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- "Demo" is not so much a reference to recording quality/sound but a tag to indicate that the creative process for the song is ongoing. As Spanky mentions above, it is a way to give listeners a peek into the process. Sharing early and unfinished versions of songs is a wonderful way for artists to interact with their fan base.
- Avoiding MySpace is not good advice. Any site that appears on the first page of search results for your name (just ask Rick Santorum) demands your close attention. MySpace is still an SEO powerhouse.
- Email consistently, and not once in a long while, but do not waste people's time. The trick here is to come up with something important to say and share beyond the obvious.
There Are Things A Band Should Never Do
Guest post by Tyler Hayes, founder of Liisten.com, an independent music discovery site. Don't label songs "Demo", "Rough Mix", "Unmastered" or anything in that vein. Even if it is one of those, but you think it sounds good enough to share and you can't wait, don't tell people it's a "demo". Ba...
"No Stanger to Cotroversy?"
Audiogalaxy Takes On Pandora, iTunes Match & Major Label Lawyers
Seattle based Audiogalaxy has launched a free online music streaming and locker service that combines the best of both with iTune's Match and Pandora. Audiogalaxy also seems certain to feel the legal wrath of record labels and other rightholders. "Our service offers music fans a tunable musi...
Lowery.
Cracker's Dave Lowery: Artists "Shafted" By New Music Industry [VIDEO & COMMENTARY]
(UPDATE 2) David Lowery, the lead singer of Camper Van Beethoven and Cracker comes close to yearning for the good old days when his platinum album netted the band some real revenue. "I'm not suggesting that we go back there," Lowry told Andrew Keen of TechCrunch. But “it looks like the artist ...
doesn't look like anybody at hypebot is going to fix the broken link so doing so here:
http://www.musicthinktank.com/blog/call-to-indie-artists-stop-giving-your-music-away-free.html
Call To Indie Artists: Stop Giving Your Music Away
Free stuff is enticing. However, free is a controversial topic especially in music. Do you believe in giving away music for free? On Music Think Tank, Taurean Casey believes that artists are giving away way too much free music. Join the debate. “The belief that giving away free music will r...
thanks for writing hypebot's story for hypebot, topspin guys.
Topspin Community Forums Hacked
UPDATE: Topspin executives tell Hypebot that only its Vbulletin-based community forum was hacked in what appeared to be a general attack on Vbulletin rather than on Topspin. No data was lost, but rather when the decision was made to switch to Zendesk, there wasn't a way to migrate the previous...
Don't like doing this, but it's getting a little out of hand.
Bruce, do you guys not have a spellchecker?
Prince "Can't Stand Digital Music.. You Can't Feel Anything", Piracy Is "Carjacking"
(UPDATED) The former Purple One, Prince "can't stand" digital music. "You're getting sound in bits. It affects a different place in your brain," he told the Guardian. "When you play it back, you can't feel anything. We're analogue people, not digital." He's also continuing his campaign against...
Excellent post, Brian.
Tunecore appears to be doubling down on the moral judgment argument:
http://blog.tunecore.com/2011/05/a-love-letter-from-the-back-end-model.html
TuneCore Explains Major Price Hike, CD Baby Responds With Discount
Popular digital distributor TuneCore recently raised prices from $19.99 a year per album distributed to $49.99 per year. While many users still find TuneCore a bargain, the reaction from others was vocal and negative. "Under the old pricing scheme my yearly costs for 4 albums would be $57.96,...
Why would Price want to weed out acts? His business model is based on a shotgun approach. The quality of the content and actual sales of their artists are of no concern to Tunecore (the latter of which helps to explain why they add new stores so infrequently and service so few of them - and now that they aren't charging per store, they have about zero incentive to expand to additional retailers and markets).
That said, Tunecore is the best deal out there for the vast majority of artists.
Also, somewhat related to all this - why does Itunes insist on wiping all reviews of albums that switch digital distributors? Seems like bad business for Itunes and great for distributors in the sense that they can use it to keep bands locked in.
TuneCore Explains Major Price Hike, CD Baby Responds With Discount
Popular digital distributor TuneCore recently raised prices from $19.99 a year per album distributed to $49.99 per year. While many users still find TuneCore a bargain, the reaction from others was vocal and negative. "Under the old pricing scheme my yearly costs for 4 albums would be $57.96,...
hey, thanks, myspace, but i'll stick with root music app + soundcloud.
Official MySpace App Helps Bands Post To Facebook
In what is either too little too late or a complete admission of defeat, MySpace has just launched the Myspace Music Artist App so artists can move their Myspace Music profile including music, videos, etc to a “Music” tab on their Facebook Fan page along with their current MySpace design. The ...
