Andre Paine's Popkomm recaps for Billboard.biz (Day 1, Day 2, Day 3) were good, but the recap with the best soundbites from the Berlin conference came from Jupiter analyst Mark Mulligan. Highlights:

• 24/7, the company that powers the bundled broadband & mobile music service for Denmark's TDC, said subscribers had downloaded 60 million tracks. (Mulligan pointed out that Denmark's population is only 5.4 million.) The service, PLAY, debuted on April 1 of this year and uses DRM for both mobile and PC downloads. Two bits I found to be fascinating: albums dominate single track downloads, and PC downloads outnumber mobile downloads 30 to 1. The takeaway here is that the album format works well when there is no incremental cost (the subscriber pays a flat monthly rate regardless of volume). Skimping consumers will prefer single tracks over albums. Gluttonous consumers will take albums over single tracks.

• Frank Taubert from 24/7 Entertainment, which powers online stores as well as mobile music services, said 3 million out of the service's 4.5 million tracks had not been played even once. "The long tail is dead," wrote Mulligan, adding that the figure "could well hint at just how limiting discovery is on mobile."

• Jamie Kantrowitz from MySpace said MySpace Music had logged 40 million streams in the U.S. with 17-18 streams per person in its first seven days of operation (that would mean 2.2 million people in the U.S. streamed music that week). Compare that number to the billion streams MySpace said were streamed "in only a few days after launching the new product." Two comments. First, unless the U.S. is the source of about 2% of MySpace streams, those two numbers do not jibe. Second, that's only $400,000 at a penny a stream. Or about $57,000 per day. Small potatoes.

Posted by Glenn at 10:47 AM | Link
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OK...since I'm a few days late on this post and don't have time for a huge write up, I'm going to give a quick recap of the Next Big Nashville festival/conference that went off in Nashville last week. (No rest. The Americana Music Conference & Festival started today.) The third edition of Next Big Nashville added two days of industry panels, a handful of parties and more out-of-town bands to an already full music festival. It was very well run and a lot of fun.

I watched some good panels (all at the Musicians Hall of Fame) and had the honor of moderating a panel about artists rights, the issues and procedures in this sphere and the various organizations that represent labels, recording artists, musicians and songwriters. On the panel were representatives from Sound Exchange, Rightsflow, The Recording Academy, Nashville Songwriters Association International and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists.

Music Row has a good recap of the "Psychology and the Art of Artist Management" panel.

I was humored by the conversation at the "Nashville Curse" panel. Opinions ranged from "It's less country than it used to be" to "Nashville musicians play for themselves and not for larger crowds" (I'm paraphrasing). The Nashville Cream blog has a nice post on the panel. Here's a teaser:

But after niceties were exchanged, everyone settled into what more or less amounted to example after example of why Nashville isn't quite where it wants to be. Why don't we have a healthy indie label with distribution on par with Merge or SubPop to cater to the local rock talent? Why don't we have more rock bands coming out of here? If we're so talented, why aren't our local rock bands producing more hits?

"If there is a curse, it's that people in Austin, TX, don't have to answer to SheDaisy and Brooks & Dunn," interjected Bobby Bare Jr., referring to the frustrating country shadow hanging over our heads.

But props for most entertaining speaker on the panel goes to A&R dude Steve Robertson from Atlantic Records, the heaviest hitter present.

"I was extremely prejudiced against Nashville," he said. "All I knew 11 years ago was that Nashville was a country town." But as he got more calls and more demos sent his way, he started checking out bands. He just wasn't getting the vibe. The bands were talented, they were polished. But it didn't "feel hot."

Posted by Glenn at 12:38 PM | Link
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paidContent has the first post from the MusicTank "Face To Face With The Millennials" conference in London. The conference is built around a report on millennials funded by MusicTank and authored by Nettwerk's Terry McBride.

The report is free only to MusicTank members, but you can download a PDF of the executive summary here. The summary's call to action is best summed up in the final paragraph:

In summary: technological advancement will promote further diversification in the music industry, in terms of business models, content and mechanisms for artistfan interaction. No single approach is ‘the next big thing’, and experimentation is strongly encouraged. No-one can afford to wait for proof of concept when the next big innovation is always just around the corner. Millennials are constantly experimenting with and evaluating their experience as consumers: we suggest the music business does the same.

The paidContent post concentrates on comments made by McBride. He claims Avril Lavigne has made $2 million from YouTube ad sharing (an incredible sum, but certainly on the very high end of potential artist revenue from video plays), and he said labels should drop download prices to $0.25 and albums to $2.00 (which would take cooperation of music publishers and a reduction in mechanical royalties).

Like many people, I enjoy listening to or reading about McBride's philosophies and thoughts on the business. If you have half an hour to spare, watch this interview with McBride at Artist House Music.

Posted by Glenn at 1:02 PM | Link
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Not a ton of news or posts coming out of NARM (I expected more given the conference was held in blogger- and media-heavy San Francisco), but there are a few posts of interest today.

• Billboard's Ed Christman sat in on a panel where the statistics were flying fast and furious. Sony BMG's Thomas Hesse predicted U.S. sales would have a 50/50 physical/digital split next year. Currently, two-thirds of Sony BMG's digital sales come from downloads and subscriptions and one-third comes from mobile. Universal Music Group Distribution's Amanda Marks offered some stats: downloads account for 54.7% of all digital sales, subscription services account for 7.3% and video downloads and streams combine to account for about 3%. As for UMGD's mobile, the split is as follows: mastertones account for 26.7% of sales, ringbacks 3.9%, mobile OTA track downloads 3.7%, mobile OTA video 0.3% and other mobile products 0.4%. Additionally, Marks said UMGD mastertones are up 23% year-over-year and revenue subscription services are up 20% year-over-year.

• A post at TheDeal.com focused on new EMI digital music chief Douglas Merrill. Wrote Paul Bonanos, "Merrill was all about ideas: 'Technology has always destroyed or radically changed its participants ... the mass market has vanished ... monetization is a result of traffic.'"

• One post at Hypebot focused on digital piracy and its affects on purchasing. I think quite a few people believe P2P is good because it allows for sampling and gives the listener a way to become familiar with a song or artist. Eventually, the thinking goes, that sampling will lead to more purchases and a better relationship with the artist. It's a good argument. As free online music (mostly streaming) services take off, though, consumers will have a fair substitute for illegal downloads and, for better or worse, music companies will have greater justification for battling P2P.

Posted by Glenn at 1:07 PM | Link
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• The NARM website is hosting a PDF of the Nielsen presentation titled "State of the Industry." Lots of juicy numbers if you're into that kind of thing. Lots of positive spin as well. "Consumers made 1.6 billion purchase decisions in 2007 (1.3 billion in 2006)," it says on page three. Other interesting tidbits: 450,344 albums (80% of the total) sold fewer than 100 units in 2007 (page seven); 1,000 of the 570,000 albums that sold at least one unit account for 50% of all sales (page eight); and 37% of all album sales in 2007 were from new releases -- the lowest percentage since SoundScan was launched (page eight).

