Deezer continues to impress with their efforts in cloud music. Try giving yourself anywhere from 5-78 minutes of music a day to improve your happiness and well-being.
NEW SCIENTIFIC STUDY REVEALS THE ‘RECOMMENDED DAILY ALLOWANCE’ FOR MUSIC
I listened with a great deal of interest to Neil Young on the Rolling Stone Magazine Now podcast. I took notes during the section that focused on Pono Music. I learned that the revised Pono Music Store will be both a download and streaming site when ready.
My question is how will we stream high-resolution audio with the existing Pono Players? Exclusive of a Pono – SmartPhone partnership or device/ existing Pono device enhancement?
Will I need to boost my ISP speed to 300MBs or more?
I researched the Internet and came up with the fact that Sony Xperia smart phones play and stream high res audio music.
The high res streaming service Qobuz (France) today streams high res. It has a limited global market (France, UK, Germany, Netherlands).
However its not streaming from Singapore…and it’s not Pono….
Hopefully Neil will further enlighten the Pono community (after all we’ve been loyal and patient) with more information about the revised Pono service after sharing that knowledge with Rolling Stone Magazine’s audience first via their podcast.
Taylor Swift is the Joan of Arc for independent musicians and young songwriters who has helped to convince Apple Music to change their policy prior to the Apple Music launch on June 30th.
The original plan prior to Sunday’s social network back and forth between Taylor Swift and Eddie Cue, was that Apple would not pay any song royalty rights to artists, etc. during the 90 day trial period of Apple Music from June 30th through September 30th.
It was a bad business decision on Apple’s part. They had not budged on that decision since the Apple Music product announcement on June 8th. The blowback on the refusal of Apple Music to compensate artists has been significant and loud. There have been several independent music organizations writing petitions expressing their dismay with Apple about their unwillingness to pay artists royalties due during the 90 day trial period.
It took Taylor Swift who is a music artist with significant clout to sway the executive team at Apple. Personally I wondered when Apple Music would come to their senses about this ill executed decision on their part.
I mean after all Apple says it values music but not paying artists for the first 90 days of the trial devalues music and the artists who are entitled to compensation for their art. Spotify, TIDAL and other music streaming services pay music artists during the trial period. Apple chose to be rogue and exert its influence by not paying artists during a trial period. They were really coming across as we are Apple you are not.
Bravo Taylor Swift, once again you show sound judgment when it comes to streaming music and what its business model must become.
I’m glad Eddie Cue and Apple Music management changed their tune on this important matter. It’s a game changer for Apple Music for those of us who care about the artists and their future well-being.
Based upon Eddie Cue and the Apple Music executive team decision I will now trial Apple Music instead of letting it lie dormant for the first 90 days.
Four years ago, I became a Day One subscriber to Spotify for $9.99 a month after I kicked Zune to the curb. I subscribed to Spotify for two main reasons. 1) Spotify promised better audio quality than the MP3 Freemium music distribution model. 2) Spotify promised to pay artists better royalty payments with a “portion” of the $9.99 a month they collected from me and others. After four years as a Spotify subscriber I have pulled the plug on Spotify Premium. I cancelled the $9.99 a month option. Spotify from my experience failed to meet the “two commitments” I wanted from them as a customer. I witnessed and read how “little” Spotify was paying artists for their content. I never received more than 320 kbps audio sound from Spotify. In the four year interim 2011 to 2015 digital audio quality improved. I own and use a high resolution PONO Music Player. I can truly hear the difference with HiRes sound. I switched my subscription to TIDAL HiFi last week, $19.99 a month. I am finally listening to the high fidelity audio music quality Spotify failed to deliver upon. I am confident TIDAL HiFi will pay artists higher royalties. After all they aren’t “owned” by a record company as an investor. They are an artist owned platform. The “sweetener” for me is TIDAL HiFi and Sonos. I itch to own a Sonos Play:1 sound cube that allows me to hear hi-def music wirelessly. So long Spotify, Hello TIDAL HiFi. #TIDALforALL
Historical Music Revolution, Artists Declaration of Independence
Photo: Jamie McCarthy / Getty Images Entertainment
Throughout history, every movement began with a few individuals banding together with a shared vision – a vision to change the status quo.
That vision came to life with a first step. Our first step begins today through the platform TIDAL.
TIDAL is an artist majority owned company with a mission to reestablish the value of music and protect the sustainability of the music industry rooted in creativity and expression.
As part of our vision to introduce change to the current system, we will continue expanding this platform into an all-encompassing destination in the coming months. We are working diligently everyday to enhance the overall service.
