Think that football was the only athletic event at the Super Bowl?  Wrong!  The Who is renowned for their high-energy shows, their guitar-smashing finales.  This is a band predicated on energy, but Townshend and Daltry were unfortunately panting on lap one during their halftime performance. (more…)

Think that the cloud is just going to replace the download, end of story?  But wait - the download has yet to totally replace the CD.  Turns out that format progression is rarely that clean, and instead, technologies tend to coexist.  The modern-day music industry features CDs (declining quickly but still worth billions), downloads (both free and paid), on-demand streams (both ad-supported and subscribed), non-interactive streams (internet radio), and even vinyl for kicks. (more…)

Can artists truly maximize their careers on their own?  Initially, artists experienced the thrill of total freedom and direct fan connectivity, thanks to a raft of do-it-yourself digital tools.  But the hangover happened quickly; suddenly, artists found themselves spending disproportionate amounts of time online, and not on their instruments, in studios, or within their creative zones. (more…)

Tough to say where Pandora ultimately lands.  Tim Westergren says the company is finally profitable, and Pandora is suddenly something your friends are using.  But despite a recent royalty resolution, Pandora still pays handsomely for content, and plenty of VCs now run away from that sort of overheard.  Others question whether the model is sustainable over the long term. (more…)

Imagine, the entire catalog of recorded music (ten million, fifteen million, twenty million-plus songs) resting safely in the cloud, accessible from any net-connected device for a modest fee.  Just think Spotify from anywhere - the US, a well-connected iPhone, wherever - and the ability to shift from PC to phone to stereo to automobile without a second thought. (more…)

What would happen if the majors stopped pressing CDs right now, closed down their plants, and wrote off their physical retail networks?  The answer is that they’d lose billions, right off the bat!  The lights would start flickering immediately! (more…)

The Hollywood anti-piracy machine is steadily growing, and that is good news for the RIAA.  The reason is that the film business eclipses the recording industry in terms of size, and that means its lobby is far more powerful.  Labels are dwarfed by ISPs and outsmarted by terrestrial radio stations on the Hill.  The music business is simply smaller, rife with paralyzing disagreements, and according to some critics, less intelligent than its big studio counterpart. (more…)