So "good business" is not registering with rights organizations? Don't you want to be able to *measure* your exposure, as opposed to it being some nebulous thing? And if you're concerned about ownership of your music, entities like SoundExchange and ASCAP/BMI serve to affirm that ownership through documentation (SE logs the Sound Recording Copyright Owner and performers, ASCAP/BMI the writers and publishers).
They are necessary because the alternative is that artists would have to enter into direct contracts with every single music service on earth. Aggregating all of those transactions under one roof is just common sense, as is taking advantage of the services that these companies offer.
SoundExchange Takes Aim At Uneducated Writers And "Very, Very Low" Rates
During a webinar last week, digital performing rights organization SoundExchange answered questions ranging from criticisms of undistributed funds to why some payment checks were so small. During the session, articles critical of SoundExchange were dubbed as "written by people who didn’t unde...
Not sure what "make it" means anymore, but point taken. Given the pittance that these services pay for music, it seems a stretch to call it double dipping. Organizations like SoundExchange, and for that matter, ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC, are necessary go-betweens, so it makes sense to work with and support them.
Now in the case of SoundExchange, it's obvious that they have a *long* way to go when it comes to transparency and modernizing their downright archaic system.
SoundExchange Takes Aim At Uneducated Writers And "Very, Very Low" Rates
During a webinar last week, digital performing rights organization SoundExchange answered questions ranging from criticisms of undistributed funds to why some payment checks were so small. During the session, articles critical of SoundExchange were dubbed as "written by people who didn’t unde...
So Phil, are you suggesting that each artist enter into an individual contractual agreement with 1,400 music services and collect those royalties directly?
SoundExchange Takes Aim At Uneducated Writers And "Very, Very Low" Rates
During a webinar last week, digital performing rights organization SoundExchange answered questions ranging from criticisms of undistributed funds to why some payment checks were so small. During the session, articles critical of SoundExchange were dubbed as "written by people who didn’t unde...
Linky no worky.
Soundcloud Launches "Takes Questions" Audio Q & A Platform. We've Got Private Beta Invites
(UPDATED) SoundCloud launched a new site, Takes Questions, in today, which enables users to take questions and leave audio answers from a customizable web page. For musicians and others, Takes Questions offers a simple and personal way to more deeply engage their fans. Several artists are alre...
Cheers, Kyle. Congratulations and well-deserved. Billboard needs guys like you.
Hypebot Editor Kyle Bylin Joins Billboard
Longtime Hypebot Editor Kyle Bylin put in his last day at the blog on Friday. Bylin has taken a job as Social Charts Manager at Billboard Magazine in Los Angeles. This week, he will make the 1,850 mile from North Dakota to California. Shortly thereafter, Bylin will start his new position at B...
Gosh, I really do hate to do this.
But does Hypebot not have access to a spell-checker?
As good as this site is, and as much as I depend on it for a resource, it's just hard to take HB seriously when the spelling is (1) so consistently wrong and (2) is so easy to fix before going live with a post.
'Fuck Freemium'. Devo Drummer Josh Freese Strikes Again With $75,000 Fan Offering
(UPDATED) Devo and session drummer Josh Freese got a lot ink in 2009 for his tongue in cheek yet effective fan packages and outspoken take on the music industry is back at it with new offerings that start at $5.000 and top out at $7500 for for his latest release, My New Friends. For $75,000, ...
What's more of a perception problem, Rihanna playing small rooms or canceling arena dates? The lower capacity venues will probably be packed. And you could probably charge more per ticket and make up some of the gap.
I can't get my head around why handlers do this to their artists. Why put them in a position like this? Perhaps the best way to go is to postpone touring until the demand is in line with the superstar image that you wish to project.
But I'd rather see the artist playing a smaller but vibe-y theatre or venue, with people spilling out the doors and tickets selling out in minutes or hours, belting out a great performance that people will pay a premium for (and tell their friends about) instead of gambling on filling up some sterile, corporate arena with 34 backup singers and dancers in tow.
Rihanna + 20 Radio Singles = Weak Concert Sales
To date, Rihanna has 20 singles; 1,056,094,048 views on YouTube; and 10 million album sales. But, at the moment, she can't sell concert tickets to save her life. Last year, her "Last Girl On Earth" tour hit problems with cancellations in Phoenix, Dallas, Atlanta, Denver and Indianapolis becau...