• Nielsen SoundScan's Rob Sisco and Chris Muratore massaged the numbers for the NARM audience by telling people unit purchases of books, movies and music were up 6.8% in Q1 2008. Very few of the Nielsen numbers address the most important thing, the dollar value of sales. (Billboard.biz)

• A really interesting slide is page #17, which lists market share by retail store type. Check out how far chain store sales have dropped -- 51% in 2003 to 34% year-to-date in 2008. Mass merchants have held steady over the last five years, indies gained a percentage point last year and non-traditional (mostly downloads at Amazon.com CD sales) have risen to 23% year-to-date in 2008 from 4% in 2003.

• NARM president Jim Donio outlined key challenges in an opening speech at NARM. One solution to tanking CD sales, he said, may be a hybrid "CD 2.0" format. Good grief. If that was ever going to work (and judging from the DualDisc it didn't) it's years late and should have taken the shelf space of copy-protected CDs. Here's what I think: nearly all people still in the market for CDs expect and want the CD to play music and music only. They're older consumers who grew up with the basic CD. Don't trick out the format in hopes of pulling in the younger generation. If there's bonus content, stick it on a separate disc in the package. Forget the hybrid stuff and be wary of putting music on DVDs. There are ways to offer exclusivity to CD purchasers (online fan clubs, for example) without adding bells and whistles to the basic CD. And whatever you do and however many are pressed, call it a "limited edition" so people think it's more special than it really is. (Billboard.biz)

• IODA unveiled branded download stores. (Press release)

• The Entertainment Software Assn. is collaborating with NARM to add film data to NARM's searchable database. (Video Business)

Posted by Glenn at 2:20 PM | Link
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(This is a week and a half late and is being posted after a busy week and a hiatus from blogging. More posts about the conference to come.)

Of the few panels I saw at the Leadership Music Digital Conference in Nashville last week, the "Marketing to Millennials" gave the most food for thought.

Hal Hassel from Echo had some very good takes on how to approach millennials. When he was asked if millennials will still spend on music, he said "absolutely" and stressed two ingredients: quality and authenticity. "It has to feel pretty genuine," he told the audience.

Dorrian Porter of Mozes spoke of the need to build a relationship. "The biggest challenge is to market today, monetize later."

"You need to use tools that millennials use," Hassel added later. "Social networking is not just a fad."

Not to dismiss the fine guests, but the most compelling part of the panel was the Mozes-powered text messages displayed on a widescreen behind the panelists.

A text appeared asking what millennials had broke using these web tools. "Taylor Swift" said a response. (I should point out the context of the word "break" in this case. In most industry circles, and especially in Nashville, an artist doesn't break until mainstream success is attained. Half a million is a start, but platinum is a better measuring stick. In some circles 100,000 album sales and a tour of large clubs counts as breaking. Not here.)

I couldn't help but jump in. "Swift had radio," I wrote, and continued to ask if anybody had broke using just millennial tools. Not an iPod commercial. Not with the help of the Disney media machine. Not Big Machine Record's radio promotion budget. Just Web 2.0.

Someone texted "Ingrid Michaelson." Nope. A "Grey's Anatomy" sync is mass media, and her label, while her own, is distributed by Sony BMG-owned RED.

Colbie Caillet? She had a big MySpace crowd before signing, but she wouldn't be a hit without Universal Republic. Carrie Underwood? She had "American Idol," the most mass of all media.

Obvious examples like Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails are rare exceptions to the rule. They already had the ears of both fans and the media, had sold millions of albums and had become strong draws on the live circuit. In a sense, though, both artists broke for a second time. The resulting publicity surrounding their choice of sale and distribution of self-released albums allowed them to find a few new fans. The twist here is the bands' impacts would not have been the same without the help of the mainstream press.

The bottom line is that mass media matters, and mass media is the source of much of the Web 2.0 chatter that is mistakenly assumed to be operating outside of the reaches of corporate America's influence. A millennial may hear about an artist through viral marketing, or get a song sent via IM, or have a link emailed from a friend, but mass media gets the ball rolling for much of the music discovery that exists in mainstream America. It may feel more genuine, but the impetus for it all was the good ol' marketing department conference call.

I'll go one step further: Labels that successfully operate in stealth are beating the millennials at their own game by hiding the source of the marketing message. If kids are turned off by overt gestures, make the gestures covert.

A purchase of Feist's The Reminder may feel more genuine (as in grass roots) because of its use in an Apple commercial, but that was a mass medium spreading a multi-million-dollar corporate marketing message organized by a top ad agency. At the end of the day, there's not that much difference between an Apple commercial and the old MTV. It may feel different, it may be a different gatekeeper, but it's still music discovery that arose through the efforts of labels and publishers.

Posted by Glenn at 11:13 AM | Link
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If you're like me and not at SXSW, or if you're like most attendees and don't attend panels and keynotes, here are some links to articles on the business-related news coming out of Austin.

• Digital Music News on artists and advertising. "'The music industry is not the best industry at understanding its consumers,' commented Dominic Hodge, senior strategist at Frukt. 'But the advertising industry is all about understanding who is buying, where to reach them, and how to target them.'"

• LA Times' Todd Martens on a keynote with Ticketmaster CEO Sean Moriarty, who said the company is likely to move to a more dynamic pricing system. "'It's going to take another five years to get very fluid dynamic pricing applied to wide swaths of inventory,' Moriarty said. 'The technology is there ... I don't think there's any downside. The perceived risk would be that with greater transparency -- if people look at a show and a show appears to be a dog -- it reflects poorly potentially on the artist, potentially on the promoter, potentially on the venue.'" There's a lot more in the post and it's a good read.

• The Boston Globe talks of creative highs and economic woes. "'Music continues culturally to be very powerful,' said Danny Goldberg, a former major-label executive who is now president of indie Ammal Records and manages Steve Earle, among other artists. 'I don't think there's any glimmer of recovery in terms of monetizing recordings. There are theories about the subscription model, but whether that's real or not, we'll see. I think that people are trying to adjust to a smaller pie.'"

• Variety on how boring a keynote could get at SXSW. It includes a bit of advice from Lou Reed, himself a former staff songwriter at Pickwick Records: "'They're going to say they want the publishing and you must say "no." That's where the money is. The answer is "no." It's the publishing. I wrote the song; it's my baby. Don't. Give. Up. The. Publishing."

• Lastly, the NY Times ArtsBeat blog is doing a good job covering the festival. Lots of music reviews without the filler that hurts most SXSW blogging (I don't want to know what you had to eat and what time you ate it).

Posted by Glenn at 4:47 PM | Link
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While reading Joseph Weisenthal's post at paidContent on a SXSW panel titled "Ad-Supported Music, A New Hope For The Industry?" I was green with envy for all those who attended the industry mud slinging. It sounds even better than when I saw songwriter Michael Penn berate Consumer Electronic Association's Gary Shapiro on a Future of Music Summit panel.