Today, the site incorporates high quality sound, video and exclusive editorial, but there are more features on the way. In time, TIDAL will not just be a streaming service but an immersive platform with enhanced experiences.
With TIDAL we are making a commitment to build a platform that reflects ideas contributed directly from artists, providing an enriched experience. Music presented and heard the way the artists intended.
We want our mission with TIDAL to spark conversation and lay a foundation for tomorrow’s burgeoning stars.
Our movement is being led by a few who are inviting all to band together for a common cause, a movement to change the status quo.
Today marks the next step.
Signers include Kanye West, Madonna, Nicki Minaj, Beyonce, Jack White, Alicia Keys, Rihanna, Chris Martin of Coldplay, Usher, Daft Punk, deadmau5, J Cole, Jason Aldean, Calvin Harris and Jay Z.
Jay-Z has acquired Aspiro, the Swedish music technology company behind the streaming services Tidal and WiMP. There will be a press conference in New York City at 5 p.m. today to relaunch Tidal Music in North America. The company will be renamed TIDALHiFi.
If Forbes sources are to be trusted, the streaming platform under Jay Z will focus on putting the creators in the driving seat, and ensuring they are fairly remunerated for their content.
Music services proliferate the cloud. I just finished writing about whyd from France yesterday. The next music Web application that floats by my Chrome browser is Arena . Arena is an “artist-friendly streaming music service with a Listen To Own hybrid distribution model”. My curiosity is piqued so I become a member and sign in to another music experience.
Arena is designed to solve the thornier cloud music distribution model that accelerates and plagues the music industry. Musicians are grossly underpaid for the streaming digital music that others play for free. The gap between the number of cloud plays (listens) versus the micropayments the musicians receive is appalling. I thought I was helping by paying $9.99 a month to Spotify. After the pie is split I learn that I am not helping the artists very much at all, sigh.
Damon Evans, Founder and CEO of Arena Music has built a more equitable music distribution model. Listen To Own is the new future of music commerce. Here is why.
Listen To Own makes it easy to picture what the transition to an economically viable and artist-friendly streaming model looks like while maintaining the historic understanding of what a sellable music ‘unit’ is in today’s marketplace. We can say with a high level of confidence that it no longer matters how many albums an artist has sold. All that matters now is how many listeners that artist can convert into owners.
The music industry has concluded that the Average Return Per User (ARPU) is now highest through a monthly subscription account because consumers no longer see a value in paying to own music. Listen To Own diminishes the long term viability of any subscription based concept by doubling the standard value of an MP3 download after a track is streamed by an individual listener, either 5 or 99 times.
Consider the $9.99 Spotify Premium Subscription Account. If $3 is used for operations, Spotify has to split the remaining $6.99 of a single user’s monthly subscription between a mix of tracks served from a mix of individual artists. What is the point in promoting value in a gross ARPU of $9.99 when the individual artist payout becomes so marginal once divided?
Arena, on the other hand, generates an ARPU of $19 for a standard 10-track album and $1.90 for a track by combining premium stream pay rates with download revenue – roughly twice that of what the iTunes download store could produce for the same exact sale. The company leverages a multitude of unique revenue streams to fund the Artist Payment Pool it uses for premium stream payouts.
I want to thank PR Newsire for Journalists for putting me in touch with today’s content about Arena.
Been reading recent ink on whyd, a social record collection. They have an iPhone App available here.
whyd’s goal is to be a “Human Pandora “, which allows people to discover new music that they wouldn’t have found out about otherwise.
As a music connoisseur I’m resistant when it comes to someone “picking my music for me”. I rejected BeatsMusic as a music service because their music curation method presented itself like progressive FM disk jockey playlist, all filler no substance…
I consider myself a crate digger. I will happily comb through vinyl record crates for new music. In addition I search extensively through music magazine Web sites such as Rolling Stone, Uncut, MOJO Magazine, Paste, etc. for music recommendations.
Don’t get me wrong I’m open to human curation. I think we can benefit from another person’s music explorations, choices and playlist builds.
I keep expecting to see Spotify with their acquisition of The Echo Nest evidence “intelligent” software curation in the Spotify application.
I just installed the whyd app today so I don’t have enough time in service to comment on its capabilities yet. I will follow-up at a later time with a technical assessment of whyd.
We are on the brink of SXSW 2014 in Austin Texas. How I would love to attend that one day. Talk about your geek and music nirvana ;). SXSW 2014 will be the announcement site for Neil Young’s PONO high resolution music technologies. Can’t wait to write about that on March 11th which is the announcement day.
Speaking of computers, music and technology directions I have written a quick post about Raspberry Pi and Music (Media Center) technologies.
