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50 Cent: Piracy is Part of Marketing

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50 Cent

Say what you will about rapper 50 Cent; the guy understands what’s going on in his industry. Here he is in a CNBC interview praising piracy as part of a musician’s marketing.

Of course, Internet geeks figured that out years ago. With the blessing of this decidedly non-geeky rapper, the marketing function of piracy just crossed the Rubicon from nerdy rebellion to mainstream obviousness.

The RIAA itself plans to stop suing customers for piracy by 2011. If 50 Cent keeps popularizing the idea of piracy as marketing, they may be forced to move up their timetable. Wonder how many major label execs want to shoot him in the face right now.

Originally posted on September 16, 2009 @ 7:35 am

YouTube UK music video ban lifted

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youtube.gifIf you’re in the United States then you won’t have been affected by the six-month ban on YouTube music videos, but British users will be well aware of the wall of silence that’s greeted them every time they’ve tried to play a legitimate music video.

At last, access to premium music clips from major record companies has been granted, thanks to YouTube paying the Performing Rights Society (PRS) an undisclosed sum of money to cover music videos until the year 2012. [Read more…]

Originally posted on September 3, 2009 @ 11:26 am

Microsoft playing catchup with Zune HD App Store?

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zune-hd-appsMicrosoft must be pretty pleased with the latest speculation over its new Zune HD media player, for although companies have to officially denounce any rumors that come out, behind closed doors they’re usually pretty pleased there’s any interest in the next big thing they’re releasing.

It’s something Apple thrives on, and perhaps Microsoft is hoping that the mere mention of an application store for its new PMP will make it more exciting than it is.

OK, so it’s been covered by Engadget without much (if any) MS snark, so it has a reasonable cool factor. [Read more…]

Originally posted on August 24, 2009 @ 12:01 pm

Cyber attack fails to thwart Top 100 DJs online poll

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top-100-djsVoting in this year’s “Top 100 DJs Poll” kicked off this morning despite a Friday night attack which took down DJMag.com’s website for the whole weekend.

Panic over, music lovers now have seven weeks to vote for their five favorite DJs, with the poll closing on 23 September. Over 350,000 voters worldwide cast their votes last year.

Every voter is entitled to a free download from TrackItDown.net, and there’s plenty to choose from in an 800,000-strong catalog from over 18,000 labels.

As an added altruistic incentive, each year the poll results are announced at an event which raises money for a charity.

You can cast your vote at top100djs.net or djmag.com/top100djs

Originally posted on August 3, 2009 @ 7:22 am

Monkey: New contract-free UK mobile music service launches

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Mobile music streaming is set to become even more popular as data rates and all-you-can-eat packages increase and various web-based services find their way to the mobile Internet, so it’s no surprise that UK mobile operator Orange has teamed up with music giant Universal and Channel 4 TV to launch Monkey, a free music service for cellphone users who don’t have a monthly contract.

orange-logoAiming to be a central source of music as well as a social network for sharing playlists and portal offering music news, gossip, exclusive content and competitions, the service is targeting the 16-24 age group.

Orange claims that the service will work on any handset connected to the network. The service is supposed to be simple to operate — users are presented with a choice of eight preset playlists (such as R&B, rock, pop, chart), and it’s also possible to set up eight personalized playlists which can then be shared. [Read more…]

Originally posted on July 29, 2009 @ 8:44 am