Ad-supported music -- heck, music period -- is a contentious issue, and this panel showed the opinions and emotions of the different sides. On one hand there was Interscope's Ted Mico and RCRD LBL's Peter Rojas going back and forth, then the crowd got a bit chippy during Q&A (and, oddly, took issue with RCRD LBL's business model even though it pays the artists).

I wasn't there and am going off only a recap, but it seems that many people are not comfortable with the melting pot (I kinda hate that word but I'll use it here) that is today's record business. Different parties are going to have to live with the existence of different business models. Not all music is going to be given away at social media or artist websites, and not all music is going to be a paid download with a predetermined amount going to the owner of the sound recording. Hobbyists can give away their music while full-time professionals need a decent income. Between the two extremes are artists who want exposure and something in return for their work. Celebrity pop stars don't need the same sales model (or sales channel) as does an established jazz musician or singer-songwriter 15 years removed from a hit. There will be different types of contracts, different rights and different levels of ownership. It will be difficult to say if any one is better or worse than another, or if any one "cheapens" music or does harm to the tenets of intellectual property. They're just different.

Posted by Glenn at 11:41 AM | Link
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A panel at Canadian Music Week predicted file trading would be a paid experience within a couple of years (read article at the Toronto Star).

The one thing in the article that just jumped out at me was a quote by David Hughes, senior vice-president of the RIAA's technology division. He foresees ISPs offering a subscription-based service ("as much as $12 a month") that will be charged according to bandwidth used. Wow. Sounds to me like an RIAA exec is predicting an ISP fee that will pay content owners. While his statements were not exactly an explicit stamp of approval, that's about the clearest endorsement of a legal P2P model I can recall hearing from the RIAA. What other subscription plan could he have been talking about? The panel was about future and legit P2P models, not ISP pricing strategies.

A system that increased broadband prices for low-bandwidth consumers, said BigChampagne's Eric Garland, was not a good solution. "Maybe the ISPs will have to find the bandwidth hogs and charge them extra," he said.

Gary Greenstein, who specializes in financing in digital media, sees the lack of ads in P2P applications as lost revenue. Users, he said, are "looking at an empty screen waiting for searches and downloads – that's a huge and untapped opportunity for advertisers." Ah, the SpiralFrog approach. I should point out that when I used SpiralFrog I toggled away from that window and did something else while my files downloaded. I assume others have the same ability to multi-task rather than stare at a screen and watch the download's progress.

Posted by Glenn at 10:22 AM | Link
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At the Country Radio Seminar in Nashville, a late cancellation by Sean Hannity resulted in a keynote panel discussion on performance rights for sound recordings on terrestrial. I couldn't score a press pass, but David M. Ross from Music Row was there and has a post on the panel. Panelists were Mike Kraski of Tenacity Management, John Simpson of SoundExchange, Tom Taylor from Radio-info.com and National Association of Broadcasters EVP John David.

For an idea of the parties' opinions, let's look at a few quotes.

• "Zero is the only acceptable number to pay" -- NAB's John David
• "On our side it is a moral imperative. If one side wins big while the other loses then we all fail. We need radio, and radio needs content. There has to be a middle ground." -- Tenacity's Mike Kraski
• "Artists who had great records of songs they didn’t write get nothing when their music is played over and over for years" -- SoundExchange's John Simpson

Ross wrote that the panel was contentious and the audience Q&A "brought the emotional impact of this economic issue to a boil." Wow, sorry I missed it. Sounds a bit like the FCC town hall hearing I attended in December 2006. The best way to get country musicians and labels riled up is to talk about country radio. The genre has an incredibly strong link to terrestrial radio, so any discussions, whether they're about ownership or performance royalties for sound recordings, are going to be emotional.

Posted by Glenn at 12:15 PM | Link
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• Digital Music News: Entrepreneurs lash out at lopsided label deals. ""There's too much squeeze up front, and companies can't survive five, seven years,' explained David Del Beccaro, president and founder of Music Choice. 'This is a ten-year transition.'"

• Post I.T.: "Can companies distribute music legally while still attracting a large enough audience to be successful? A rather heated exchange over this very question occurred onstage during one of the panels this morning."

• paidContent interview with Napster president Brad Duea: "If you come in and you stream, that’s basically an unlimited subscription… the one place that we will still have DRM is on the portable subscription."

• Listening Post has quotes from all sorts of speakers as well as a summary of the keynote interview with Sony BMG head of digital Thomas Hesse. Definitely read the Hesse post.

• Also at Listening Post is a recap of an interview with MP3Tunes' Michael Robertson. "Our position is that the consumer owns the music and can move it onto the device they want, and it's okay for us to help them do that. The DMCA says that if you're storing a file at the request of the user, you're generally free from copyright claims as long as you do it responsibly."

Posted by Glenn at 3:42 PM | Link
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A Nokia executive vice president offered some information on the company's Comes With Music service at the MIDEM conference. Bloomberg has the article.

• Nokia will share revenue with mobile operators. Said the executive, "In those cases where we cooperate with operators, there will be an arrangement so they can get a piece."
• Downloaded tracks will come with DRM. Users will be able to transfer tracks from handset to PC, but will not be able to transfer tracks between PCs.
• The service will not be available on existing phones. "You actually buy a device that is complete," he said. "You can't buy the same device without the content."

Posted by Glenn at 1:43 PM | Link
|Comes With Music||Conferences||Nokia|

There are now a few reports online about a keynote Q&A with Vivendi president at MIDEM conference in France. (Vivendi is the parent company of market-leading Universal Music Group.)

A report by Billboard.biz highlighted Levy's comments on the CD format. Wrote Lars Brandle, "Levy ... defied widespread gloomy predictions for the CD when he told delegates the physical format would continue to play an important role in the recorded music industry for years to come, alongside digital formats."

The Canadian Press adds this quote on the CD: "It's not the migration of one physical format to another, I think it's a transition into very diversified business models of which CDs will remain a part. I don't believe at this stage for the next few years we will see a complete showdown (elimination) of CDs."

A post at paidContent has quotes on both the CD and Vivendi's stance on DRM. "We are still testing (DRM-free models)," Levy said, "but our policy is still that we are strongly attached to DRM, especially for advertising-based models and subscription-based models."

Reuters' headline is "Vivendi Chief Says Music Industry Gloom is Overdone" and included this quote: "I think altogether today there is an exaggeration in the industry ... Of course it is not doing that well, but look at us, we have flat revenues, a good two digit margins and it's not as dark as what many people describe."

