Warner Bros + Swedish Cop = Pirate Bay Scandal

Spotted on: Digital Music News, The Register, p2pnet.net Here’s a news flash that hit the blogosphere en masse in the last few days. The Swedish Magazine Sydsvenskan recently reported that there is more to the original investigation of the Pirate Bay than meets the eye. Mere months after the investigation began, officer Jim Keyzer, landed a [...]

How Low Can Album Sales Go?

Spotted on: Digital Music News It’s nothing new that the music industry is experiencing a steady downward trend in album sales. A few years ago, chart toppers were moving millions of albums a week. This trend isn’t just continuing, it’s advancing. For the first quarter of 2008, albums sales were down 10.7% from [...]

Sony-BMG Uses Pirated Software

Spotted on: Ars Technica The major labels are very outspoken about the evils of piracy, and aggressively pursue those who chose to download music and not pay for it. That being the case, there is great ironyin the fact that up to 47% of Sony-BMG’s software is pirated. Recently, a tech support call for a program called [...]

How Collective Idiocy Left the Record Companies in Bits

Spotted On: The Guardian “When the history of our digital times comes to be written, one of the questions that will puzzle historians is why the record companies missed the significance of the internet.” What a great thought (and a very catchy headline). Here is a summary of the article, with some commentary. Since World War II, [...]

The End of The Music Industry As We Know It?

Spotted on: Digital Music News The folks at Forrester Research recently published an 18 page paper on the decade long decline in music sales. The article points to the idea that the shift in music sales is permanent, thanks to the Internet. I haven’t read the paper, but thanks to the blogosphere, information [...]

Artist Turns to BitTorrent when his Music is Pirated by iTunes

Spotted on: TorrentFreak An interview with the Flashbulb about his recent calamity with iTunes, and putting his album up on BitTorrent. It turns out iTunes is selling his albums without permission, and not paying royalties. The Flashbulb (Benn Jordan) has been releasing albums for 14 years, the last 5 have included various commercial endeavors. The [...]

Is Trent Reznor Reshaping the Music Business?

Syndicated from: Digital Music News - by Paul Resnikoff Ghosts is a variation on a theme created by Radiohead. The latest NIN album is part free, part paid, part digital, and part traditional. And a broad range of consumer preferences and budgets are accommodated by the initiative. Reznor and Radiohead are important market-movers and fearless [...]

Does Chatter Matter? The Impact of User-Generated Content on Music

Spotted on: NYU Archives Here’s a paper titled “Does Chatter Matter? The Impact of User-Generated Content on Music”. It’s a study in how blogs and and social networking sites are impacting music sales. The study did not include any analysis on radio or internet broadcasting as a variable. Since this a very long and [...]

What Happens to Music Collections When They?re Just Collections?

Spotted on: The Campus Word This article looks at the impact that huge MP3 collections has on our perception and enjoyment of music, and really got me thinking. Music has value because it moves us.  That special album that takes us back to some magic moment, or the songs we love to dance to.  What has people [...]

IFPI Chairman Speaks About the Music Business

Spotted on: The Register A fascinating interview with IFPI chairman John Kennedy about the future of music for independent labels in the digital realm Here are some of tasty quotes : “it’s always very difficult going from something that’s free to an industry to something that has a cost to the industry.” “I think what we have to do [...]