snapshot 6/27/08

Napster faces proxy battle from three shareholders
Three shareholders of digital music service Napster Inc are seeking election to the board, saying current management had not been aggressive enough in battling rival Apple Inc and Internet piracy.

Perry Rod, Thomas Sailors and Kavan Singh are preparing an independent proxy after their May 21 application to Napster's board for nomination was rejected on June 13, according to a regulatory filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday.


Blockbusters stomp on the long tail, Harvard study finds
Meanwhile, our research also showed that success is concentrated in ever fewer best-selling titles at the head of the distribution curve. From 2000 to 2005 the number of titles in the top 10 percent of weekly sales dropped by more than 50 percent--an increase in concentration that is common in winner-take-all markets. The importance of individual best sellers is not diminishing over time. It is growing....

Is most of the business in the long tail being generated by a bunch of iconoclasts determined to march to different drummers? The answer is a definite no. My results show that a large number of customers occasionally select obscure offerings that, given their consumption rank and the average assortment size of offline retailers, are probably not available in brick-and-mortar stores. Meanwhile, consumers of the most obscure content are also buying the hits. Although they choose products of widely varying popularity, top titles generally form the largest share of their choices. (The wide appeal of these top titles is, of course, what makes them popular in the first place.)


B&W Music Club
The B&W Music Club is a subscription based service which provides its members with an exclusive album every month in Apple Lossless Compression. The idea is simple, record the album in one of the most advanced recording studio around and distribute it in a lossless format so that you can hear the music as it was intended. A yearly subscription will run you around $67 which is about $5.50 an album which isn't bad considering the quality you'll be getting.