iTunes has just gone live in South America. These new stores only launched today and they will be announced in the next few hours. This is an amazing move by iTunes, which Im sure will bring them great success.
RouteNote is an iTunes official partner and our full catalogue will be available in South America. As an artist you dont have to do anything!!
AIM (Association of Independent Music) has released their latest digital sales figures for indie labels and bands and it claims that 94.4% of all indie digital revenues is via iTunes, Amazon and Spotify. Everything else is fighting over just 5.6% of the market.
Alison Wenham, head of the UK-based consortium, pointed to a lopsided logjam. ”There are now a series of monopolies and it is jolly hard for anyone else to get a slice of the market”.
In the US there is still no Spotify presence and it seems as though eMusic is the third largest player, but Im sure they will change when Spotify finally enter the US this year.
Lots of users have been asking if they can sell their cover songs on iTunes.
If your track is on the PRS database you are able to cover that track and sell the music in the UK. However, if its not on the PRS databse you will need to find out who own the copyright to that music and try to obtain a license.
The NPD has just released new data about the digital download market. According to the report, Apple has continued to pull away from Amazon and Walmart and now controls 66% of the market.
Apple’s share of the digital-download market from 63.2 percent to 66.2 percent. Amazon’s share climbed from 11 percent to 13.3 percent.
Record label distribution executives say the situation could be even worse for Amazon than reported. According to them, Amazon maintains just 6 to 10 percent of the market in any given week, while Apple hovers at closer to 90 percent.
NPD’s report affirms Apple as the continued leader in music sales. In 2008, Apple surpassed Walmart to take the No. 1 spot among U.S. music retailers. Last year, iTunes represented more than a quarter of all U.S. music sales.
There are a lot of rumours that the Beatles catalogue will be released on iTunes within the next 30 min. While Apple, EMI and the Beatles estate have yet to announce the partnership officially, Billboard has stated that they believe from their own Music industry sources that a deal is in place and ready to come about.
Here at RouteNote we are providing more and more artists with Ping Artist Profiles. If you havent already requested your Ping Artist Profile then please get in touch.
To be eligible for a Ping Artist Page just use RouteNote to distribute your release. To provide more insight on your Ping Artist Page, Apple has created an “Artist Guide and Best Practices” document.
It provides detailed information on the format, types of video and pictures you can include on your Ping Artist Page along with a step by step process on how to upload videos, tips on settings for your iPhone, etc.
Just a quick post for those of you who missed yesterday’s Apple news because you live in a cave on the moon or somewhere beneath the ocean – here are the most exciting bits from the keynote;
1) iPod Shuffle – not much new to say here. They have returned to the clip design which I approve of. The voice over feature might be useful; this will say the name of the song, album or playlist to you so you know roughly where in your playlist you are. This has been a genuine problem with previous shuffles. £39 for 2gb is excellent value for money.
2) iPod Touch – consistently the most underwhelming of the iPod range. This new version has made a move inline with the iPhone 4, as was probably to be expected. HD video recording, front facing camera allowing for ‘FaceTime’ blah blah blah. It’s not that I don’t think this is a great product, I do, it’s just that the entry level 8gb model is £189. For that price you could just get an iPhone 4 and have the same product as your mobile phone.
3) Apple TV – you’ve got to give it to Steve Jobs, the guy is persistent. After years of trying to make Apple TV work they are still grinding away. Here is the latest redesign/revamp of the service. I really want this to work and think that the Movie rental feature will be key to its success. Call me a capitalist if you will, but a way to monetize the online video market is something the media has been in desperate need of for years. I will be buying it, I suggest you do the same.
4) iPod Nano - this 6th generation of the iPod Nano has taken my first place award as the best announcement of last night. A brilliant multi-touch screen on a device that clips to your jacket is inspired. If I didn’t already own an iPhone 4 this would be the iPod for me. At £129 for the basic 8gb I think that these will sell quicker than any of the other new announcements. Watch the video below for full details.
The app phenomenon has really helped Apple stay ahead of their competitors, but in iTunes users still buy music more than anything else, according to a Tuesday study from the NPD Group.
NPD found that while nearly every iPhone and iPod Touch user has downloaded a free app, users were more likely to pay for music than an application.
Of the 3,862 people surveyed by NPD, about 82 percent of iPhone and iPod Touch users have purchased music, while 56 percent of iTunes users bought music from the service exclusively.
NPD found that 9 out of 10 iPhone and iPod touch users said they had downloaded a freebie app. Russ Crupnick, vice president and senior entertainment analyst at NPD, said this behavior could lead to a “major up-selling opportunity to paid versions of the same app.”
“Apps and video certainly do compete for consumer dollars, but they can also be used to promote music and re-energize digital music and video download sales,” Crupnick said.
Apple’s Steve Jobs will take the stage on Wednesday at the company’s annual September media event, and he is expected to announce that iTunes users will be allowed at least twice the amount of time to sample a song.
iTunes currently offers 30 second snippets of songs, which is to provide users with a taste of the music to help them decide whether they like it enough to buy.
While Apple offers the Genius Mix, a song recommendation engine, music consumers know that they can go elsewhere and be given more of a chance to try out a song. This could give YouTube and Pandora an advantage, as iTunes is not the starting point in the song-purchasing process.
According to the sources, Jobs and Apple will focus a large part of Wednesday’s gathering on how the company is improving iTunes’ music discovery experience.
iTunes has just gone live in South America. These new stores only launched today and they will be announced in the next few hours. This is an amazing move by iTunes, which Im sure will bring them great success.
