Myspace Music has officially launched in the UK. Stuart Dredge pointed out that, despite an embargo preventing him from writing about the service’s launch, a Myspace designer tweeted about it’s launch 17 minutes before the media were (in theory) allowed to publish anything.

Stuart has acknowledged this on Music Ally.

UPDATE: Now the embargo has passed, you can read Stuart’s thoughts here

What this has demonstrated is that in the world of social media, the embargo is a threatened beast, and what better way to annoy a blogger than to give them an embargo and then break it. I’m sure the Myspace designer didn’t mean to break an embargo and was harmlessly sharing his excitement of the service going live.

It’ll be interesting to see if this inadvertent slip has any affect on how the service is received or how the social media sphere discusses it. It will also be interesting to see how sustainable the service is as users, used to spam and becoming widely regarded as behind the curve as Myspace itself falters, sign up (or don’t).

Photos By Joel Casingal

More Pics Here Or Here

Thank You Roslynn – U da besssss!!

Me and dB – Kings Of Chickens!!

Ryan Leslie warming up – check Myspace Music for the video!

DJ Jay-P and Trek Life!

Mel’s Diner!

On The Strip!

My Store!

Charles Hamilton Is Back!

My Future House…

The Most Action I Got In Cali…

Pause…

Crew Love! Maaad Fun!

In 1974, Rolling Stone music journalist Jon Landau boosted a then little known musician’s career by declaring, “I have seen the future of rock and roll, and its name is Bruce Springsteen”. Fast forward to 2009 and the future of rock and roll isn’t a person. It’s not even a band. It’s an online music service called Spotify. It isn’t just a game changer for the music industry. It’s a first glimpse of the future of all home entertainment.

Spotify is a music streaming service without the need to buy songs to listen to them. It’s basically Apple’s iTunes, except it’s free. 4 million songs are available and it’s legal since major music labels - Universal Music, Sony BMG, EMI Music, Warner Music – are shareholders. Spotify is an attempt to beat music piracy and it seems to be working.

There is a catch. Australia doesn’t have access to Spotify’s delights yet. The UK, France, Spain, Finland, Norway and Sweden are the current lucky countries. The USA and China will soon have access. However, it’s easy to bypass this tricky geographical problem.

I’ve been using Spotify and it‘s terribly addictive. Remember when you used to make mix tapes for friends, lovers and friends you desperately hoped would be your lover? Spotify allows you to build music playlists and share them with friends/lovers/others who can marvel at your impeccable taste in music. Playlist links can be sent via Twitter and/or Facebook. You can even allow friends to add or delete songs on shared playlists. Recently, Apple approved an application allowing Spotify music to stream directly to iPhones.

The future is now. Some luddites will cling to vinyl records. Some may even persist with CDs. But the majority will listen to music this way once it goes mass market. To be commercially viable, it’s likely all users will eventually have to subscribe. Reliability, convenience and legality means most won’t begrudge paying the approximate $20 monthly subscription Spotify’s premium service costs. I’d certainly subscribe if it was available in Australia.

We won’t own music but will be able to listen to anything any time we want. Movies will be next. And, if Rupert Murdoch and rivals are able to build a similar single point user friendly ‘pick and mix’ delivery system offering a compilation of their individual content, people may be willing to pay for online news. Unfortunately News Corp’s own foray into a similar music system – MySpace Music – is frustratingly clunky so you have to wonder whether they could build a seamless and intuitive integrated online news service that people would be willing to pay for.

However, if the notoriously antagonistic music labels can work together to sell their collective wares surely media companies can see sense in a little collaboration? Better to get a little money from most readers than no money from all.

Speculation arose this past week that News Corp.-owned (s NWS) MySpace Music is considering moving to a paid model, as the cost of free streaming is making its current model unsustainable. News Corp. digital chief Jon Miller expressed some interest in such a move in an onstage interview conducted by paidContent’s Rafat Ali in Monaco on Thursday, noting that he believes in the “freemium” music model conceptually, even if a practical and sustainable version hasn’t appeared yet. (The audio and video are out of sync, but the segment concerning MySpace begins around the 7:15-minute mark, with deeper discussion of MySpace Music after 12 minutes.)

But even if the freemium model does work for music — and I’m far from convinced that it does — MySpace is so far behind in terms of user interface and experience that it’s hard to imagine the company launching a compelling paid product. A primary reason Spotify has garnered attention is its user interface, and the emerging battle for the music subscription marketplace will likely hinge on a compelling user experience. Consumers already know plenty of places to find free music, and historically they’re only liable to open their wallets for a superior experience. MySpace, however, isn’t seen as a premium provider of anything — and MySpace Music is viewed as a place where clutter and advertising are tolerated in order to get something for free.