Posted by Glenn at 3:36 PM | Link
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One speech can create many different articles with varying points of emphasis. Viacom chairman Sumner Redstone spoke at the Media and Money conference in New York. Here's how they reported it:

• Billboard.biz: "Redstone: Ads Will Pay The Way." "Ads will pay the way into the digital future, Sumner predicted. Today, advertisers are not necessarily shifting their dollars, but they are taking advantage of integrated ad opportunities over multi-platform placements."
• Hollywood Reporter: "Redstone: Content Still King in Digital Domain." "Redstone argued that with consumers having taken charge in the digital age, content must be 'viral, ubiquitous and easy to use.' And with 500 channels and 8 billion Internet sites out there, "digital means dollars for those with the best content," he said. "
• Forbes: "Redstone: 'If Content Is King, Copyright Is Its Castle'." "'If content is king, copyright is its castle,'' he said. 'Copyright compels creativity, it furnishes the incentive to innovate. If you limit the protection of copyright, you stifle the expression of self.'"
• New York Times: "CBS and Viacom Executive Chairman Hip to Digital Trends." "When it comes to technology, Sumner Redstone says he’s not an early adopter, but rather a 'non-adopter', joking about the fact that he doesn’t blog or Twitter. Still, during his keynote address to the Media and Money Conference, he made sure to get across that he’s hip to big digital trends and that CBS and Viacom are well positioned to take advantage of industry changes."

Most of the articles I've seen outlined the main themes of Redstone's speech: copyright (still important), distribution (need to follow consumers' needs and behavior), advertising ("will pay the way") and content ("Professionally produced content only increases in value as digital platforms multiply"). Redstone's opinion matters a great deal as Viacom has a wide media footprint that includes MTV, BET, Paramount Pictures and video game maker Harmonix ("Guitar Hero").

Posted by Glenn at 2:56 PM | Link
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At the In The City music industry conference in London, panelists debated prolonging the life of the CD, the re-emergence of vinyl and that pesky value gap (that we've been hearing a bit about recently).

Tommy Boy Records' Tom Silverman thought the CD's life support system has gone on long enough: "Silverman said he'd lambasted his fellow RIAA board members for prolonging the life of the CD, and not being more forward looking. The CD had given them a short-term revenue boost, raising the price of the album from $8-$10 to $14-16 as the format switched from vinyl and cassette to CD. The good old days weren't coming back. While all three retailers were optimistic - Silverman thought things were so bad that even cautious optimism was unwarranted."

The concept -- it's too far from reality to call an actual plan -- of the blanket license was a topic that split the panelists. The Orchard founder Scott Cohen and DrownedInSound.com's Sean Adams called for blanket licenses on ISP and mobile customers. (Quick question: Telecom companies...they have pretty good lobbyists, right?) Cohen's fictitious numbers: "If they paid just $1 a month they don't know, we have 1.1 billion ISP customers and 2.6 billion mobile customers, giving us $45 billion overnight to be divided up."

Jupiter's Mark Mulligan insisted the numbers do not add up. "In the UK, he pointed out, just 15 per cent of internet users, and therefore something around 12 per cent of the population were using P2P file sharing. And these are often users with the lowest disposable income. Yet the industry has seen a 30 per cent decline in revenues." Of course there are other reasons. Here's a simple math problem: One explanation could be that the 12% of the UK's population that uses P2P used to buy a disproportionately large amount of music. There's no need to assume each 1% of the population accounts for 1% of music sales. Beyond that, the unbundled album is a problem. Consumers are swapping albums for songs and labels sorely miss that forgone revenue. They obviously don't miss it enough to put their weight behind a P2P scenario. That's going to be the last option. Next up: Total Music.

Posted by Glenn at 11:06 AM | Link
|Conferences|

It doesn't matter if a music industry conference is held in the U.S. or Germany, the same rehashed statements and vague directives will be uttered by panelists. A few bits of wisdom and vision have come from the conference, but most of what I've read has been tired talking points. One new, common theme was the 360-degree artist contract. A number of panelists look to such contracts as a practical solution for industry woes.

I shrugged when I read a recap by Paul Resnikoff of Digital Music News. The Orchard founder Scott Cohen, he wrote, wondered out loud about the revenues that could be generated if all the world's music-related P2P traffic could be monetized. At $0.99 per song and a conservative estimate of 12 billion tracks annually, "it doesn’t even come close to replacing the old business," he said. Cohen admitted the calculation was pure fantasy, but it's both disturbing and an outright shame that industry panels bother to entertain such notions of business fiction.

The rest of the panel was equally short on substance. Later, Cohen tossed out another rehashed idea that lies somewhere between fantasy and unlikely: The well-worn P2P tax proposal. "Monetizing mobile users" -- whatever that means -- was mentioned by the panel. Comprehensive, 360-degree business relationships got a nod as well. That actually has a chance of stemming the tide...mainly because music companies are already switching to that model. (Best to worry about what can be done, not what is unlikely to be done.) To build a multi-service music group, all a company needs to do is to go on an acquisition binge. Finding the debt capacity to rebuild a company is a lot easier than finding the magic wand needed to monetize P2P and equitably distribute the money to rightsholders. I might have a different opinion if anybody had put together a coherent plan for legit P2P. To date, I've heard too much "it could look kinda like this" and not enough "this is how it will work and benefit all parties." Details, please. Details.

Billboard.biz's recap of day three had some very insightful comments by manager and agent Carl Leighton-Pope. He theorized that concerts are growing in popularity right now because people are relatively isolated in the Internet era. "People migrate to where other people are," he said. "We want to be with other people."

Christof Ellinghaus, owner of German independent label City Slang gave a vote of confidence for broader artist contracts. "For me, 360 degrees is the only model if we're to survive," he told the audience. "Music (only) is a thing of the past. If I have the expertise to book a tour in-house, then I'll do it."

On the first day of Popkomm, Bragg put populism over capitalism. "If the industry wants to move forward than it needs to move with the artist, and have less of a standoff way of doing things.... If industry has any sense, it will refocus itself around the artist and give catalogs back. So much of the way the record company is configured doesn't fly anymore." Novel, but off the mark. Chances of record companies voluntarily giving away its recorded music assets: Zero point zero zero. Again, my beef here is that panelists are talking about events that have only the slightest chance of ever happening. They need to inspire the audience by discussing what should and could happen.

Much more sense came from Michael Baylor, CEO of Rights Marketing Group. "What we need to do is look at the 360-degree franchise of the talent and go to companies saying 'what marketing problem can we solve for you?' Not 'how much money can we make from you, or how many records can we sell from you? Management of talent needs to be much more outwardly focused, and much smarter at helping consumer brands solve marketing problems. It's a difficult dance and it's really hard work."

Posted by Glenn at 6:19 PM | Link
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Warner Music Group CEO and chairman Edgar Bronfman Jr.'s interview at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia is worth a listen (if you have 40 minutes or so to spend with it). In the interview with a Goldmann Sachs analyst, Bronfman gave insight into WMG's strategy and priorities. (Click here for webast page at WMG investor relations page.)

On WMG's broader artist contracts that deal with multiple revenue streams: "The one place the strategy has evolved is essentially broadening our revenue stream beyond just a recorded music business into a broader music business. ... We're adding to that the notion of partnering with our artists from day one. We want to partner with our artists in all the revenue streams that are derived from that brand over time. Merchanise. Touring. Management.

How long until these initiatives make an impact on margins and the bottom line? WMG is buying and building those components, Bronfman said, though he didn't want to predict when the changes would hit the bottom line.

