Cincinnati artist Kim Taylor just put out her latest full length, Little Miracle (and I mean “just”).  It’s digital only at this time (but DRM free)… pick it up via her Nimbit store at http://kim-taylor.net/…

I’ll be picking it up tonight when I get home… and you know what this means?  My Top 25 for 2009 is not done (crap – I just finished it yesterday).  Eh, it just means my current #25 (U2’s No Line on the Horizon) is very likely getting bumped.

Support indie music!  With Kim Taylor, you can’t go wrong!  Srsly.

~Dan – np: SF Jazz Collective – 2009 

Way Out West’s lastes single ‘Future Perfect’ is available DRM free via their website – Read the story on M12N  in full here…

I am seriously behind on reviewing the P&P fic I’ve read lately. A new post with lots of reviews is coming soon — these blasted holidays are interfering with my multitude of side projects.

But I am getting off the hook easy here. I got a dear friend of mine hooked on P&P and Jane Austen fan fiction and she has been reviewing what she’s read too. Being an organized, rational creature, she has made this fantastic spreadsheet that includes her own reviews (on a scale of 1-5, like mine). If I also reviewed the story, her chart also includes my rating for comparison.

So, without further ado, I present the guest reviewer’s JAFF Matrix. I hope you enjoy her valuable reviews of these stories.

Click to Enter the JAFF Matrix

Many moons ago, Apple announced to the cheering masses that iTunes should now be freed by and large of the ridiculous DRM which hinders legal and illegal users of content alike.

A new study reveals that Apple mobile product users actually have been trained by the App Store or other means to pay for more media than others do.

OK, so isn’t this contradictory? Surely DRM free will mean less overall payment for media since more devices of multiple-owning, and hardcore purchasing, Apple fans will use the media available? Well, yes.

Of course, this is saying that Apple iTunes and mobile device users are happy to pay for data. Not so. I believe that – as an owner myself – it is possible that the torture cell of paying is what’s going on here and that less payment means even more willing users, even if those users were resigned to paying in the first place.

SKY has launched a beta website for their brand-new music-subscription service which allows DRM-free song downloads and streaming for all UK and Irish music lovers. In case you’re wondering, the DRM-free songs offered are truly DRM-free, untethered as the day they were digitally born (or made, if you will). For a simple fee every month, subscribers get a certain number of DRM-free songs to download, as well as unlimited streaming of music on the Sky music website. So far, as usual, only the pro-digital Universal Music Group has jumped right in with the utmost of enthusiasm.

While Sky assures that there are ‘talks’ for other labels to come onboard, I can assure you that it’s not going to happen anytime soon. If Sony, Warner and EMI are not already laughing at UMG for their overzealousness for such digital projects, then they are definitely bidding their time, waiting in line to see if UMG’s throat gets cut first, and when. These three giant labels are more concerned about profits first, and not about paving the way to building new digital business models.

Or maybe they are actually concerned about the latter, but in any case, they still have naught to show for it.

As of 12 October 2009, all four major labels have come onboard with offerings from their catalogue, making SKY a true model of the new digital music business. Wonderful news!

Sky, a self-proclaimed ‘communications’ corporation, has implemented a sleek look for their beta music site, which can be found here. Simple, elegant, and easy to use, Songs.Sky.Com has all the offerings from UMG’s huge catalogue, which consists of jazz great classics from the VERVE and ECM catalogues, hip-hop gems from the Def Jam catalogue, and of course chart-topping hits from pop and rock acts like the Black Eyed Peas, the soon-defunct Pussycat Dolls, Mariah Carey, No Doubt, Pixie Lott, Snow Patrol, Hoobastank, Keane and much more.

Mike Darcey, COO of BSkyB, sums it up, “We aim to offer an easy and affordable service for all UK music fans, while ensuring that artists are properly rewarded for their creativity.” While it has yet to be proven that digital profits from such straight-to-the-label tie-ups will blow through the roof anytime soon, it is heartening to see that a certain digital music business model is taking shape all over the world. To sum it up:

And there you have it: the new digital music business model of the 21^st-century:

This guide is going to show you how to remove DRM from iTunes music, convert DRM protected iTunes M4P to MP3 and sync iTunes music to HTC Touch Pro. First, let’s take a look at the multimedia support of HTC Touch Pro:

Video Playback: Windows Media Player
Music Player: MP3, AAC, AAC+, WMA, WAV, Windows Media Player

So, if you want to play iTunes M4P, M4A, AAC music on your HTC Touch Pro, you just need to use TuneClone Audio Converter to help you convert the iTunes music to HTC Touch Pro compatible format and then transfer the output files to your HTC Touch Pro.

