Label:Life

Advertising sales at the online arm of Clear Channel Communications Inc. jumped 30 percent compared with last year after it restructured its roster of 950 radio Web sites, the largest U.S. radio broadcaster said on Monday.

The radio company’s network of Web sites collectively were among the top five most-visited online music sites in May, according to comScore Media Metrix, ahead of Apple’s iTunes and MTV.com after a year of steady growth.

More@reuters

One of the more annoying things we’ve found when discussing how the entertainment industry needs to adapt and change and embrace new technologies in place of their old business model, is the repeated claim that it’s impossible to make money if the content is given away for free. Impossible is a pretty absolute statement—and all you need is one example to disprove it. However, as we’ve shown, there are many, many examples of entertainers who have learned how to make more money out of giving away their content—which seems to disprove the whole “impossible” bit. However, the industry folks don’t seem to know how to respond to that, so they just keep saying it’s impossible.

Witness this bizarre exchange between John Perry Barlow and the MPAA’s Dan Glickman debating the future of the entertainment industry. Barlow notes that he made an awful lot of money as a songwriter for the Grateful Dead, which encouraged its fans to make tapes of its shows for free.

More@techdirt

After nine weeks at number one in the UK chart, Gnarls Barkley have asked for their own track to be deleted to make way for their next release pushing them down into the number two slot, making way for singer Sandi Thom.

The US duo asked for their song to be deleted to make way for a follow-up single, due to be released in July.

Crazy was the first single to top the charts on download sales alone, and the longest-running number one since Wet Wet Wet’s Love Is All Around in 1994.

More@bbc

Reports surfaced last week that Starbucks quietly removed CD-burning kiosks from all but 10 of its stores—a move that caused speculation that the company was backpedaling from its high-profile efforts to offer customers the ability to create customized music compilations.

So why did Starbucks remove more than two dozen of the kiosks from stores in Seattle and Austin, Texas?

The answer to that question is becoming a little more clear because of a relationship between Starbucks and MOD Systems, a Seattle software startup that is announcing its digital media delivery technology today. That technology is now powering the CD-burning kiosks at the remaining Starbucks’ Hear Music locations, including five in Seattle and five in Austin. MOD’s technology, which was recently deployed in the Starbucks stores, replaces the existing technology from Hewlett-Packard Corp.

“That system is out; our system is in,” said Chief Executive Mark Phillips, who co-founded MOD last year with former Microsoft executive Anthony Bay to help retailers more effectively manage digital content in stores. Phillips declined to disclose the number of Starbucks stores it plans to be in this year.

More@seattlepi

Pandora the slick new music discovery engine has been hacked allowing music to be downloaded instead of streamed to the user. Will the RIAA allow Pandora to continue with it leaking music to the massess?

More@stuff

Tens of thousands of people line up for cattle calls all over the USA, hoping to be chosen for a chance at a one-million dollar recording contract. But only one will take home the big prize. What about the others? Will they go back home to Anywhere, USA with their tail between their legs, never to be heard from again? Or will they take control of their own career and propel themselves to the top without Simon, Paula, or Randy’s help? (more…)

Bath based band The Girls are attempting to claim TWO world records on Wednesday 31st of May in a hot air balloon. The rock band, who released the critically acclaimed Zebra Jeans EP in 2005 and are due to release their debut album in 2006, will be recording a new song titled What I Did Today. Written for the flight, the lyrics refer to the naughty things you can do when you are above the world below. (more…)

Pearl Jam’s new music video “Life Wasted” is now on Google Video for free! Be sure to check it out now, as free streaming and download is available only until next Wednesday.

And in line with the band’s experimental personality, Pearl Jam released the “Life Wasted” video under a Creative Commons “some rights reserved” copyright license. What does all that legal gibberish mean to you? It means that you can download the video for free, share it with your friends, and even post it on your own site—provided you give the band credit and don’t use it for commercial purposes. It’s yet another example of Pearl Jam putting its fans first.

[Music Videos as a marketing tool, who’d have thought it? – ED]

Source:googleblog

Sony is giving away free mobile phone ringtones with every purchase of a 512MB Sony Memory Stick Micro (M2).
The ultra-small M2 card is currently available in capacities of up to 1GB, and is designed to store mobile content such as ringtones, pictures and music videos on compact multifunctional devices. The M2 also comes with a Memory Stick adaptor enabling users to transfer data from their mobile phones to other Memory Stick PRO compatible devices. Sony Ericsson has recently launched a number of mobile phones compatible with the M2 including the Z530i clamshell model.
To receive the free ringtones, customers need to activate their mobile phone’s WAP connection and then enter a unique promotional code on the Sony BMG Music Entertainment official website at www.sonybmg.fr/M2. Customers can then choose five tunes from a list of 24 most-wanted ringtones.

Source:whatdigitalcamera

[Note – the link, www.sonybmg.fr/M2, doesn’t work from a PC, maybe it’s just WAP… another mistake SONY? – ED]

Vodafone is conducting mobile marketing through Enpocket, including SMS barcode fulfilment, to support a series of music events it is putting on this summer.

Mobile marketing specialist Enpocket is planning and delivering the activity, with the next Vodafone TBA [To Be Announced] gig to be The Zutons in Liverpool on May 20. The locations of the TBA gigs are kept secret until the last moment, and the gigs are broadcast later by Channel 4 and E4.

More@brandrepublic