The Wall Street Journal reports that Apple is “in talks” to obtain licenses for what amounts to a Pandora-like streaming music service. All Things Digital says it’s true, or as ATD’s Peter Kafka puts it, “Industry sources I’ve talked to say that’s correct.” I’m sympathetic to this reader comment on the WSJ piece: “Oh great. […]
I can barely believe that it’s been over a year since I wrote my first review of Spotify, which itself came a month after the service debuted in the US. At the time I was most critical of the relative rarity of free Spotify accounts, in addition to a monthly limit of 10 listening hours […]
SoundExchange put out a happy face press release on Thursday, announcing that the performance royalty distributor has paid out no less than $204.4 million to artists and their representatives in the first two quarters of 2012. But attention through most of the week has focused on Representative Jerrold Nadler’s (D-NY) rather contorted effort to correct […]
Edison Media reports a big surge in Internet radio listening. And mind you, it’s not just the boring old predictable annual uptick in Internet radio listening that we’ve all become accustomed to hearing about. This uptick is serious, Edison insists. The weekly usage of online terrestrial radio streams and Pandora “pure play” has jumped from […]
SiriusXM announced its 4th quarter 2011 results today, revealing that the company turned a profit and reached 8.7 million subscribers, with 1.7 net subscribers added last year. While those numbers apparently look good both to the company and investors, SiriusXM is only holding on to 44% of subscribers who get a free trial when they […]
As everyone paying attention to the news knows, Facebook’s first Initial Public Offering S-1 statement is out, and it’s a fascinating read. No need to get into an extensive analysis of the whole $5 billion shebang here, but it’s worth noting that Facebook clearly sees itself as a player in the radio business and a […]
When AT&T first announced new monthly data caps for iPhone users in 2010 I suggested that it could stunt the growth of mobile internet radio. Some eighteen months later I do have to admit that doesn’t seem to have happened. I made some rough calculations based upon the typical bandwidth consumed by streaming internet stations […]
It’s been a week since the Consumer Electronics Show wrapped up in Las Vegas, and I apologize to Radio Survivor readers for not having kept closer track this year. Warm Las Vegas certainly seemed like it would have been a nicer place to be than bone-chilling snowy Chicago, where I’m writing this post. But as […]
This is certainly an indicator of strong growth for internet radio and streaming services. Music royalties agency SoundExchange announced Tuesday that it ended the year collecting $292 million in royalty payments, up 17% from 2010. These royalties are paid by internet, satellite and cable TV music-only services for the right to play sound recordings, and […]
Despite heavy lobbying from Clear Channel and its allies, the Federal Communications Commission proposes retaining its current ownership rules for commercial AM and FM radio stations. Here is a quick refresher course on the local radio rules. They allow any entity to buy as many AM/FM signals as its wants, nationally, with these restrictions in […]