Now let’s take a look at how it performs to convert the iTunes music to HTC Touch Pro compatible format using TuneClone Audio Converter:

1. Create a new playlist in iTunes.

2. Add the iTunes songs to the playlist.

3. Launch TuneClone Audio Converter. Click the “Settings” tab. In the pop-up window, you can specify output folder, output file name format, output format, etc for the output files. Note: You can check whether TuneClone virtual CD drive is successfully installed and where it is installed at the bottom left corner of the interface.

4. Switch to iTunes. In iTunes, select the playlist you just created and click the “Burn Disc” button.

5. In the pop-up window of “Burn Settings”, select “TuneClon Virtual_CD-RW” from the “CD Burner” drop-down list, click the radio button next to “Audio CD” and tick “Include CD Text” option. Click “Burn” to start burning.

6. Upon the completion of burning the disc and encoding the music, you can open the TuneClone manager screen to show all the converted music files. To locate the output folder, simply click the “Folder” tab on the interface.

After you get the output music files, connect your HTC Touch HD or Touch Pro to computer via the USB cable, darg and drop the converted music to the music folder, then you can play the iTunes M4P music on your HTC Touch HD, Touch Pro at ease.

Extracted from http://www.tuneclone.com/play-itunes-m4p-on-htc-touch-pro.php

One of these days, I am seriously going to kick my addiction to Pride & Prejudice spin-offs. At least, I should to read at least one non-P&P book in between each of these P&P books. I’m trying, really. In the meantime, here are my thoughts on the recent P&P fic I’ve read, most of which are available for free online.

Novels

Of Time Gone By by Bekah — 4.25 stars out of 5

A childhood illness renders Darcy deaf. Though still raised as a gentleman and the Master of Pemberley, he faces many obstacles and prejudices. When Elizabeth Bennet comes into his life, both must decide their future. A very interesting take on how the characters would react under very different circumstances. Well-written, but perhaps a bit too long.

Overhearings More to the Purpose by Sharni — 4 stars out of 5

What if Elizabeth never heard Darcy’s comments that she was only tolerable, and instead heard that he admired her fine eyes? Though she is given the chance to view Darcy’s actions from a different perspective, the two continue to misunderstand each other. A really cute love story with a lot of text from the original P&P and just a few annoying flaws (such as the repeated use of “effected” instead of “affected” — I hate to be a grammar snob, but I find that one particularly disturbing).

Assumed Engagement by Kara Louise — 3.75 stars out of 5

A carriage accident puts Darcy in a coma on his way back to Pemberley after his ill-fated Hunsford proposal. Georgiana, to whom Darcy had written his intentions, assumes Elizabeth must have accepted the proposal. She therefore invites Elizabeth to Pemberley, hoping her presence might stir Darcy into consciousness, and Mrs. Bennet all but forces Elizabeth and Jane to go. A nice story about courtship, but I was put off by a few incorrect Regency references and some clunky writing.

Note: A reader of this blog let me know that, as I mentioned in my last post, you can get this book as a DRM-free PDF at Lulu.

Short Story

Crossed in Love by Catie (requires membership to message board) — 4.5 stars out of 5

Jane, fed up with Miss Bingley’s snub in London, decides to travel to Hunsford to join Elizabeth for the final week of her visit with Charlotte. She arrives just in time to hear Elizabeth’s information about Darcy’s interference in Bingley’s love life and, as Elizabeth remains upstairs with a headache, confronts Darcy when he arrives to propose at Hunsford. This well-written story is told from Jane’s perspective and provides a very interesting take on her character and how the Elizabeth’s actions are viewed by others. (Note: A long short shory — almost novella length.)

