snapshot 2/28/08

Facebook Adds Music & Film Launch Pages
Facebook has just launched two new "Pages" for music and film designed to lure more musician and film makers and ease the way for them. The new templates include applications specifically designed for music and film like a review app, tour dates app, the ability to sell tickets and merch, a Flash player, music player and co-branded Facebook applications from sites like Fandango and iLike.


Mobile Music On $17.5B Track Despite Ringtone Decline
The global mobile music market is expected to rise to more than $17.5 billion by 2012, driven by subscription music services and full-track downloads, according to a new report by Juniper Research. “I think it’s fair to say that 2007 marked the tipping point as far as mobile music adoption was concerned," says report author Dr Windsor Holden. "Far more subscribers began downloading and subscribing to music content in developed markets, and it must be said that that the publicity surrounding the iPhone launch undoubtedly contributed to consumer awareness of mobile music services per se.”


Apologize' by OneRepublic Only the Second Song to Pass the 3,000,000 Mark in Downloads
The 3rd hit single from Timbaland's platinum album, Shock Value, as well as the first single from their own album, Dreaming Out Loud, OneRepublic's "Apologize" has become only the second song in history to score 3,000,000 digital song downloads, following "Crank That (Soulja Boy)" from Soulja Boy Tell'em earlier this year. The Timbaland mix of the first single from OneRepublic's debut album, Dreaming Out Loud (Mosley Music Group/Interscope Records), officially surpassed the milestone the week ending February 17 (Billboard issue date of March 1), according to SoundScan.


Digital Percentages Accelerating Rapidly at Majors
Major labels want their digital percentages to rise. But recent figures from top-level executives suggest that digital percentages are starting to accelerate at an uncomfortable rate. At the Digital Music Forum in New York this week, a pair of helpful figures emerged. Ted Mico, head of Digital at Island Geffen A&M, revealed a digital revenue percentage of 40 percent. And Thomas Hesse, president of Global Digital Business & US Sales at Sony BMG, shared a global digital percentage of between 35 and 40 percent. Both figures cover online and mobile sales.


Universal Buys Univision Music
Universal Music Group has purchased Univision Music Group, which includes Univision’s music recording and publishing division. The buyout gives Universal a commanding lead in the Latin marketplace in North America, but is subject to regulatory approval.

Univision Music Group is the largest Latin label in the US and includes Univision Records, Fonovisa Records, Disa Records and La Calle with close to a 40% marketshare according to Nielsen Soundscan’s year-end numbers for 2007. In turn, Universal’s Latin labels, Universal Music Latino and Machete, have a combined 14% marketshare. Their combined numbers will have Universal controlling half of the Latin music landscape in the United States. Univision’s holdings also include Univision Music Mexico and Univision Music Publishing.