What could MySpace deliver that people would pay for? Neither charging to hear music that used to be free nor crippling the free service by taking away music from people’s playlists are very good options, and violate the 10 commandments of freemium. Building a premium ad-free desktop, browser-based or mobile service would merely put MySpace in more direct competition with Spotify — which is having its own troubles satisfying content owners — and other music subscription services that are still seeing more experimentation than customer traction. And for a company that’s already admitted it’s long stopped innovating, MySpace would have to overtake more nimble competitors to draw users to a paid music service while overcoming the perception that it’s a messy-but-free one.

Asked if MySpace Music is nearing profitability, Miller told Ali, “On an operating basis, it’s getting there, but no, because of the payments to the music companies,” adding that he considers a paid model “something to look at.” Fourteen months after MySpace Music’s launch, with the four major labels on board as equity partners, time appears to be running out for its free ad-supported model. It’s worth revisiting Om’s remarks from back then:

If this works, then that is a good statement for the future of the music business. And if it doesn’t, then it tells where the industry is going. In other words, this is a must-win move for the record labels, who are increasingly looking hapless and, well, unable to deal with change.

This article also appeared on BusinessWeek.com.

A singer-song writer that my friend recommended to me that I liked.

http://www.myspace.com/emmadeanband

Apple’s invention of the iPod and iTunes in 2001 revolutionised the music industry. While music companies – still sometimes quaintly referred to as record labels – struggle to sustain profitability due to illegal downloading, Apple has got very rich indeed by selling the hardware (iPods/iPhones) and providing the distribution means (iTunes) for music without having to worry about the risky time consuming and expensive business of paying for musicians to record music and promote their wares in the hope something may be commercially successful enough to turn a profit.

Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation wants to be the new Apple. The Australian’s Caroline Overington couldn’t resist boasting about News Limited’s “cool new toy” to her company’s rivals at last week’s media140 conference in Sydney. All the signs point to News Corp launching that much vaunted – but never successfully implemented – holy grail of a user friendly device that enables consumers to read online news they want, when they want it, on a relatively cheap subscription basis. Basically, an iPod for news with an iTunes-like gateway allowing users to pick and mix the news they’re interested in reading.

Two possibly insurmountable obstacles stand in News Corp’s way.

The first is the free availability of public taxpayer funded news services, hence the reason James Murdoch launched an attack on the UK’s “dominant” BBC last month claiming that “dumping free, state-sponsored news on the market makes it incredibly difficult for journalism to flourish on the internet. Yet it is essential for the future of independent journalism that a fair price can be charged for news to people who value it.”

The second is, in some ways, even more problematic for News Corp. They’re just not very good at the internet thing. Sure - Rupert may have learned a few new tricks from selling financial news from his newly acquired Wall Street Journal to those who invest in the stockmarket but News Corp still shows signs of just not being able to deliver the goods online. And there’s been a recent example right here in Australia.

A few weeks ago MySpace Music was launched in Australia. Rupert Murdoch, the man who has been slammed by so many for having the audacity to try to make money from online content he’s paid people to write (with some exceptions…), suddenly decided to give content away for free. We can all now listen to an extensive selection of music via News Corp’s MySpace social media website. Initially this seems to be a fantastic proposition but there’s a problem. Far from being user friendly, MySpace Music’s interface is horribly and frustrating clunky. It’s not anywhere near as good as the likes of Spotify (unfortunately not available in Australia yet).

The promotion of the concept has also been dire. Despite the local News Limited newspapers dutifully trying to spruik the *ahem* cool new toy that is MySpace Music by publishing a survey of politicians’ listening habits (Joe Hockey likes Nickelback?! Say it ain’t so, Joe!) and laughably claiming politicians are “scrambling to join the site” (way to get down with da kidz…), it’s pretty much sunk without trace. Two (2!) fans turned up to a free Wes Carr MySpace Music gig recently. Wes Carr may not be everyone’s favourite singer but when only two people turn up to a free gig you have to wonder how competently it was promoted. MySpace Music has appointed Australian independent agency Bulldozer Inc for strategic communications with the account said to worth US$3 million in media and marketing. But it doesn’t matter how much money they spend to sell the sizzle. A shit sausage is still shit.

