Monday, August 6, 2007

snapshot 8/6/07

Nokia, Microsoft to boost mobile entertainment
Cell phone giant Nokia will start to use Microsoft's copy protection software to boost the use of wireless entertainment, like music and videos, the two companies said on Monday. Microsoft's technology allows users of Nokia cell phones to share protected pieces of content -- like music, games or videos -- between phones, PCs and other devices.


Amazon leads investment in music site AmieStreet
AmieStreet, a digital music site that prices songs of new artists according to their popularity, said on Monday that Amazon.com Inc. is leading a first round of investment in the start-up.Started last October by three Brown University graduates, AmieStreet allows musicians to post songs with a variable pricing model, which is different from the one-price model used by Apple Inc.'s popular iTunes Music Store.


EMI says Q1 revenue falls, DRM-free sales encouraging
British music group EMI , which has agreed to a 2.4 billion-pound ($4.9 billion) takeover by private equity firm Terra Firma, said on Monday its first-quarter revenue fell 5.1 percent at constant currencies. EMI said the result was in line with its expectations and the fall in revenue was led by a 13.4 percent drop at its music business, which more than offset an 11.9 percent rise at its music publishing business.

EMI's digital revenue rose 13.2 percent with cost savings coming through on budget. The company said it was seeing "encouraging" early revenue indications from its Digital Rights Management-free products on Apple's iTunes online music store.


Myspace a musical meeting place
The Denver-based band, which plays a sold-out stint at Red Rocks Amphitheatre on Saturday through Monday, now boasts more than half a million MySpace friends. Every day the band adds hundreds, if not thousands, more. Its ability to connect with young, tech-savvy fans through social networking sites like MySpace has made it one of the most successful of the digital age. Besides selling more songs on iTunes than any other, the Fray's hit singles, including "Over My Head (Cable Car)" and "How to Save a Life," have been streamed 53 million times on its MySpace profile, averaging more than a million plays per month.

Models to allow bands (and their fans) to sell music directly from their MySpace profiles, even if the site's retail potential still is unproven. Sites like MySpace are also changing the way the record industry works. Warner Music Group and EMI are developing models to allow bands (and their fans) to sell music directly from their MySpace profiles, even if the site's retail potential still is unproven.


A new contender in content delivery
The so-called content delivery business isn't glamorous, but it's growing fast. Dozens of small companies are vying for a piece of the action and challenging Akamai Technologies Inc., which controls about 60% of the $800-million global market. The torrid growth of video, music and other data-heavy media is straining the Internet's infrastructure -- no surprise to anyone who has suffered through "buffering" messages while trying to watch something online.

Akamai, based in Cambridge, Mass., was an early player in content delivery, launching its first service in 1999. But many competitors have sprung up recently, trying to cash in on a market that research firm IDC predicts will soar nearly threefold in the next four years to $3 billion in sales. EdgeCast set up its own servers in a dozen key locations around the world where numerous phone and cable TV providers -- the companies controlling the last mile of broadband to homes -- have facilities.


Survey says: only DRM-free music is worth paying for
One of the largest surveys of music consumers to closely examine the question of Digital Rights Management (DRM) has an important two-part message for the music industry. The first is that DRM is definitely turning consumers off music sales, and charging them extra to get rid of it may be an uphill battle. The second message is that knowledge of DRM and its problems is spreading fast.

First, the bird's eye view: 68 percent of those with opinions on the matter say that the only music worth purchasing is that which is DRM-free. Yet less than half (39 percent) are willing to pay a little extra for it, while 18 percent say that they'd rather save a little dough and keep the DRM if they had to chose between the two. In the middle is a mass of people with no opinion on the matter, because they're not sure what DRM is or don't know their preference. That will likely soon change.


Creative Teams Up With Hasbro’s Playskool For DRMed Baby Toys
Hasbro and Creative have joined to create a line of digital audio players for the Playskool line of toys for tots. Plans are to integrate digital music into various Playskool toys starting with some sort of tune playing mobile. The product is aimed at Generation X and Y’ers that will be able to customize the music played by downloading songs from the internet.


What’s next for the AppleTV?
Many Apple fans are concerned that the AppleTV has been overshadowed by the introduction of the iPhone and that Jobs once referred to the AppleTV as a “hobby.” There’s little doubt that the speculated numbers of units sold — ranging between 200,000 and 300,000 — seems soft and unimpressive.

But I get the feeling that Apple has not unleashed the full potential of the AppleTV because its ecosystem, like the one developed for the iPod, isn’t fully in place.

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