I have made my feelings clear on DRM before (see end of this post), but sometimes buying a DRMed book seems unavoidable. If you’re an ebook fan, you’re just not used to waiting to get a book in the mail and may even be prone to papercuts (not me! Someone I know — a friend. Really!). So, even I often buy a DRMed ebook on Amazon, Fictionwise, or some other site rather than getting the in-print version.

But I recently purchased a bunch of books from Amazon before realizing that, before being released on Amazon, the books were self-published on Lulu.com. Since the publishing industry is changing, and a lot of publishers are less likely to take a risk on a book that has no demonstrated market, a decent number of books are being self-published before being picked up by bigger publishers. What is the benefit to the ebook market? Well, ebooks on Lulu are DRM-free PDFs! I just convert them with Stanza and I have an awesome ebook that I don’t have to worry about losing when I upgrade my device.

I also was also pleased to learn that another recent ebook purchase from Webscription.net was DRM-free. The site has a good selection of sci-fi and speculative fiction and is definitely worth a visit.

So remember kids, if you’re anti-DRM, vote with your wallet (or stored credit card number, as the case may be) and buy DRM-free!!

This Saturday, August 29th, Mark Coker will guest on the “Book Publishing Rocks!” segment of my radio show “Cover to Cover” on wnzf.com at 11:30 AM Eastern.

Mark is the founder and president of Smashwords, Inc. And, in case you’re not familiar with Smashwords, here’s how Mark describes it on his web site:

Smashwords is a publishing platform, online bookstore and ebook distributor for indepedent ebook authors, publishers and readers. We offer multi-format, DRM-free ebooks, ready for immediate sampling and purchase, and readable on any e-reading device.

For readers, Smashwords provides an opportunity to discover new voices in all categories and genres of the written word. For registered members, the site offers useful tools for search, discovery and personal library-building, and each week we add new features based on feedback from Smashwords members.

So, I am excited about having Mark on the show this Saturday and look forward to asking him lots of questions of interest to my listeners who are authors, publishers, and others interested in the exciting world of books.

Join us Saturday morning, August 29th, at 11:30 ET/8:30 PT on www.wnzf.com.

Rockol questa mattina pubblica un articolo nel quale citando fonti Nokia, afferma che da parte del colosso finlandese non vi è nessuna intenzione di abbandonare il DRM nel servizio “Comes with music”. L’articolo completo è disponibile a questo indirizzo.

vodafone

• Vodafone España se convierte en la primera operadora en ofrecer a sus clientes canciones sin DRM con una oferta de más de 500.000 temas. De esta forma, podrán descargarse las canciones en el móvil y transferirlas a cualquier dispositivo: reproductores de MP3, CD, PC…

• Durante el fin de semana del 19 al 21 de junio, los clientes de Vodafone podrán descargarse, de forma gratuita hasta 10 canciones sin DRM; con esta iniciativa Vodafone apoya el Día Europeo de la Música.

Vodafone España es la primera operadora en lanzar una oferta para la compra de canciones con el modelo DRM Free. A partir de hoy, los clientes de Vodafone tienen a su disposición una oferta de más de 500.000 canciones que podrán descargar sin DRM en sus teléfonos móviles y pasárselas a todo tipo de dispositivos como reproductores de MP3, CD, PC… por el mismo precio que actualmente*.

Universal Music, Sony Music Entertainment, EMI Music y la mayoría de las compañías independientes participan en esta iniciativa para ofrecer sus contenidos musicales sin DRM.

La oferta inicial de 500.000 canciones se incrementará durante los próximos meses hasta incluir el catálogo completo de música de Vodafone, con más de dos millones de canciones.

Vodafone hace coincidir este lanzamiento con el Día Europeo de la Música, y ofrece 10 canciones DRM Free en formato MP3 a todos sus clientes de forma gratuita, desde el viernes 19 de Junio hasta el domingo 21. Podrán disfrutar de artistas como La oreja de Van Gogh, El canto del loco, Beyoncé, La Quinta Estación, Eros Ramazzotti, Amaia Montero, etc. Para descargárselas sólo tendrán que acceder a Vodafone live! o a Vodafone Music desde su teléfono móvil.

