Boing Boing posted a story about Wal-Mart ending its use of DRM wrappers on its MP3 download service and how, for its customers, there is now the inconvenience of backing up those MP3s by burning them to disc. If the files are not saved that way they will no longer be available via the Wal-Mart [...]
I’m not one to promote the iTunes store but when a Northwest indie label not only succeeds and stays in business while getting to be 20 years old it feels good to be a supporter. And for those of you who haven’t got a CD shelf or computer full of Sub Pop artists’ tunes now [...]
I am not sure I enjoy a mystery revealed. Here’s the story - “Anonymous musician Podington Bear made his musical den on the internet in the beginning of 2007, announcing he intended to write, record and release three songs a week, via podcast and blog. 156 songs total. During this campaign Podington Bear was spotlighted [...]
Starting today, Rhapsody launches a new DRM-free, MP3 downloading service and they’ve also partnered with iLike, MTV Networks and Yahoo. The new service obviously challenges Apple’s iTunes service as Apple sticks to its allegiance to DRM on behalf of the record companies. And given that you can preview an entire MP3 file before you buy [...]
Radiohead continue their release onslaught, seemingly determined to bring us everything-head that we might possibly need. I look forward to Radiohead tea coseys. The news today is that we can now purchase, via iTunes, a slew of videos from the In Rainbows sessions brought to us by Nigel Godrich, the producer who works with the [...]
No it doesn’t…
June has almost gone and I haven’t had time to get through all the promo MP3s in the in box yet. The incoming music plugs have remained constant and mostly the quality is very high. Although I have mentioned this many times, I’d like to reiterate - I prefer electronic submissions. I have [...]
Help me with my math! I gave a talk yesterday at U of O, as I mention in the last post, and one of my slides was about how as of March 08 iTunes had sold 170 million iPods according to Wikipedia. As of last September Apple said it had sold 2 billion songs. Apple [...]
Portland band, Hockey, prepare to blast the Bay Area
As we noted in the Wal-Mart/Handelman story below, music sales are still in decline and haven’t quite found the bottom yet. Meanwhile retailers are getting creative at least. Insound.com is an online music retailer that focuses on alternative music mostly, if not exclusively, but I admit I [...]