Music+Industry+5

=[MUSIC INDUSTRY: UPDATE #5] =

[|Article]
 * Free music and more with the use of Internet Explorer 9 **

Microsoft is introducing a holiday campaign that will offer free music, movies and discounts in order to get Internet users to switch from other Internet browsers to Internet Explorer 9. These offers will only be good in the US and some of these offers include one free month of Pandora, a free month to Hulu Plus, a free $5 movie ticket from Fandango, and more.

// Posted by: Melissa Huapaya //

[|Bloomberg Article]
 * SoundOut Predicts Music Hits With Reviews, Linguistic Analysis **

What song will be the next hit? This a question that is notorious in the music industry. From focus groups to mere gut feelings, SoundOut, a start up service in the UK, is trying to update these old ways of gauging hit potential. SoundOut's method is primarily technology based. They use online listener reviews of new songs and insert the data into a linguistic analysis program. After the analysis, SoundOut can come up with substantial statistics of a song's overall market potential as well as passion rating, divided in demographic such as listener's age and gender. Although there are similar companies, SoundOut claims that their results are more reliable. How? They use a random sample of users, who don't know they are taking part in the research. As we learned in research classes, a random sample as well as the lack of motivation to produce certain answers yields results pretty close to the general population. Only time will tell if this business model will be adapted in the U.S.

//Posted by: Christal Bundang//

= A Very Gaga Thanksgiving = Billboard Article

According to the Los Angeles Times, "A Very Gaga Thanksgiving" will air on ABC on November 24th at 9:30 pm (EST). The show will include ninety minutes of Gaga with a peek inside her personal life and an eight-song performance. The pop star will also prepare a Thanksgiving feast with chef Art Smith. Katie Couric will be sitting down with the performer to finally get “a chance to see more of who she is beneath the wild costumes and staged musical numbers as well as the girl who embraced fame and fortune that seemed to come overnight.” Three days before "A Very Gaga Thanksgiving" airs, the singer will release "Born This Way: The Remix," as well as her "Lady Gaga Presents The Monster Ball Tour at Madison Square Garden" DVD. So for those who aren't interested in watching NFL games or spending some quality time with your family on Thanksgiving, Lady Gaga is offering an entertaining alternative.

//Posted by: Brianna Dotson//

=Chuck D. Sues Universal Music Over Digital Royalties= [|Article]

Universal is being sued for shortchanging many different artists because of the vague language used in some older record deals. Along with the Allman Brothers and Eminem, Chuck D. of “Public Enemy” is disputing payouts of digital downloads being labeled as “sales” versus “licenses.” The suit claims that for every one thousand downloads an artist will get paid $80.33 (10-20 percent) from the label, but if paid by licensing agreements they would get $315.85 (about equally split). Because Universal is giving iTunes and other digital music stores the right to sell this music it is technically selling the license, the suit claims. This is an interesting story because in the digital age money is not exchanged by hand as much anymore, and with digital music it is confusing to think about where the money comes from. Who pays who, and for how is hard to keep track of with how active the labels are and how many artists they balance. Universal claims these cases to be flawed, but if the case goes through it could cause a lot of trouble for them in class action suits because many older record contracts are vague in terms of digital sales and could cause other artists to join in to claim a part of the money.

-Trevor O'Brien

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