About the competitive response to WMG's moves, he said WMG willl do what they will do. Bronfman again emphasized that WMG will not stock its portfolio with only recorded music. LiveNation and Ticketmaster are theoretically competitors, but if WMG adopts the new model it can adapt to the new competitive threat. (One feels he was referring to the reported offer LiveNation has made to current WMG aritst Madonna.)

Bronfman was asked about artist reactions to 360 contracts. "I think it's a mix," he said. "We're focused more on the newer artists and mid-tier artist roster, not so much on the top tier artist roster," at which point WMG would be paying "market rates" and would have lower margins.

One thing that stood out to me was that Bronfman singled out Lala.com as a bright spot for the future of digital music. (Universal has SpiralFrog, EMI went DRM-free with iTunes and WMG is in Lala.com's corner. Funny how everybody puts their weight behind different companies.) WMG is the only major to license its content to Lala.com, and WMG artist James Blunt is now selling an iPod-compatible album download at his MySpace page via a Lala.com widget.

paidContent has more on the interview and emphasizes Bronfman's comments on needing an equity stake in the "MTV of the Internet."

Billboard's Ed Christman has a very good recap of the interview.

Posted by Glenn at 1:06 PM | Link
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I'm not there, but I've been reading up on the Future of Music Summit that kicked off in D.C. yesterday.

Future of Music Blog: Notes from the first day of the conference. Here's a quote from musician Bob Mould: "I worked so I could buy music, now people are downloading 100 songs a day that are an icon on their desktop. Where is the respect for the artist, where is the sacredness of the music?" And a quote from Nonesuch Records' David Bither: "There's more vitality in the music community than there has been in a long, long time."

Billboard.biz: Basically a recap of a speech by Sen. Byron Dorgan. The senator told the story of a train crash in his home of North Dakota and how the lack of a locally-owned radio station meant residents were not informed of the danger via radio. I heard the same story earlier this year in a speech by Eric Klinenberg, who wrote the book Fighting for Air: The Battle to Control America's Media.

News.com: Coverage focused on Sen. Byron Dorgan's encouragement to the crowd to continue a push for net neutrality.

Washington Post: In his blog, tech writer Rob Pagoraro ran down some first day highlights.

Bloggers with more coverage: Taking It Back To The Roots!, FairMusic and Saki Store Blog (with a transcript of yesterday's retail panel).

Posted by Glenn at 2:34 PM | Link
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I hadn't heard anything about the two-day In The City of New York conference that started today in New York City. (Typical poor media coverage of a music industry event, frankly, but maybe some coverage will show up tomorrow.) Jupiter's David Card put up a short blog post about a "keynote question" by Tommy Boy Records founder Tom Silverman.

Silverman, wrote Card, wonders where the big hits are since technology now allows for a lower cost of production and distribution, as well as the social networks to help promote the hits. It's a good, quick read, and I think Silverman is hitting the nail on the head. People have not found a way to utilize technology that will effectively harness all the untapped (as in not monetized) enthusiasm for music that exists.

The only other thing I could find on the conference was this near-worthless article by Newsday's Glenn Gamboa.

Posted by Glenn at 8:31 PM | Link
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• Album sales were up 5% last week but were 8% lower than the same week last year. For the year, album sales are down about 16%. Digital track sales were up 2% and were up 40% year over year. For the year, track sales are up 49%.

• iTunes' entry into the (possibly free) live music business will allow it to sell downloads of the performing acts at iTunes. (Hollywood Reporter)

• U.K. download service 7digital has beefed up its service: DRM-free MP3s fro EMI, video downloads and online music lockers. (The Guardian)

• PassAlong Networks is getting EMI's DRM-free MP3s for stores (such as Trans World's download store) powered by its StoreBlocks technology. (Press release)

• At the Digital Hollywood conference, a panel discussed the "impossibility of the packaged product" and changing priorities in young consumers' budgets. (Digital Music News)

• The private equity train keeps on rolling. British company Chrysalis is reportedly in talks with a private equity group over the possibly sale of its radio division, Heart 106.2. (Reuters)

Posted by Glenn at 8:03 AM | Link
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The recorded music industry recently converged upon Chicago for the annual NARM convention. Coverage was limited to pretty much Billboard and Hits. (Since Hits' website is too tedious to visit -- why require Flash in this day and age? -- I'm not going to link to its stories.) No blogging David from Digital Audio Insider blogged about Digital NARM here, here and here. Not a single picture (other than one of NARM's Jim Donio and Don Cornelius). Nobody from a Chicago newspaper (as far as I could find). Given the amount of griping about the industry done by music critics from Chicago, I figured one of them would attend the conference and get a better perspective on the issues. Not so.

Billboard's Anthony Bruno covered a presentation on digital music by NPD Group's Russ Crupnick. "Consumers are a little bit overwhelmed, and it's starting to inhibit the purchasing decision," he claimed. "For all the benefit that digital has done, it's created a huge barrier from getting (fans) to purchase as much as we'd like them to... Is there discovery that leads to purchase, or is there discovery that leads to more discovery."

Crupnick pointed to a study that showed satellite radio listeners are 30% less likely to buy a CD because the music they like is readily available. Download the PowerPoint presentation of the NPD Group presentation here.

More at Billboard.biz: Todd Martens on indie retail's look to digital and vinyl for growth, Anthony Bruno on labels' new digital initiatives and Anthony Bruno on a Thomas Dolby address that hit on technology's empowerment of musicians.

Billboard's Ed Christman has an article that says the RIAA has invited some labels to a May 11 meeting to explore whether a new physical format is needed to replace the CD. Said one exec, "Other new format efforts have failed in the past, but we want to explore if there's a play to be made to come up with a replacement for the CD."

Forbes' Louis Hau covered NARM and focused on the industry's attempt to breath life into physical formats.

Video Business talked to NPD Group's Russ Crupnick after his presentation at NARM. The article looks at parallels between changes in consumption of music and video.

Posted by Glenn at 2:29 PM | Link
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• Big news out of EMI's Caroline Distribution: All regional sales reps are being let go. The three remaining Los Angeles employees are gone. Their accounts are going to be serviced by EMM reps. (Billboard.biz)

• The value of Canada's music sales fell 35% in Q1 of 2007 (to $68.7 million from $105.6 million) a big increase over the 12% drop last year. Digital music sales make up a mere 6% of the market. (CRIA press release)

• XM Satellite Radio announced its earnings for Q1, a net loss of $122 million on revenues of $264 million. Revenues were up 27% year over year. Subscribers increased to 7.9 million from 6.5 million. (Press release)

• The IFPI announced a "major step forward" in licensing music for streaming across different European countries. (Press release)

• A panel at paidContent's @EconSM conference talked about music and social networking. Not a big surprise that panelists said the musicians cannot rely on MySpace alone. (paidContent)

Posted by Glenn at 10:25 AM | Link
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• Though it was just down the road from Vanderbilt, I was unable to attend the Leadership Music Digital Summit 2007 yesterday in Nashville. Paul Resnikoff from Digital Music News was there and has posts on the familiar themes that emerged and the conversation about lack of scarcity in the digital world.