Un nuevo modelo de negocio para revolucionar el mundo de la música

Vodafone España ya anunció el pasado mes de abril su apuesta por revolucionar el mundo de la música con “Música Sin Límites” y se convirtió también en la primera operadora de España en incluir la música en una Tarifa Plana de Internet en el móvil: por 12 euros al mes y sin límites de tiempo ni conexión los clientes pueden disfrutar de la música para siempre y sin coste adicional, mientras se encuentren dados de alta en la misma y se la descarguen a través de Vodafone Music.

La tarifa Plana de Internet en el móvil que incluye toda la música por 12€ es válida para los clientes actuales y para aquellos que la contraten hasta el 30 de septiembre. Los clientes que contraten dicha tarifa disfrutarán de la misma para siempre.

Vodafone Music es una aplicación exclusiva desarrollada por RealNetworks, socio tecnológico estratégico de Vodafone, pionero en la implantación de los servicios de streaming en el mercado americano con su plataforma Rhapsody. Esta aplicación permite acceder a la música directamente desde el menú del teléfono, buscar de forma rápida y sencilla las canciones, acceder al catálogo de 1 millón de temas, bajarse álbumes completos, crear de playlists…

Vodafone y el compromiso por la música

Desde que en 2002 Vodafone anunciara el lanzamiento de los servicios de Vodafone live!, la operadora no ha dejado de innovar y demostrar su compromiso con la música. Algunos de los hitos que han marcado el desarrollo de estos servicios a lo largo de los últimos años han sido el lanzamiento de las primeras descargas de Canciones MP3, la exclusiva del primer álbum musical a través de Vodafone live! o la presentación de Vodafone Music Player en 2008, la primera aplicación de música para el PC que permitió descargar canciones mp3 y disfrutarlas simultáneamente en el móvil y en el ordenador.

NOTAS AL EDITOR:

* El precio por descarga es de 1,5€ por canción

TARIFA PLANA INTERNET

• El cliente puede dar de alta la tarifa plana Internet en el móvil a través de:

El portal Vodafone live! en su móvil: Vodafone live!→ Inicio →Mi Vodafone live!

La página Web www.vodafone.es/tarifaplana

Llamando gratis al 123

Enviando TP al 22521

Asimismo, podrá darse de baja en cualquier momento sin que suponga un coste adicional. Para darse de baja el cliente procederá de la misma forma que para darse de alta.

VODAFONE MUSIC

• La aplicación Vodafone Music se puede descargar:

En el portal Vodafone live!: Vodafone live!→ Música →Canciones MP3

En la página Web www.vodafone.es/tarifaplana también en esta página se pueden consultar los teléfonos compatibles.

Enviando MUSICA al 22521

Dopo iTunes, Amazon e diversi altri canali digitali, anche Nokia Music si appresta a levare il “lucchetto” DRM (Digital Rights Management) dal proprio catalogo entro l’inizio del prossimo 2010.

Al momento gli utenti che acquistano tramite Nokia Music Store non possono riprodurre la canzone su altri supporti (iPod o similari) e possono essere masterizzati un numero limitato di CD. Alcuni reports che arrivano da Mobile Entertainment citano inoltre che oltre il 60% degli utenti che in Inghilterra che hanno acquistato un 5180 “Comes With Music”, hanno attivato il servizio di musica illimitata (musica gratis per 12 mesi). Tale percentuale è inoltre superiore in Messico dove ben il 70% dell’utenza ha attivato il servizio “Comes with music”.

This is in the public domain.

My company, Universal Music have partnered with Virgin Media in the UK to provide an unlimited download service. The service will enable customers of Virgin Media broadband to stream and download as many music tracks and albums as they want from Universal Music’s entire catalogue.

Wow.

All in return for a monthly subscription fee to the service reported to be between £10-15 a month. There will also be a lower priced scheme for those not wanting unlimited access.

Now you are probably wondering what happens to your access if you unsubscribe? Well, the music is yours. As it is DRM free you can play it on most media players. Unlike Nokia’s Comes With Music service the music is not tethered to a specific device.

Press released the day before the government shares it’s Digital Britain report, the plan will combat illegal file sharing on the ISP who will also take measures with customers illegally downloading by suspending their service or adding ’speed humps’ to their usage.