But here’s the really scary part. News Corporation is possibly every other commercial media companies’ last, best hope to save their own skins. Rupert has hinted he’s happy to speak to his rivals about forming an alliance so their content can also be made available via the iRupe (or whatever it’s eventually called).“We should be talking to Fairfax about a structure for charging for content online,” states Rupert in an interview published in today’s Herald Sun (ironically, not available online!). It’s a smart move. Fairfax is interested. The ACCC may protest but what’s wrong with media companies collaborating on a delivery model to benefit all and provide a service that will allow consumers to decide what news they want to read?

It’s just worrying that News Corporation’s reporting, especially its political analysis, is so biased. And it’s so antagonistic toward anyone who questions their motives it’s possible they’ll stymie their rivals’ content by not offering a level playing field. With great power comes no responsibility.

Let’s hope News Corp is successful in its bid to save the media industry from itself by being so innovative and kind enough to ensure everyone profits from providing online news.

I, for one, welcome our new media overlords.

Google has announced that Google Music Search is officially “rolling out.” This new feature will allow users to hear song previews and easily obtain artist and album information, and it is expected to be accessible to users across the U.S. soon.

Google Music Search

According to Google:

Of course, this is just a first step toward making search more musical. There’s a lot of music out there in the world, and in some instances, we may not return links to the song you’re looking for. But by combining the strength of Google’s search algorithms with our music search partners’ efforts to increase the comprehensiveness of their music content, we’re on track to answer more of your rhymes with the right rhythms.

Read more at:
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/10/making-search-more-musical.html

So it still seems that this project is a bit under wraps.  I did find an article from Rolling Stone’s blog “Rock & Roll Daily.” For the most part, the information was the same as what I found earlier this morning.  The music searching site will hopefully be easy and fast enough that it will divert people from illegal downloading.  It seems you would plug-in a query to Google and at the top of the results page would be a “play” button.  This would quickly take you to a place where you could listen to a free song and also be linked to LaLa, MySpace, and other sites where you could buy the music.  The thought is that people live on Google.  Tools like e-mailing, chatting, blogging, searching, and more are all available on this one site.  Even though iTunes exists in much the same way, the thought is that people are already on Google all day long, so they are more likely to use this new feature than deal with iTunes.

I personally do not know which I would trust more.  I also don’t know how much better this will be compared to using YouTube for music searches.   It will be interesting to see this idea get underway.  If you find any updates on it, please post them! I am interested to find more about the “unveiling” of Google’s newest venture.

Traduzido por Pablo Lopes Queiroz

Fonte: www.utalkmarketing.com

Rumores indicam que a gigante Google lançará um serviço similar ao iTunes, que integrará  os serviços de busca e música.

Fontes informaram que a Google já está, há algumas semanas, adquirindo direitos de conteúdo de grandes gravadoras, para o lançamento do serviço, o que afirmam tornar mais fácil encontrar, ouvir amostras e comprar músicas por meio do recurso de busca.

Usuários poderão adquirir as músicas disponibilizadas na página da Google ao clicar em um botão de “compra” e por meio de diversos sites, como a Amazon.com e a  iTunes Music Store da Apple.

Os serviços iLike e LaLa facilitarão o recurso a partir de 28 de outubro, informaram as fontes, que não obtiveram permissão para falar publicamente do serviço antes de seu lançamento.

O novo serviço envolverá as principais gravadoras de música do mundo, como a Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, Warner e a EMI.

As gravadoras esperam que, ao facilitar a busca por músicas na web, possam também alavancar o mercado digital, atualmente dominado pelo iTunes que conta com 70% das vendas de download na rede.

Steve Purdham, CEO do we7, um dos sites mais acessados do Reino Unido, com 2,5 milhões de usuários mensais, disse que a proposta deve ser analisada com cuidado.

“O acesso à música on-line parece ser o ‘hit’ do momento e os jornais sempre abordam rumores como este, sobre um serviço de música da Google”, afirma Steve.

“Enquanto esse conceito é bastante discutido, muitas pessoas ainda evitam falar sobre a grande questão: isso reforçará o mercado? Tanto o MySpace Music, quanto o Imeem e o Spotify enfrentam os problemas da realidade econômica atual, em que a escala de valores não é a questão principal, mas sim a sustentabilidade econômica.”

Steve ainda disse, “o YouTube, por exemplo, ainda aguarda pelo retorno de lucros desde sua aquisição, pela Google, em 2006. Entretanto, o site continua a se expandir de forma rápida, anunciando recentemente que conta com mais de 1 bilhão de visualizações por dia”.

“A habilidade de expandir a plataforma de vídeo, em tal escala, ao menos por agora, e sem o desenvolvimento de um modelo de renda sustentável, tira o foco das inovações necessárias para transformar a internet em um ambiente corporativo favorável às diferentes mídias.”