• MusicRow.com covered Terry McBride's speech at the conference. "We must move to monetize the behavior of the consumer, not try to change it," he said in a common refrain. I'd love to hear his thoughts on Qtrax, which attempts to monetize a behavior by trying to change that behavior so it is in line with the only type of licensing agreements that will allow for such attempts to monetize a behavior... (MusicRow.com)

• A Chinese court has ordered Yahoo China to delete links to free web sites that offer music downloads. Beijing's No. 2 Intermediate Court ruled Yahoo should bear some -- but not all -- of the responsibility for the copyright infringement. Warner Music Group, through the IFPI, sued Yahoo China for copyright infringement in January of this year. (Reuters)

• The IFPI's statement on the Yahoo China ruling said "the ruling promises to improve the whole environment in which the local and international music industry does business in China." (IFPI)

• The iinovate blog has a podcast and video interview with Pandora founder and Chief Strategy Officer Tim Westergren. (iinovate)

• A Bank of America analyst said of XM and Sirius "stand-alone values and merger synergy values likely are lower than previously estimated." Based on market valuations, he believes regulatory approval of a merger is 35-40%, but " FCC contacts believe that the percentage is trending lower." (RadioInk)

• Other Music, perhaps the ultimate tastemaker New York music store, has launched its digital download store. Downloads are 320kbps non-variable rate MP3 files. Said the introduction page, "It is very important to us that in this new era, real record stores run by real music fans can still survive and thrive."

Posted by Glenn at 10:02 AM | Link
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The final panel at the Music 2.0 conference was about the future of music retail and featured people involved in the business of selling CDs in one form or another. It was a symposium on a market in transition that sees different opportunities in selling CDs.

Simon Wright from Virgin Entertainment Group International described how his company's product mix is in flux. Company-wide sales were up 12% last year, but Virgin is moving away from music and toward products like clothing. "Out marketing agenda for this year is we want people to stop calling us a record store," he said, adding that it sells "bucket loads" of items from Gwen Stefani's clothing line.

The belief that brick-and-mortar retail will survive was built upon consumers' enjoyment of shopping. One key opportunity -- which is filled with challenges -- is to bring digital into retail. "People like to get out and about," said Bob French, president of Mix & Burn, which allows retail consumers to create custom mix CDs at in-store kiosks. "When they're out there, they're compelled. They make impulse purchases. Digital is a great way to satisfy that impulse.”

Bill Nguyen, founder of Lala.com, called for retailers to incorporate better technology to offer customized shopping experiences. He argued there's more great music now then ever before, but there's "a search problem." Rather than act as a loss-leader, the music, he argued, needs to stand on its own. "The industry never learns from its lessons,” he said, and the industry is getting behind “weird business models” like advertising."

So the CD is getting fewer square feet, people are hopefully about CD-burning kiosks and a technology entrepreneur thinks traditional retail is mindlessly spinning its wheels. What did I take away from it? There is no killer app that will bring digital-era shoppers into brick-and-mortar retail, and retailers would rather shift the product mix than use innovation to sell more music. The economics of the CD are its biggest liability. Music offers low margins. How does one succeed with a low-margin product? Volume. How to increase the volume of music sales? If somebody made a convincing argument that answered that question, the panel would have ended the conference on a high note. Alas, the question went unanswered.

Posted by Glenn at 2:27 PM | Link
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A few key themes quickly arose in the Music 2.0 panel Attack of the iPod Killers: Consumer choice, music discovery and the continued strength of Apple products. On the panel were Kevin Nakao from RealNetworks, Jef Holove from Logitech and Pedro Vargas from Sandisk.

The consumers' ability to discover new music is seen as a driver in digital adoption. Nakao stressed consumer choice. "Fundamentally it's about the music. If we can make it easy for people to discover new music, everybody can win, including the artists." To those ends, he argued that the industry needs open ecosystems and platforms.

Mobile is expected to change the digital music landscape. Holove pointed to data that shows while consumer sentiment is fragmented, the MP3 player isn't yet in jeopardy of being phased out due to convergence. The largest minority of those polled, he said, plan to not use the MP3 functions at all. The second-largest minority will use their MP3-enabled mobile phones as a compliment to their MP3 players. These intentions may change, Holove added, as issues such as battery life and capacity change.

The competition, though, is still looking up at Apple. Holove called Microsoft's Zune "interesting" and pointed to the "changing model" offered by the partnership between Rhapsody and Sandisk as proof that viable competition exists.

Posted by Glenn at 11:45 AM | Link
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I'm at the Music 2.0 conference in Los Angeles. Today I moderated a great panel discussion on marketing to Generation Y. Before that I caught a few speakers. One was Larry Kenswil, president of Univeral Music Group's eLabs. I took some loose notes on a notepad -- didn't have the laptop out at the time. (Digital Music News has a report on the first panel of the day, a sour discussion on the new music industry.)

After going through some statistics on digital purchasing and P2P usage, Kenswil got into a few more interesting topics. I was struck by how his comments showed how his comments are so far from public and digirati opinion. One topic was a key theme of the last year or so, DRM. Kenswil framed DRM as more of a non-issue than an issue, a rallying cry from a small minority rather than a concern of Middle America. iTunes users aren't asking for it, he said. "Apple's retail competitors, they're definitely asking for it."

"Subscription is a huge disappointment," Kenswil said flatly of the model that once held much promise -- and still holds promise in the minds of many. There's huge upside, he said, because the lack of ownership results in repeated revenues for content owners as songs are played repeatedly.

On the issue of the MP3 format, Kenswil called for experiments rather than full submersion. "How about testing if first?" he proposed. But he pointed to equipment with no copy controls and the risk of unintended consequences. "There would be no turning back," he said of a jump to MP3, adding that things may go that route but people need to be aware of the results. He threw out a scenario in which a market could be created for second-hand MP3s.

In comparison to the first panel, Kenswil painted a frank yet sometimes opimistic picture of an industry in flux. His comments were pretty much par for the course. There was no inspired vision of the future, but I had the feeling that this Kenswil is open to the change that will come.

Posted by Glenn at 5:16 PM | Link
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I'm not at MIDEM, but I'm keeping watch on the news and notes coming from the annual conference.

The majors' embrace of MP3 will happen within months, reported the Herald Tribune's Victoria Shannon.

"Executives of several technology companies meeting here at Midem, the annual global trade fair for the music industry, said this weekend that a move toward the sale of unrestricted digital files in the MP3 format from at least one of the four major record companies could come within months.

Music executives, while saying that timetable was self-serving on the part of technology companies that would benefit from the change, nevertheless acknowledged that the debate was front and center."

Shannon later adds that some executives say it's not a done deal. The reason for the majors' move to MP3 would be the failure or inability of technology companies to produce copy-protection systems that consumers find agreeable. Going away from DRM, the thinking goes, would shift all risk of copying to the labels.