Ping is indeed a failure. Apple may find a way to resuscitate it, but they had better hurry. Ping simply doesn't play well with other social networks, and most people I know don't want the obligation of maintaining yet another profile. And as Kyle noted, Ping is an ecommerce platform that seems uninterested in facilitating meaningful interaction and is mainly about funneling traffic to buy links.
Say What? – “All of My Friends And I Use Ping.”
The other day I had a chance interaction. I met a Ping fan, which is like spotting a Dodo bird. Mid-lecture at a university, I talked about the problems facing music-based social networks. One girl kindly raised her hand and said: "All of my friends and I use Ping." In that moment, I almost ...
the death of MySpace was actually about two years ago. it was just baffling to many of us why the turnaround plan didn't start a year earlier than that. ultimately, the site seemed to have no vision and little interest in improving the user experience - only an interest in spamming the hell out of anything that moved and padding its clickthrough numbers with a deliberately inscrutable interface.
MySpace Traffic Races to the Bottom [CHART]
The folks at Business Insider have confirmed that the death of MySpace isn't overly exaggerated. According to comScore data, MySpace had 45 million unique visitors in January. That's down from from 70 million the year prior. "This is why MySpace is up for sale," they write. "Its turnaround pla...
A print ad in the New York Times? Even before one word of content, his cluelessness is already apparent.
Music Exec Buys Full Page Sunday New York Times Ad To Slam The Grammys
Updated. Veteran hip hop music exec Steve Stoute took out a full page ad in the New York Times this Sunday to attack the Grammys and the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences for losing touch with contemporary music culture and failing to acknowledge top selling artists like Justin B...
while this sounds great on the surface, many pirates, perhaps even the majority of them, are motivated by an animus toward the industry of music and the very idea of art being monetized. to many of them, their biases and anti-corporate principles would likely get in the way.
also, anytime you inject financial gain into the picture, credibility is compromised. if the music community knows or suspects that a pirate or blogger is being compensated for what they choose to feature, objectivity is damaged. they've sold out to the very system that they were ostensibly fighting.
HOW TO: Take the Music Business Back From Apple
Apple has the music business cornered. Or does it? Chris Holmes has a radical idea that would help the music business free itself from Apple's stranglehold and reward the real influencers that distribute music. Apple might sell music, but it's the blogs and music pirates that distribute it. ...
Well done. Thank you for consolidating this information, Kyle.
Spotify is indeed exciting, but it's still not clear how artists, or even Spotify itself, will make a living from this model if it actually does dramatically shift consumption habits.
The Official Music Industry Launch Calendar – PLUS: Six Reasons to Be Excited For Music In 2011
2011 will be the year that defines the trajectory of digital music. The developments that everyone has been waiting for are on their way. In the past few months, launch dates for Spotify, Apple in the Cloud, Slacker On-Demand, and Sony's Music Unlimited have been confirmed. As well, the majo...
thank you for linking this, Kyle. this is one of the best debates i've read in quite a while.
Rich Venture Capitalist Converted Into Music Pirate
Fred Wilson, a predominate venture capitalist and blogger, converted into a music pirate the other day. This is someone who is extremely well off and, by his own admission, spends upwards of $2,000 a year on music in his family. And yet, Wilson found himself pirating the latest Streets album ...
Huppe is spot on about streaming rates and gives an excellent real-world example. As long as piracy and streaming pay about the same, we're going to get exactly nowhere.
Now if I could ask a question - when will the SoundExchange PLAYS database be up?
SoundExchange Names Micahel Huppe New President & Our Exclusive Interview
SoundExchange today named long-time Executive Vice President and General Counsel Michael Huppe as its new President. Huppe succeeds John Simson, who announced in July that he would be leaving SoundExchange after 10 years. On accepting his new position, Huppe promised to be “an eager champion o...
i think you want "fringes" (but i love "fridges"). don't mean to be grammar police, sorry.
guy in the video has hands like me. poor guy.
the idea of making music more family tree-oriented is kind of cool.
Hitlantis – Discover New Music at the Fringes
Another day, another music discovery tool. Hitlantis is a Helsinki-based startup that's striving to make finding music more visual. Bands placed at the center of the visualization are at the center while obscure acts reside at the fringes. Color signifies genre. Each dot on the heat map repres...
yeah, i think it's absolutely fair to say that this article is well below Hypebot standards. i see pieces like this constantly, but until today, Hypebot has been a respite from this kind of thing.
The Case Against Artist Management
This post is by Robin Davey of The Hoax and The Bastard Fairies. Interview. Managers don't know more than you about the music business. They may know more people in the business, but it doesn't mean they know more about it. It's a bold statement I know, but the reality is the music business ...
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