Okay, people can get most stuff for free anyhow and this may not be enough to deter the most hardened of downloaders but this is a viable and cost friendly alternative and certainly a reason to join Virgin Media on this global first.

The service launches later this year. Where do I sign?

Lately I have been on a new music buying kick. I can’t seem to stop! With the iTunes store mainly DRM-free and all the instant gratification, I can’t help myself. It seems I’m constantly surrounded by brilliant music. It occurs to me that this is a stark contrast to the copious silence I enjoyed in past years…

As I was pondering my sudden urge to consume — I couldn’t help but ask where that urge was hiding before. Cause it really retreated for a while. I really didn’t feel like hanging around a record store, or scouring the interwebs… I didn’t even really turn on my stereo much. Normally, this would be my default state: tunes blasting, always finding something new and tasty. Gorging myself on fresh tunes. It’s almost like I went on an accidental music diet. I wanted silence, silence and more silence.

Maybe it’s because I had mixyhead a lot. This is what my BFF Keith G calls the state of mind that follows a long and arduous mixing session. It’s kind of a weird aural soup, sort of a heightened ear sensitivity or insensitivity with lots of musical phrases jangling around your head. Senses buzzing. Usually I can’t sleep in this state. I don’t think Keith can either. Normally I find the cure is silence… So it stands to reason that I didn’t want to binge.

I’ve also considered another factor. Composing and producing music: maybe I need silence to receive the music in my head? Sometimes the ideas come in the strangest place. It’s rarely convenient. In the shower, in bed, out for a walk in the forest… It’s often when I’m spacing out that a little phrase, or a little nugget, will spark my imagination. When listening to the radio, it seems my head is full of someone else’s nuggets.

If I’m really honest,could it be even more subtle than that? Maybe I don’t want to compare. Maybe my Artist Goblins will come out to play if I hear something that truly blows me away. Maybe I will worry too much about how I fit into the landscape. Is it trendy? Is it cool? Does it sound current and hot?

Truth be told, I’ve usually found these thoughts to have the opposite effect than what I desire. I start to feel like I’m suffocating, boxed in by the pressure to be cool. Trying to be cool isn’t cool. Cool is as cool is. They say you either follow trends, or you make them. I suspect most of the trend-setters I admire didn’t give a rat’s ass about trends. I very much doubt they were sitting around with their calculator, calibrating all their flavours of awesomeness to make something so fresh and hot that people hailed it as “seminal” or “groundbreaking”.

I dunno. Maybe that is naive. Idealistic. Maybe they did have a calculator.

My only salvation from the Goblins seems to be to ignore the trends altogether and go hang out in a land where the only comparison is what I’ve done before. Is this better than before? If yes, then proceed. Any other comparing is mere foolishness. Let someone else do that for you.

This isn’t to say that I think I’m breaking any ground this way. I just need some silence — in my mind.

Also, this isn’t to say that artists aren’t all inspired by each other. I don’t write in a vacuum. I try not to be self-centered. I do pay attention. I ask people what they think. I just try not to be anybody else — no matter how much I would like to be. I have to build on the strengths I have and work with what I’ve got. See where the chips fall. Let it go.

This being said, I don’t think I’ll ever really answer the question of why I went on an accidental music diet. I didn’t even notice until I started getting mystery music cravings again lately, so the real cause may always evade me.

Thankfully, right now, I am all about everybody else’s nuggets. My ears can relax. And it’s really sincerely delicious.

Jarvis Cocker comes back with a rock album ‘Further Complications ‘. He was a boy with the weird nose and the big glasses back in High School but he believed in his individuality. Jarvis Cocker wrote songs about short skirts, dance moves, sexual espionage and the abject glamour of drug consumption. “Common People,” the song about a rich Greek student, who could learn about the real life in England, became an international hit. Cocker sang about all types of creepies and crawlies, applying himself to songs about the trees that make our oxygen, species, natural selection and genetics, and the little bird singing in the garden.