From paidContent: Chris Stephenson, GM of Zune's global marketing: "Wireless will definitely be part of that roll-out, version two." Also, talking about the importance of Flash drives to Microsoft, Stephenson said, "expect to see a broader range of devices in Q4."

Also from paidContent, a few posts on the ongoing DRM debate. One is a keynote by RealNetworks' Rob Glaser. "For purchases, move away from DRM," he said. Even if DRM is dropped from a la carte purchases, it's not going to disappear from subscription services such as Real's Rhapsody. Analysts and experts predict solid growth for subscription services -- for which DRM is mandatory -- in the coming years.

paidContent also compiled some executives' comments on DRM. The consensus is there is no consensus. Geoff Taylor of the IFPI thinks "DRM will become ubiquitous in a way that is accepted by the consumer." Martin Mills of the Beggars Group thinks non-DRM is a competitive advantage for a label.

The Financial Times's Emiko Terazano has a Day 1 recap.

Posted by Glenn at 6:17 AM | Link
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There was a spirited discussion about entertainment and technology at MIDEM. Three trade association execs -- Gary Shapiro from the Consumer Electronics Association, Mitch Bainwol from the RIAA and Fritz Attaway from the MPAA -- had a sometimes heated discussion on the opening morning of the convention. Each duly defended the interests of its membership.

paidContent has a transcription of a section of the discussion. Here's a snippet:

Bainwol: "Technology is the basis of our future. We have to be able to monetise product and, every time we try, you want to make it available for free so people can buy devices. Gary stretches the concept of fair use to the point where the notion of ‘fair’ has been eliminated. You have to protect the market value. [Gary] wants to morph fair use into a concept that justifies any consumer behavior to the point where you eliminate the value of property. ... Gary takes a concept, morphs it, makes us look like we’re evil."

Shapiro countered: "I don’t make you look evil - your lawsuits against old people around the country make you look evil. You’re very good at paraphrasing things I never said."

Posted by Glenn at 1:46 PM | Link
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iHollywoodForum's Music 2.0 conference will be held on January 31 and February 1 at the Bel Age Hotel in Los Angeles. On the first day of the conference, I will be the moderator for a panel discussion called "Marketing to Gen Y and Beyond." On the panel will be Jennifer Nielson, Marketing Manager at YouTube; Amanda Berman, New Media Manage, Create at EMI; Russ Reiger, General Partner & Co-Founder of Pipeline; Kevin Arnold, CEO of IODA; and Jay Faires, President, Music & Publishing at Lionsgate.

Keynote speeches will be given by Dave Goldberg of Yahoo! Music, Chris Stephenson of Microsoft (Zune), Terry McBride of Nettwerk Productions, Gary Churgin of Harry Fox Agency, Howard Handler of Virgin Mobile USA, and Larry Kwensil of Univeral Music Group's eLabs.

If you plan on attending, drop me a line. Hope to see you there.

Posted by Glenn at 12:41 PM | Link
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• Warner Music Group continues to show its belief in the first-mover advantage. Next licensing deal: muvee, which produces automatic editing software, will enable its users to put WMG videos and tour footage in their homemade movies. muvee charges $39.95 for its software. (Read press release)

• Chicago Tribune music critic Greg Kot got out an article on the Future of Music Summit about a week after it ended. Nice enough piece, but it shows why I tend to groan when music scribes write about business. Kot wrote: "The big labels continue to lose money; record sales are down for the fifth consecutive year." Yes, revenues are down. No, not all labels have a net loss on their financial statements. Another failure of the article: Pointing to a government-subsidized Canadian band (Arcade Fire, in this case) as an example of the kind of mid-level hit that is thought to be the future of the industry. Sorry, but the future will not be subsidized. (Read article at Chicago Tribune)

• EMI announced first-half revenue dropped five percent, but contends its second-half release schedule is strong. (Read press release)

• At least some analysts are bullish on EMI's second-half release schedule. The major is hoping Robbie Williams and Norah Jones hold up a year without a release by Coldplay or Gorillaz. (Read article at This Is Money)

• Kemado Records ends its run with Hollywood, signs with RED Distribution. (Read article highlights at Billboard.biz)

• Billboard's Anthony Bruno wrote about the continued controversy that surrounds digital rights management. (Read article at Reuters)

• The 2006 Global Entertainment and Media Summit (GEMS) is scheduled for December 9 and 10 in New York City. Scheduled guests include MTV co-founder Les Garland and E! Channel co-founder Larry Namer. (More info at the GEMS website)

• RIP Freddy Fender. (Read article at Billboard.com)

Posted by Glenn at 7:46 AM | Link
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No, I'm not in Canada, but I have been digging around to find some reports from this year's Future of Music Summit. (Thus far, there's not much out there, especially in the blogosphere. Last year there was more coverage. Weblogs Inc. actually had a short-lived blog just for the occasion. Move the conference too far from the American Northeast and the coverage disappears?)

The most consistent coverage has come from A&R guy David Fetch for Maisonneuve Magazine. He wrote about David Byrne's "Record Companies: Who Needs Them?" PowerPoint presentation. Fetch said Byrne made a "shoddy case" and his stats were "iffy." The rest of his articles can be accessed here.

Chromewaves Frank's posts have been more about Popkomm than Future of Music. Read his posts from Day One, Day Two and Day Three.

David Byrne squeezed off a post at his blog. Byrne wrote about his PowerPoint presentation (no assessment of his statistics), visiting a McGill research lab with the Arcade Fire and seeing an Under Byen/Joanna Newsom gig.

Posted by Glenn at 7:19 PM | Link
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• Today's Wall Street Journal reveals Google is in talks with YouTube for about $1.6 billion. From a music perspective, there is a lot of potential in a Google purchase of YouTube. (The video angle is obvious: YouTube owns Google Video.) While Google has mastered free email, maps and text ads, it has yet to reach success in entertainment. Though its deep pockets may be tempting, I could imagine labels working with Google to promote their music on MySpace. (Read article at Wall Street Journal)

• The Future of Music Summit in Montreal started yesterday. cleverLazy, Fluxblog, Chromewaves and other bloggers will be there. Check their blogs for comments on the Summit, and check for Future of Music posts at Technorati.

• Partnerships about: Best Buy is the retailer of choice in the Rhapsody/SanDisk partnership and Samsung is working on an online store with MusicNet. Plus, Target is rumored to be working on an online music store. That's it, the market will officiallly be satiated when Target enters. (Read article at Red Herring)

Posted by Glenn at 12:38 PM | Link
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• The anti-DRM train keeps on rollin': PayPlay will offer its catalog of 600,000 tracks as unprotected, 192kpbs MP3 files for $0.88 apiece. Now if they get music people want, they'll really be in business. The company does, though, offer a widget (a la Snocap) that allows users to sell music through the MySpace page, website or bog. (Read press release)

• Sony BMG to license its catalog of music to Russian download sites. Tracks will be available at around $0.60, over a third lower than at the U.S. iTunes. (Read article at MarketWatch)

• The European Union deems labels' commitments on rebates on music royalty payments are legally binding. (Read press release)

• Dates for the 2007 Winter Music Conference were announced. The annual dance music event will be held in Miami from March 20th to 25th. (Read article at ResidentAdvisor.net)

Posted by Glenn at 9:08 AM | Link
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• Interscope's TV on the Radio widget may be the coolest I've seen yet. It has sections for news, audios streams (currently there's only one) and photos.

