All hail the era of the media bundle. Days after Verizon announced that millions of its wireless subscribers will receive a year of the forthcoming Disney+ streaming service at no cost and Spotify teamed up with Google to offer free Google Homes, Apple is unveiling a bundle of its own: …
Read More »R.I.P. Apple's iTunes: Remembering the Best, Worst and Wackiest Moments
The iTunes brand is no more. Nearly two decades after introducing the world to the digital store-library hybrid, Apple announced at its annual global developers conference on Monday that it will shutter the iTunes software this fall, replacing it with three standalone programs for music, television and podcasts. While core …
Read More »Spotify's New Show Lives Inside Its Playlists
Spotify is quietly moving further into original video, dropping on Monday a new series about the hip-hop industry called “The Break” — which plays from inside RapCaviar and other signature playlists on the music-streaming service’s platform, living among songs rather than other videos. It marks the latest push from the …
Read More »Spotify Wades Deeper Into Politics With Custom Midterm Playlists
When was the last time a mere music distribution service — think iTunes, Best Buy and Tower Records — asked its customers to get political? That’s what Spotify is doing this week in sending users notifications and custom, state-specific playlists asking them to vote in the U.S. midterms. On Tuesday, …
Read More »Apple Is Finally Buying Shazam
UPDATE:On September 24, Apple announced its complete acquisition of Shazam. *** It was nearly a year ago that Apple announced its plans to buy the popular music-identification company Shazam — plans that have largely been stalled because of an European Union investigation. After several months of inquiry, however, the EU …
Read More »Coachella Artists Can't Play Half of Its Competing Festivals
UPDATE: U.S. District Court Judge Michael Mosman has dismissed a lawsuit filed against Coachella’s organizer Goldenvoice, Billboard reports. The suit alleged the California festival’s restrictive radius clause, which prevents Coachella-booked acts to perform at any other North American festival from December 15th through May 1st, violated anti-trust law. The suit …
Read More »With Spotify IPO, Labels Expect Massive Windfall. But Will Artists Benefit?
After some 20 years of stumbling through the digital era, the world’s biggest record labels are finally poised to get richer, thanks to Spotify’s plan to go public. The music-streaming giant, which has 159 million monthly listeners and 73 million paid subscribers, filed for a modified initial public offering Wednesday, …
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