, you read correctly. It’s arrived. It’s so beautiful. I will take some photos tomorrow and will post them here for those that are interested.

I am not much of a 50 Cent, let along, R’n'B fan but he certainly puts it well:

Q: “How are G-Unit Records doing in these times of file-sharing?

“Not so good….The advances in technology impacts everyone, and we all must adapt. Most of all hip-hop, a style of music dependent upon a youthful audience. This market consists of individuals embracing innovations faster than the fans of classical and jazz music.”

“What is important for the music industry to understand is that this really doesn’t hurt the artists.”

“A young fan may be just as devout and dedicated no matter if he bought it or stole it.”

“The concerts are crowded and the industry must understand that they have to manage all the 360 degrees around an artist. They, (the industry), have to maximize their income from concerts and merchandise. It is the only way they can get their marketing money back.”

“The main problem is that the artists are not getting as much help developing as before file-sharing. They are now learning to peddle ringtones, not records..They don’t understand the value of a perfect piece of art.”

I thought I’d hijack a post by Nick Gonzalez, of the Running with Foxes blog.

Having majored in economics, I’ve been a fan of Swivel from the start. They’re solving the problem of easily displaying data online, which I had to deal with myself as an intern at an economic development office back in college.

I’ve been perusing the site and came across this particularly striking graph that shows the gentle rise and fall of sales of vinyl, cassette, CD, and iPod sales as one format replaces the other (unfortunately itunes sales were not pegged). CD sales seem to have peaked after a steep rise out of the eighties and into the nineties. But the more interesting part is the decline in sales. Looking at the slopes and peaks for each of the formats, you can see that the peaks are becoming steeper and the transitions quicker. People are continually choosing the more portable format.

The decline in CD sales is happening, and it’s only a matter of time before CD’s are the domain of audiophiles (At least DJs still use vinyl). Eyeballing it, CDs seem to have another 10 years till they’re phased out of the mainstream, although it could come sooner.

I’d be interested to see how the same data compares for video sales.

Quite the interesting read. I’m interested to see the sales/adoption graph of each of the Apple iPods.

PJG

Radiohead’s name-your-own-price sale of its new In Rainbows album has generated lots of commentary, especially since comscore released data claiming that 62% of customers set their price at zero, with the remaining 38% setting an average price of $6, which comes to an average price of $2.28 per customer. (There are reasons to question these numbers, but let’s take them as roughly accurate for the sake of argument.)

Read the rest of this article

It’s around the traps at the moment that British art-rock band, Radiohead are signing with Starbucks’ record label, Hear Music. Paul McCartney has apparently done so.

Could this be true, or further from the truth?

Radiohead is extremely anti-corporation and anti-globalisation. Lead singer, Thom Yorke is an active member of Friends of the Earth which exemplifies the bands participation in global issues, i.e. Global Warming.

Starbucks, on the other hand, has been critisised for its fair-trade policies, labor relations, and environmental impact. I don’t see how the two consort?

Personally, I think the concept of coffee shop-cum-record label is a great idea. What do people in a coffee shop enjoy doing? Reading a book/magazine and listening to their music. What sort of people are portrayed as frequenting a coffee shop? University students in a hurry for class and arty-farty types that enjoy weak-decaf-soy-latte. What an extremely captive audience!

Obviously these above views are generalist but I am sure plenty of you will agree, they are fairly on-the-money.

I see Radiohead and Starbucks as being compatible if it weren’t for the fact that Starbucks is Starbucks. If they had the right culture and their head in the right place I could understand. I think this is all just speculation. I believe Radiohead will manage themselves in-house.

Pajago