• Registration is open for the Future of Music Summit taking place in Montreal from October 5-7. David Byrne will give a multimedia presentation (PowerPoint?). The list of panelists is a good and varied one. Among the names are Derek Sivers (CD Baby), Graham Henderson (Canadian Recording Industry Association), Terryl Brown Clemons (NYS Office of the Attorney General), Ryan Schreiber (Pitchfork) and the always humorous Jeff Waye (Ninja Tune/Big Dada).

• Former Replacements singer Paul Westerberg got his picture on the front page of today's Wall Street Journal "Weekend Journal" section. (There's a morning suprise for ya.) Ethan Smith wrote about Westerberg's work on the soundtrack for the Sony animated movie "Open Season." The studio plans to submit the Westerberg-penned, Pete York-sung tune "I Belong" for consideration for the Golden Globes, Academy Awards. Good article. If you want to here samples of the songs, go to the soundtrack page at Lost Highway Records. (Wall Street Journal)

Posted by Glenn at 11:47 PM | Link
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The seventh annual Americana Music Conference will take place September 20th through the 22nd at the Nashville Convention Center. Schedule permitting, I will be there to listen to panels and check out some showcases.

Will you be there? Let me know. Registration information can be found here.

Posted by Glenn at 2:49 PM | Link
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The Bandwidth Conference just finished and there are a few good posts to check out:

• Digital Music News has posts on lowering download prices to halt piracy and what the future music business will look like.
• Joe Gratz blogged much of the conference. Read his posts on a conversation with Nettwerk's Terry McBride, a licensing panel moderated by the EFF's Fred von Lohmann, the obligatory long tail panel hosted by Chris Anderson, a panel on online music pricing and a panel of predictions called The Crystal Ball.
• Ethan Kaplan, Director of Technology for Warner Bros Records, had a few comments about the conference at this Black Rim Glasses blog. Not so long story short: "...the conference was non-stop panels (which SUCK very badly) and was a lot of dogs-chasing-tails."

Posted by Glenn at 12:49 PM | Link
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Hits' recap belittled parts of the NPD seminar and the speech given my NPD's Russ Crupnick. NPD's main argument was that music demand and consumption is up if one looks beyond physical sales (P2P, burning, TV shows, in-store kiosks, etc).

Every year NARM gives awards to the best merchandisers and suppliers. Best retailer of the year in the larger division was none other than the talk of the conference, the on-ship-hold Tower Records. Austin's Waterloo won in the medium division and Denver's Twist & Shout won the small divison.

WEA won best distributor of the year in the large division. RED Distribution won the medium division, and Redeye won the small division.

For labels, the winner of large, medium and small were Rhino, Verve and Sub Pop, respectively.

There were awards given to artists as well. Read the list of winners here.

Other than Tower, this year's hot topic was DRM. The Global Entertainment Retail Association is on the record as supporting NARM's call for compatibility and interoperability.

What came of last year's hot topic, the in-store kiosk? Nobody has figured out how to get it to work. Consumers don't want to burn songs to CD (as Starbucks found out) and who actually thinks consumers will want to buy tracks to transfer to portable devices as long as those files are in a protected format that is incompatible with the iPod?

Posted by Glenn at 11:02 AM | Link
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• MTV.com's James Montgomery got a preview of The Killers' Sam's Town and calls it "incredibly pompadocious," "voluminous," and the band's "bid for artistic legitimacy." (MTV.com, via Stereogum)

• SOHH is back with the rumor that Atlantic may have dropped Fat Joe. (SOHH)

• A guide to this weekend's Pitchfork Music Festival. (Chicagoist, via Information Leafblower)

• Power pop fans take note: Not Lame Recording Company unveiled a new layout last night. Titles are broken down as "New Major Label/Larger Indie," "Reissues," "Indie Power Pop" and "More Indie Power Pop." (Not Lame, via Absolute Power Pop)

• San Francisco won't let dance fans wait 12 months: its Summer Music Conference happens September 27th to October 1st. "Where Music, Media and Technology Intersect" the headline says. (Summer Music Conference, via Danceblogga)

Posted by Glenn at 5:38 PM | Link
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Coolfer has a list of upcoming music and music-related conferences in every weekly new release email (sign up at the top right part of the blog). Here is an updated list that includes conferences for local music, digital music, mobile technology and other fields.

Continue reading "Upcoming Conferences" »

Posted by Glenn at 5:49 PM | Link
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Coolfer is currently in Orlando for the Florida Music Festival. (Full disclosure: Coolfer was sent down here by the festival's organizers to speak on two panels about music and new media). Downtown Orlando is filled with artists and industry people, and in the evening there are live performances going on at over ten venues.

Big 10-4, whose album Testing the Atmosphere was released by Universal on Tuesday, had a headlining show at the festival's main stage last night. The band is all about having fun, as evidenced by this promotion at the band's table. The night before Third Eye Blind (yes, they're still alive) played the big show of the evening. (Coolfer missed it.)

Music highlights thus far: Radio (pictured), a very young four-piece with an affectation for '80s metal; Plain Jane Automobile, a tight, likable band with Coldplay-ish pop sensibilities, solid songwriting and a great rhythm section; and The Heathens, a alt-country (or whatever it's called this year) five-piece with banjo, fiddle and a playful earnestness.

Comments on some panels after the jump.

Continue reading "Florida Music Festival Notes" »

Posted by Glenn at 6:34 PM | Link
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The Florida Music Festival runs May 18th to the 20th, and Coolfer will be in Orlando for the event. I'll be on a panel about music and new media on both Friday and Saturday, and will be at various industry parties and hopefully a lot of showcases.

I'll post from Orlando so check in to see what's going on. If you're going to be there send me an email and say hello.

Posted by Glenn at 1:39 PM | Link
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This month Coolfer will be in Orlando, Florida, to attend the Florida Music Conference. It runs from May 17th to 20th -- I'll be there on the 18th and will speak on a panel about music and new media.

Drop me a line if you'll be there, too.

Posted by Glenn at 2:55 PM | Link
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Increased connectivity is an important ingredient to the growth of digital music. Those in the music industry -- as well as other fields -- should be concered with how Internet policy is developed, and thus may be interested in attending the upcoming F2C: Freedom to Connect conference that will be held on March 3rd and 4th in Silver Springs, Maryland (just outside of D.C.). The list of speakers includes FCC commissioner Michael J. Copps, Congressman Rick Boucher and Ed Felten (Professor of Computer Science and Public Affairs, Princeton University).

(There's a good chance Coolfer will be there on Monday the 3rd)

Posted by Glenn at 7:58 AM | Link
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