There are so many stupid award ceremonies out there, but Billboard thought it would be worth adding another one to the list. Billboard has announced the Billboard Music App Awards on Tuesday.
For the first time, Billboard will set out to pay homage to the gods of… mobile music apps. Not desktop apps, mind you, just apps for iPhone, BlackBerry, Android, and Nokia platforms. A “panel of industry visionaries” will whittle down apps to the finalists, which will be announced on September 1, 2010. All app makers are encouraged to apply for consideration at MobileEntertainmentLiveFall.com.
Billboard’s award categories are Best Artist-Based App, Best Music Streaming App, Best Music Engagement App, Best Music Creation App, and Best Branded App. To be eligible, an app must have been released between July 1, 2009 and July 30, 2010.
Winning apps will be announced at the Mobile Entertainment Live!: The Music App Summit on October 5. Select finalist apps will be featured in a pre-show section of Billboard magazine, and their developers will be able to demo their apps in person in Billboard’s “App Lounge” at said summit.
Guvera is a music download platform that seems to be getting a lot of press lately. The team has put together a great video to explain what their service is all about. Let us know what you think and if you would want to put your music onto their service.
A report from business analysis firm Ovum says they think UK based Internet Service Providers (ISP’s) could bundle a silver bullet with their broadband contracts by adding a digital music service to their offerings. They argue that this would increase customer loyalty (Ovum call it reducing consumer churn), generate additional revenue per customer, reduce online music piracy and increase music industry revenue. They estimate (and they don’t say how they arrived at the figure) that direct revenues from selling music-inclusive deals could be around £103 million by 2013, representing 41% of 2009′s market.
Commenting on the report earlier this week the BPI’s Geoff Taylor said “It’s increasingly clear that it isn’t smart to be a ‘dumb pipe’. This report shows that the revenue potential of digital music services alone makes sound economic sense for ISPs.”
Fair enough. But take note that Universal Music Group sponsored the report, the same UMG that are desperately worried about the collapse of their revenues, and the same UMG that are invested in Spotify, a music service that could very easily sell premium subscriptions bundled with an ISP package. This is by all indications a great idea, and would go a long way to helping the ISP community appease big music – who are accusing it if not of complicity then at least negligence in the article of stopping access to copyright infringing sites and torrent trackers like the infamous Pirate Bay – but an awareness of possible bias might encourage conservatism when looking at Ovum’s estimated numbers. There are a lot of solutions vying for the fast growing digital music dollar, it’s a market in which we’re currently diversity and innovation, and a big move like the one the BPI are advocating could seal the future of music online.
MOG has provided a quick intro to their new music streaming service that will be launching very soon in the USA.
There currently is a lot happening in the music space online, with Spotify delaying their launch in the USA, and Myspace Music possibly moving over to a subscription model. MOG music streaming service only costs $5 per month, which means it could be a great little option away from these other major players.
Search looks to be extremely fast, with intelligent auto-complete. Adding songs from various places in the service is simple (compare to MySpace Music, which is still cumbersome after a year). And users can make the playlists private or public.
It has been reported yesterday that Pandora has secured a new round of funding. If you are not aware what Pandora is, its a personalised online radio service. Pandora lets users choose which artists they like and then suggests new artists to them with the hope that they will also like their music. Pandora currently is based in the USA and is only for USA users, which is why most people here in the UK and outside the USA havent heard that much about Pandora.
However, within the next few months we hope to offer a new option to only a select few of RouteNote users, which is going to allow them to get their music onto the Pandora service and help promote their music in the USA. The downside is that only USA artists who are signed up to ASCAP and BMI can receive royalties for their streams. However, here at RouteNote we still believe this is a great opportunity for our artists to gain a lot more exposure in the USA, plus Pandora provide one of the leading iPhone applications which links in very nicely with iTunes, so if users enjoy your music they can purchase straight away. In the future we hope to have a more all round deal with Pandora but this is going to be very difficult until they launch in other markets outside of the USA.
Pandora is a music startup that he been getting a lot of great reviews of late. Pandora will reach profitability in 2010 according to founder Tim Westergren. Revenue is expected to double this year to $40 million thanks to targeted ads delivered to 27 million registered users which are growing at the rate of 50,000 to 60,000.
With the iPhone app release for Pandora they have been seeing a third of their growth come in this area. “It’s changed the perception people have of what Internet radio is, from computer-radio to radio, because you can take the iPhone and just plug it into your car, or take it to the gym.”
The yesterday Pandora also announced their new Pandora One service, which is just Pandora a few added features and of course no ads. Pandora One is a subscription based service in which is only $36 a year. Additionally with Pandora One they have released a desktop application which includes high quality streaming, a personalized look, a mini player and extended player timeouts
Nokia has announced that it will be launching it “Comes with Music” offering in Italy, Sweden and Mexico in the coming months. Nokia initially launched their Comes With Music service in the UK and Singapore and its already announced it will launch in Australia later this month.
The company has also announced three new music phones in its XpressMusic range: the 5730, 5330 and 5030. The first two of those will be Comes With Music handsets in selected markets.
Here at RouteNote we have just launched a Twitter account. Currently we already have over 50 followers, so make sure you head over and chat with us there!!
If you have any issues with our service, or suggestions, please just drop us a message on there and we will reply straight away.
Here at RouteNote we are always trying to find ways to improve our service. With so many new music companies appearing online, we thought it was about time we started to sign more agreements with them. Our most recent addition is Last.fm. Last.fm is a UK-based Internet radio and music community website, founded in 2002. It claims over 21 million active users based in more than 200 countries. On 30 May 2007, CBS Interactive acquired Last.fm for £140m.
RouteNote artists will now be able to opt in to Last.fm. Last.fm will be paying royalties at the end of every quarter, with the first available on October 31st. Royalties will be paid for every time your track is played by on the Last.fm site or off site using their tools.
How do I opt in? If you haven’t uploaded your music yet, then head over to Single or Album upload and you will find the last.fm in our retail partner stores. If you want to opt in with any of your current online tracks, then go to your My Content section, then edit each track, with ticking the box for last.fm in the retail partners.
We hope that adding Last.fm to our partners will help all our artists improve their royalties.
There are so many stupid award ceremonies out there, but Billboard thought it would be worth adding another one to the list. Billboard has announced the Billboard Music App Awards on Tuesday.
A 
It has been reported yesterday that 