Raspberry Pi was released to the public as an Open Source Linux credit card sized computer on February 29, 2012. It celebrated its two year birthday yesterday, March 1, 2014. The technology initiative has grown substantially in that time frame. The latest estimate is that 2.5 million Raspberry Pi computers have been sold worldwide.
I liken Raspberry Pi to the Radio Shack, Popular Mechanics hobbyist crowd. Raspberry Pi is a raw, unfinished computer in comparison with say an Apple iPhone. In terms of finished goods Raspberry Pi has many exposed components. In order for you to fully engage yourself with Raspberry Pi and the software, peripherals, cables etc it’s best to posses an erector set mentality to persist with this experience. Raspberry Pi is playing a major role in the M2M: Internet of Things (iot) that is disrupting how we are reshaping the InterWeb.
My interest as a music technologist is specifically focused on the Raspberry Pi Media Center and Volumio (formerly known as the RaspyFi Project). The Raspberry Pi Media Center when connected to your Hi Def Television, WiFi and your cable Internet system becomes a powerful, self-programming solution for you to curate your own media programming. Volumio is an entirely new music system. It is designed to play all your music, whether is an Hi-Res file or a Web Radio, with the highest quality.
Once I get the Raspberry Pi Media Center I want to experiment with I will post again about what I am learning about this cool technology through my living room entertainment system.
Here are some resources that I have discovered to help you with Raspberry Pi, music and the technology.
O’Reilly Books
O’Reilly publishes the best technology books bar none ;). I am pleased to finally see a Raspberry Pi Cookbook available and written by Simon Monk.
Packt Publishing
A definitive source is the book, Raspberry Pi Media Center by Sam Nazarko. You also want to make sure you are browsing and keeping up with Raspbmc* at this Web site: http://www.raspbmc.com/about/
*Raspbmc is a minimal Linux distribution based on Debian that brings XBMC to your Raspberry Pi.
I have completed my trial evaluation of beatsMUSIC. I am impressed with their interface and “human” curation. But unfortunately I found beatsMUSIC a “Closed” cloud music solution. I am a music technologist who respects innovation and music software development. beatsMUSIC achieves those attributes to a “degree” but it lacks being an extensive “development” platform. beatsMUSIC doesn’t publish an application programming interface that encourages music software development.
I am staying with Spotify because it is an “Open” cloud music platform. Spotify allows me as a subscriber to choose the music application I wish to use to grow my music listening experience. Spotify offers a cloud music architectural platform that embraces music software engineering (music hackathons) to take place on a global scale. We in turn as listeners get the advantage of harnessing those apps and interpreting music from new vantage points. I don’t get those options at all from beatsMUSIC. beatsMUSIC programs my music for me (didn’t radio do that for decades…) or I can build a music playlist, underwhelming options, already available elsewhere if you ask me.
The true competitive advantage Spotify has over beatsMUSIC, Pandora, etc. are the applications Just like on Apple’s iPhone or the Android phone the rich set of applications helps to sophisticate the use of these devices. Spotify like Apple’s iOS is a software platform.
Let’s look at Spotify from the jazz listener point of view. The Spotify Web application has the option App Finder listed under the Apps section. I found two premier Spotify Jazz apps from 2013, Blue Note Record’s Timelineand JazzTimes Magazine and Concord Music Group The Stylus. The Blue Note application leverages the Blue Note historical timeline of jazz. You can set various filters for jazz artists by sector (Tradition, Groove, Voices) and instruments.
The Stylus app was developed for JazzTimes and Concord Music Group by a development company known as Neon Roots. Albeit a random app to play with I find it intriguing to discover jazz genres and artists. Give it a spin sometime and see what I mean 😉
Spotify continues to innovate and invent on behalf of the music listener with a technological interest towards what lies next in the cloud music ecosystem.
I switched my subscription to TIDAL HiFi last week, $19.99 a month. I am finally listening to the high fidelity audio music quality Spotify failed to deliver upon. I am confident TIDAL HiFi will pay artists higher royalties. After all they aren’t “owned” by a record company as an investor. They are an artist owned platform. The “sweetener” for me is TIDAL HiFi and Sonos. I itch to own a Sonos Play:1 sound cube that allows me to hear hi-def music wirelessly. So long Spotify, Hello TIDAL HiFi. #TIDALforALL
I have completed my trial evaluation of beatsMUSIC. I am impressed with their interface and “human” curation. But unfortunately I found beatsMUSIC a “Closed” cloud music solution. I am a music technologist who respects innovation and music software development. beatsMUSIC achieves those attributes to a “degree” but it lacks being an extensive “development” platform. beatsMUSIC doesn’t publish an application programming interface that encourages music software development.
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