Steve afirmou que o “Google Music” (ou “Google Audio” / “OneBox” como vem sendo chamado) seria ótimo para os consumidores, mas alerta, “o que a atual indústria fonográfica mais necessita no momento é  uma demonstração de que a economia pode funcionar”.

“O foco deve estar no pagamento de direitos autorais aos artistas, nas transparência do modelo e em sua sustentabilidade. Uma vez que isso aconteça, então as escalas de valores e as oportunidades poderão ocorrer de forma positiva”, ele conclui.

“A we7, com um bom amparo das gravadoras, construiu um importante serviço de distribuição on-line de conteúdo e atingiu o primeiro lugar como um dos sites de música mais acessados do Reino Unido, com 2,5 milhões de usuários mensais, e nosso foco está no modelo de trabalho baseado em anúncios publicitários.”

NOTAS DO TRADUTOR:

• O evento de apresentação do serviço se chamará “Discover Music!”.
• Informações adicionais sobre as músicas (títulos, bio, artistas, CDs) serão fornecidas pelo serviço.
• O novo serviço da Google será integrado ao já conhecido serviço de busca da companhia.
• O sistema de busca de músicas será bastante similar ao padrão de busca da Google.
• O ILike foi recém adquirido pelo MySpace, portanto é provável que o novo serviço da Google envolva ambos os sites.
• Os usuários poderão fazer o stream de músicas direto do Google e por meio de seus parceiros ILike e Lala.
• Tanto o serviço ILike quanto o Lala fornecem o stream limitado de músicas.
• Por meio do Lala, usuários podem fazer o stream da música apenas uma vez, após esse processo o usuário  poderá comprar a música ou a acessar por apenas 30 segundos.
• Já no ILike, algumas músicas estão disponíveis (completas) para streaming e outras contam apenas com 30 segundos de acessibilidade.
• O MySpace Music possui os direitos totais de streaming de todo o conteúdo disponibilizado no site (por meio das principais gravadoras).

Photos By Patrick Neree

More Pics Here

The Blueprint 3 at DJ Hero Show

MySpace.com DJs | MySpace Video

So, my first blog entry. Thanks Des for re-inventing my interest in blogs

Current music: Almost Lover – A Fine Frenzy

Current mood: Bah.

So, after 3 hours of Accounting, not much has actually seeped into the skull. Instead, I am blogging for the first time in a very long time.. and wondering a) how I managed to survive for so long without it, and b) what this post is actually going to be about.

Perhaps I shall whinge for a while about the intricacies and frustrations of group work. I don’t mind group work, don’t get me wrong. But, only when you’re stuck in a room and nobody has the chance to just disappear. This other breed of group-work, the one where you don’t SEE your group members, can’t CONTACT them, and they won’t reply to your bloody emails. This group-work, I like not. I hate, in fact. It’s a bit of a joke, because the only reason we have ‘group work’ is so people learn how to communicate properly, socialise like civil human beings and learn ‘patience’ and other such crap, but all this isn’t even NEEDED in group work anymore. Group work now consists of a few emails, the rushed mushing together of slides, and a quick impromptu meeting to discuss whether our slides are shit or not. Okay, complaint done.

I suppose I’ll move onto a nicer aspect of my life right now. I did an RPM + Body Combat combination yesterday, turned out to be a lot LESS strenuous and death inducing than I thought. Which is really good to know, because it means that I’ve gotten stronger. I remember doing my first RPM, I nearly fainted towards the end. I actually had to go outside and sit there for a while, while feeding myself water and a chocolate biscuit. A fair distance from where I came from. So, RPM + Combat. Good combination. Lower body + cadio, then upper body + cardio essentially. Should be a good combination to keep. I wish our gym had Body Balance, Jam and Flow (I think was the other one). In any case, really glad that happened.

On another topic altogether, was annoyed that I didn’t get to go to Oktoberfest. First-ish social gathering and I couldn’t make it. Fail. But yeah, I don’t drink that much, and suddenly this has become unacceptable. What else? I need new clothes. But, that is a minor matter.

Should I stop procrastinating and finish this Accounting and move onto legal? Yes. Am I going to… maybe.

Also re-discovered a lot of new music on Myspace. I forgot about their garage band thing, where they basically have music on there for all to hear. It’s good stuff. Discovered Augustana’s new song, Bluejuice, which I’m going to on Wednesday, Lost Valentinos, etc. etc. Should listen to more at some point.

Cheerio.