Before Jarvis Cocker came back, he moved to Paris, got married, became a father, and grew a beard. In his new album, between the noise-pieces, he sings wonderful tearjerkers such as , “I Never Said I Was Deep”. In other sections, scratchy wind sections and contorted guitars account for an overall atmosphere similar to that of the sort of smoky club where you would never hear a Pulp (previous Jarvis band) album played. He is still interested more than anything in lonely mothers and disco dancing. The fact that he is now married only serves to make his songs of seduction more delicate – if not the stuff itself. In “Fuckingsong ,” he lewdly suggests listening to his songs, because in real life he is never so punctual, dependable and persevering.

Buy Jarvis Cocker’s music here

The new plan, which goes live tonight, undercuts just about anything that doesn’t involve BitTorrent.

Five bucks a month nets you streaming access to Napster’s 7-million-deep music library as well as five DRM-free MP3s.

Full Story at Gizmodo

Next Wednesday the BBC is hosting a conference entitled “Combating Piracy In The Digital Age.“:

On 6 May the BBC is hosting a conference, bringing together people from across a wide range of creative industries to examine common approaches to combating online piracy.

Rt Hon David Lammy MP, Minister of State for Higher Education and Intellectual Property, will make a keynote address. Media analyst Mathew Horsman will present the latest analysis of how piracy is affecting music, TV, film and other sectors including computer games, business software and publishing. Senior figures from these industries will discuss the right legal approach to tackling piracy; the role that media literacy and consumer education might play; and how new business models could create attractive legal alternatives to what the pirates offer.

I will be going along and I am hoping it will prove to be a productive conference.

My vision and advice for the industry:

- The content producers in a digital media world have lost their ability to guarantee the uniqueness of their content.
Content owners have sought to lock their content down with Digital Rights Management (DRM) techniques. These DRM techniques have imposed much greater restrictions on content reproduction and distribution than those present in a non-DRM world. This has led to a desire for those who wish to have their content as free as possible to seek to circumvent these DRM techniques. The past ten years, since the introduction of the DMCA act in the United States in 1998, has seen a clash of cultures between those who believe that content owners have a right to manage the distribution of their product and those who believe that this content is part of culture and should be freely available. The advent of faster network access, improved coding techniques, more powerful computers, new protocols allowing for decentralised, distributed digital media delivery architecture, the rise of Open Source computing and the convergence of consumer media products has created seismic shifts in the digital media landscape. This has resulted in content producers starting to look at distributing their content DRM-free – but without having an alternative system which allows them to maintain some control they recognise that they are in a business model which is doomed to extinction.

- The infrastructure owners, the people delivering digital media content, have no incentive to deliver unique content.
Online delivery methods have developed which are decentralised and open. These have facilitated the free sharing of digital media – where the marginal cost of copying is almost zero. This has resulted in more people wanting greater infrastructure access, faster broadband, uncapped limits, etc. The infrastructure owners have benefited from non-interference in the traffic flowing across their network. Hence there is no gain for them, at the moment, in having one digital copy more valuable than another. They also have no desire to do the content owners job for them. The infrastructure owners recognise that the content producers have painted themselves into a corner with their doomed policies on DRM. They also recognise that by adopting the “do nothing” approach they can continue to benefit from the explosion in digital media content without having to get directly involved in negotiating access to it. There is a lack of trust on both sides. There have been efforts by both sides to legislate and sue the other into compliance. Neither side is enamoured with the other at the moment.

- The key is to develop a Digital Media Exchange to put trust back into the ecosystem and give both content producers and infrastructure owners the benefits of a unique digital media product.

This will require the will of the content producers to try something different – which they are more than willing to do at the moment – and a big carrot for the infrastructure owners. This we can give them as there are a lot of complementary services they could develop, which is what they will need in their competitive market where margins are low and churn rate is high.

The plan would be to digitally watermark content as it enters the Digital Media Exchange to allow for a unique identifier to be attributed to each piece of content. The content will also be in the highest quality format. You can then implement a system which will allow the people who wish to have access to this content – primarily focusing on businesses wishing to sell advertising (and using the content as a vehicle) to begin with – to specify what format they wish to get this in and how they wish to place their logos/messages on the audio/video.

