The Billboard Q&A: Lyor Cohen
Posted on Jan 18th, 2009Warner Music Group Chairman/CEO of Recorded Music for the Americas and the U.K.Warner’s label chief speaks out on 360 deals, $1.29 singles and why YouTube deals don’t pay.
No one can say that Lyor Cohen isn’t opinionated. At Def Jam in the ’90s, he earned a reputation as an entrepreneur who would fight to protect the interests of his artists. And he didn’t mellow out much at Island Def Jam or at Warner Music Group, where CEO Edgar Bronfman Jr. brought him in 2004.
Hired to make Warner’s various labels more efficient, Cohen has recently posted some impressive gains. In 2008, WMG gained 2.2 percentage points of market share, according to Nielsen SoundScan, and Atlantic became the No. 1 label in the United States.
Soviet Atomic Lighthouses Are Both Spooky and Deadly
Posted on Jan 18th, 2009
Once upon a time, back when people in Russia used big moustaches and sent other people to Siberia, there were no GPS or tacky cellphones. But they had atomic lighthouses to light the Artic shores. Since there was no easy way to travel by ship across the Northern coast of the Soviet Union, the smartypants of the Communist regime decided that they needed a chain of autonomous lighthouses that could run 24/7/365.
Universal Music expands Web video profile with Kyte alliance
Posted on Jan 16th, 2009Universal Music Group continues to bolster its Internet profile via digital video.
The largest of the four biggest recording companies is expected to announce on Friday an agreement with Kyte, the video-streaming startup. Under the terms of the deal, Kyte is to provide the mobile and online platform for the label's artist, including 50 Cent, All American Rejects, Lil Wayne and Lady Gaga. Financial terms of the deal were not released.
Universal Music and Kyte have also agreed to develop new mobile entertainment applications. The question with a deal like this is why any of the labels need a video platform other than YouTube?
Ted Mico, the digital chief for Interscope Geffen A&M, one of Universal Music's subsidiary record labels, says Kyte's live-video streaming has impressed nearly everyone in the music industry. The service enables artists to shoot and distribute live video to fans from their dressing rooms, their limousines or even from the stage. This isn't meant to be the glossy, heavily-produced video productions that are often seen in rock videos.
“Kyte offered artists and fans a fantastic value proposition,” Mico said. “If you like the big budget stuff, this is really zero budget, but just as engaging in its own way because it has that immediacy and authenticity. We've waited a long time for technology that delivers on that and I think the Kyte platform does.”
This kind of live Web TV will appeal to bands and artists who can engage an audience just “by being themselves” Mico said.
How Warner Music Killed Facebook Music
Posted on Jan 16th, 2009Facebook’s ongoing effort to launch a free streaming music service is stalled, according to multiple sources familiar with the situation. The company was close to a deal that would bring free streaming music from three of the four big labels (Universal, Sony, EMI) through the Total Music joint venture. But the deal stalled when the lone holdout, Warner Music, refused to participate.
Through most of 2008 Facebook said on and off record that they had no real interest in their own music service and that third parties like iLike could continue to build their Facebook music applications without fear of competition directly from Facebook.
News leaked in the Fall, though, that Facebook had approached a number of third parties to power the official Facebook music application.
YouTube Full Of Creepy, Soundless Music Videos
Posted on Jan 14th, 2009YouTube has been testing a new way of combating copyright violations on the site – removing the audio, leaving the video. The result is a wasteland of music videos that are creepily silent.
For some time now the company has been fingerprinting audio tracks and notifying users of infringement when they find a copyrighted song (I received one of these in error, fought it and won). Until recently, the copyright holder was able to choose between having the whole file removed or making revenue off of ads placed on the content.
But now YouTube seems to be just stripping out the audio. Examples: here, here, here. This user-created one is just sad now.
