Music Streaming: The Haves and the Have-Nots

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In recent days, I have blogged about the vast divide between the music industry elite and the have-nots. Last week I focused on the music elite via my post about Jay Z’s relationship with Samsung. (Jay Z responded defiantly by removing the hyphen in his name.) Yesterday my post about Thom Yorke’s war against Spotify focused more on the have-nots (such as indie musician Sam Duckworth), who earn next to nothing from streaming services. On July 19, Sasha Frere-Jones of The New Yorker also posted a thoughtful article about how difficult it is for emerging artists to generate any revenue from streaming services like Spotify. His well-written and well-reported piece also shows how streaming services favor the giant record labels for established artists with strong back catalogues, and I would recommend you read it. (For a dissenting view, I would also recommend two posts by Bob Lefsetz, “Thom Yorke vs. Spotify” and “Spotify?“). I don’t believe the solution to inadequate streaming royalties is for emerging artists to remove their music from Spotify (doing so sounds self-destructive, especially because Spotify gives musicians a platform to generate awareness). The music industry really needs an artist-owned music streaming/distribution service akin to United Artists in the movie industry many decades ago. Right now it’s coming down to big corporate brands like Coca-Cola and Mountain Dew to champion emerging artists. In 2010, Coca-Cola gave Somali-born rapper K’Naan a global stage via the 2010 World Cup tour. Mountain Dew runs its own label, Green Label Sound. Perhaps it’s time for another major brand named Jay Z to invest some of his own millions into a streaming service that champions the artists?

For additional reading:

Future of Music Coalition, “Does Spotify Make Sense for Non-Superstars?”

The Guardian, “Pink Floyd Back Catalogue Available on Spotify after Song Passes 1M”

The Independent, “Thom Yorke Spotify Criticism: Top Producer Accuses Radiohead Singer of Twitter Hypocrisy”

Update: NPR, “Paying the Piper: Music Streaming Services in Perspective”

The Top 10 Searches of the Decade

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Tired of reading lengthy analyses of the decade we just left behind?  My employer Razorfish has a solution: a visual depiction of the major trends affecting search engine marketing throughout the past 10 years.   A Decade in Search is a rich media experience that touches upon major trends and events ranging from the bursting of the dot-com bubble in 2000 to the launch of Google Caffeine in 2009.  According to A Decade in Search, the top 10 searches of the 2000s were:

1. Facebook

2. Baidu

3. MySpace

4. World Cup

5. Wikipedia

6. Britney Spears

7. Harry Potter

8. Shakira

9. Lord of the Rings

10. Barack Obama

To get insights about the decade ahead for search, please check out Razorfish Search Marketing Trends.  Meantime, do any of the Top 10 searches surprise you?