The advantage this gives to the content owner is that they now have a unique product which can be redistributed in multiple format but always with a unique identifier and so therefore with a full audit trail. The advantage to the infrastructure owner is that by having access to a legitimate source of content they can build services around this which they can use to differentiate their offering from their competitors. The advantage to the advertiser is they get access to a whole new world of legitimate content – an untapped market which the content producer now can bring their product to, thus delivering them another benefit.

The input of digital media is the advantage for the content producer. All they need to provide is one high quality copy of the product with appropriate descriptions of the content. After that the system within the Digital Media Exchange assigns the appropriate coding to the file to indicate who it originated from and when and then proceeds to transcode multiple copies in multiple formats – each with its own unique code to identify it.

Within a Digital Media Exchange advertisers can choose the individual files, categories, user profiles, genres, etc. they wish to market to and upload appropriate branding to go with the formats and different market segments can get the same content with different branding, also diffent market regions can get different products targetted at the same demographic.

The digital media buyer can browse the Digital Media Exchange online and choose both file format and branding they would like on their output. If they would like to brand the file with their own specific identity then that facility also exists. So they can have the choice of:

This leads to a world where content producers and broadcasters stop thinking in terms of units sold or ratings achieved and more in terms of relationships formed.

Content producers target specific broadcasters for their market reach. Broadcasters deliver specific content to specific channels for specific market segments. People become fans of certain programmes/genres and they place a certain value on a programme based on the channel they receive it. These are the relationships that exist already between the various parties in the entertainment chain. These relationships get measured currently by specific metrics and these metrics give a value to a distribution chain.

By allowing users to store content centrally, the broadcaster becoming the facilitator of access to that content and the content producer being the primary source for renewal or upgrading of that content then you begin to build a new ecosystem that allows digital files to become unique as they begin to have a value that comes from the relationships.

This may not be to everyone’s liking – or people may want more immediate results – but if you begin to accept the realities of digital distribution then you recognise the need to think and act differently!

Frank Sinatra was an American singer and actor. Sinatra became a successful solo artist in the early to mid-1940s, being the idol of the teenage girls. His career declines in 50s but reborn in 1954 after he won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. He signed with Capitol Records and released several critically lauded albums such as’In the wee small hours‘, ‘Songs for swingin’, ‘Come fly with me‘and others.

Sinatra attempted to weather the changing tastes in popular music, but with sales of his music dwindling, and after appearing in several poorly received films, he retired in 1971. Coming out of retirement in 1973, he recorded several albums, scored a hit with “(Theme From) New York, New York” in 1980, and toured both within the United States and internationally until a few years before his death in 1998. He is also a winner of the eleven Grammy awards.

Download Frank Sinatra’s music here

Coldplay is British alternative rock band formed in London, in 1998. The band sold 50 million records worldwide and are best know for their hits like “Yellow”, “The scientist“, “Clocks“, “Speed of sound“, “Fix you” and “Viva la Vida“.

Coldplay achieved worldwide fame with the release of their single “Yellow”, followed by their debut album, ‘Parachutes’ (2000), which was nominated for the Mercury Prize. Its follow-up, ‘A Rush of Blood to the Head’ (2002), won multiple awards such as NME’s Album of the Year.

Coldplay’s musical style has been defined as alternative rock, being compared to Jeff Buckley and Oasis. Lead singer/songwriter Chris Martin once labeled the band’s music as “limestone rock”. The band’s music has been called “meditative” and “blue romantic”; it “[reflects] on their emotions” and Martin “endlessly examines his feelings”. Martin’s lyrical wordplay has been called feminist, similar to Andrew Montgomery of Geneva.

Buy Coldplay music here

Elbow is a Brit Award and Mercury Prize winning English alternative rock band formed in 1990s. Elbow have received vast critical acclaim and been endorsed by major artists Radiohead, Coldplay, Blur, R.E.M. and U2.

BBC about the album ‘The seldom seen kid’ (2008): ‘For everyone who likes to be moved, relaxed, and cheered by superior, soulful Mancunian lullabies, The Seldom Seen Kid is essential.’

NME: ‘Elbow remains one of the more interesting outfits to originate from Manchester in recent years.’

Elbow is also nominated for Ivor Novello Awards that takes place at Grosvenor House, on 21st of May.

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