Deloitte & Touche's "State of the Media Democracy" Study

As you can see from the chart below, Search Engines and Recommendation were more much more effective than print ads at driving Web site visits. Think about that for a minute. And then think widgets. Syndication and Social Networking as new ways to reach your audience…

Another takeaway from the study was that print simply doesn't deliver the same bang for the buck as digital…

http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?id=1005303&src=article1_newsltr

 

Deezer's New Online Music Jukebox

I just stumbled across yet another Web 2.0 music site called DEEZER (actually not new, it’s Blogmusik redone) and am enjoying my free test drive.  Strangely enough, Google hasn't indexed their website yet, but the URL is www.deezer.com.

According to the website, they claim to offer a  5-in-1 service:

1-LISTEN for FREE to your favorite tracks with no Limitations
2-CREATE your own Playlists
3-DISCOVER new artists with their exclusive SmartPlaylisting
4-UPLOAD all your songs in your unlimited personal storage space and participate to their growing song data base
5-BLOG & SHARE your favorite tracks with your friends

The concept is simple:
-Give consumers a full and free access to all their favorite songs
-Pay artists and their producers through a revenue share based on our advertising revenues
-Help discovering new artists through a wide audience

**  I haven't seen much chatter about this "legal" streaming service, but Universal seems to NOT be happy about it.

I'd love to hear some of your thoughts and feedback of your experience after the weekend!

Ofcom Research Report Gives Dim View of Mobile TV

UK communications industry regulator Ofcom has released new research, Ofcom’s fourth annual Communications Market report, which looks at how new technologies affect consumers' media consumption. According to the report, 38% of mobile users now use their MP3 player less - due to their mobile being able to play music, while 51% use a portable radio, tape or disc player less.  This trend will only continue to grow and the handwriting is on the wall, so mp3 player manufacturers need to wake up and smell the coffee…..

 

But, there's bad news for the mobile operators though when it comes to mobile TV: only 10% of UK consumers are aware they can get it, and only 2% actually do so. In addition, over 50% of adults think mobile TV is "not at all valuable" when prompted.

 

NJ teen unlocks iPhone from AT&T network

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070824/ap_on_hi_te/iphone_unlocked
A 17-year-old hacker named George Hotz of Glen Rock, N.J has broken the lock that ties Apple's iPhone to AT&T's wireless network - freeing the most hyped cell phone ever for use on the networks of other carriers, including overseas ones.  I hope he doesn’t get into any trouble, but apparently there is no U.S. law against unlocking cell phones…

FLASH Grows Up & Adopts H.264 Video

Good news!  The free Adobe Flash Player was upgraded today and it includes support for the widely used industry standard H.264 codec as well as High Efficiency AAC audio support.

 

 

The True Cost of Sound Recording Piracy to the U.S. Economy

Executive Summary Text:

“Piracy” of recorded music costs the U.S. sound recording industries billions of dollars in lost revenue and profits. These losses, however, represent only a fraction of the impact of recorded music piracy on the U.S. economy as a whole. Combining the latest data on worldwide piracy of recorded music with multipliers from a well established U.S. government model, this study concludes that recorded music piracy costs American workers significant losses in jobs and earnings, and government’s substantial lost tax revenue.

 

 “There is little debate that U.S. sound recordings are “pirated” in vast numbers in the U.S. and in international markets. Piracy of these works harms the intellectual property owner, who loses the revenue that would have been gained had the legitimate recording been purchased. These “direct” losses, however, represent only part of the story. Piracy also causes significant and measurable harm to the “upstream” suppliers and “downstream” purchasers who also would have benefited from the sale of legitimate, copyright protected sound recordings. Indeed, the harms that flow from pirate activities produce a cascading effect throughout the economy as a whole. These harms include lost output, lost earnings, lost jobs and lost tax revenues.”

 

Download any MP3 from MySpace

If you’ve ever wanted to download a song from MySpace without stream ripping it, there’s now an easy solution for you called – MySpaceMP3.org.

 

According to the website “MyspaceMP3.org does not host any of the files, it just provides the link to download them.”  I haven’t tried it yet, but I’ll wager that it will become a pretty popular hack, since most MySpace users aren’t going to whip out their wallet for a paid download via SnoCap and the fact that that it will take a while to shut it down since it’s based in Spain….

Universal Music Snubs Apple - Releases DRM-free Music

There's been a lot of chatter lately about Universal's recent decision to offer DRM-Free tracks everywhere online, but I think the biggest flaw in this strategy (besides excluding iTunes) is that it's only an experiment and that it's only for some of the catalogue...The one smart move they did make was not to penalize the consumer for choosing a file that is interoperable...However, I still think the downloading business would grow much faster if mini-albums were bundled in 6 packs for a dollar...

 

Also, whatever happened to the old BMG business model, where you buy

12 physical albums for a penny and then over the course of a year you agree to buy 8 more at regular price?  I think the market is ready for this type of digital offer and Universal should incentivize their consumers to buy more legal music this way...For example, buy 10 downloads for a penny and then buy 5 more for $.99 cents.....?

 

Either approach is a win-win with more sales and satisfied customers......

Microsoft Escapes Patent Infringement

According to the WSJ, it appears that Microsoft has won the appeal for the 1.5 billion in damages in a recent court case with Lucent- Alcatel.  The case involved mp3 royalties related to Windows Media Player and would have been a huge setback to others in the industry who have been paying Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft for the right to use the encoders/decoders.  I was pretty sure sanity would prevail in this case and I’m glad to see the ridiculous decision has been reversed.

Apple iTunes Songs for Free....?

Here’s an interesting new blog all about the evolving business model that gives you free music (i.e. advertising supported).  Apparently from recent filings and public statements, Apple is at least considering jumping into this frothy space…The author, Marc Cohen, does a great job of sharing links to recent research that help fill in the blanks between all the hype…I liked it so much , I just added it to my RSS reader.