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The change averse music industry has warmed to streaming music services, with industry leaders finally warming to the idea that smartphone streaming is the future of the medium.

Eclipsing everything

David Joseph, who heads up Universal Music, recently told The Guardian that streaming services like Spotify and Last.fm were ‘eclipsing everything’ in terms of cash generation in the music industry.

He said: ‘It’s a different digital currency to downloading. You’re dealing there with 175 million single tracks bought a year compared to seven billion streams of music.’ So, in effect, what Joseph is copping to, is if these streams are monetized, at significantly less revenue per instance than each download, the record labels could still make more money from the streams.

This is the future

He continues, saying: ‘The revenues are significantly growing and I fundamentally believe that streaming and subscription models with unlimited access on all devices are the future of our business. But will people still listen to albums, or just single tracks, or send playlists to their friends? Answer: all of the above.’

Advertising won’t work, though

A future David Joseph and others do not see, however, is one where ad-supported streaming music services work. The basic problem is the revenue per stream derived from advertising per user is less than that derived per stream from users who pay a subscription fee.

This is widely cited as the reason Spotify has struggled to break into the US market, because the company insists on having a free advertising supported component to its service in conjunction with the paid-for service, whereas competitor Rdio only has a subscription service.

Thank you for waking up, finally

It’s always strange watching the music business warm to models consumers and service companies have already shifted to. Streaming music services are not new, and music listeners have long known smartphones were the future medium for the consumption of music. I suppose rather show up late than never, right?

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Piracy has fundamentally altered the film, gaming and music business, killing the massive margins once generated from the mediums and leading to major job cuts. Well, Sony and Universal are discussing ways of circumventing this problem through a policy called ‘on air, on sale’, which would effectively kill the traditional radio single. The problem is this policy isn’t really that novel, but is rather dead obvious and you can’t help but wonder why listeners haven’t been able to purchase music on demand until now.

So what is this policy?

The ‘on air, on sale’ policy [via TechRadar] would effectively kill the six-week window period radio stations get to play a song before it is commercially available for download or purchase. So, as its name suggests, if you can hear it, you can buy it immediately. Music on demand, basically.

And Sony BMG has already trialed this model through the X Factor, allowing viewers to download the music played on the show day and date with its airing. How did that work out, you wonder? Well, it propelled Matt Cardle’s ‘When We Collide’ Christmas single all the way to the top spot.

Wait, why is this only happening now?

Not being someone who lets what’s playing on radio shape my musical taste, I cannot help but hang my head and wonder why this is only happening now. You mean to tell me, record labels, all this time, when people have been amped about hearing a song play on radio and then wanting the instant gratification of buying it right away to play on their mp3 players, there has been no way for them to do this?

This is absolutely absurd. No, it is actually borderline stupid, and the Chief Executive Office of Universal Music, David Joseph, is in agreement even if he doesn’t word it as strongly.

Joseph says, ‘Wait is not a word in the vocabulary of the current generation’, a statement followed up by: ‘What we were finding under the old system was the searches for songs on Google or iTunes were peaking two weeks before they actually became available to buy, meaning that the public was bored of – or had already pirated – new singles.’

No music on demand? Absurd.

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You’ve just bought your shiny new mp3 player, or finally downloaded Spotify for your smartphone, and are finding that your music collection is a little dated? Don’t worry. This problem is common for many people, and the best way to solve it is by consulting music review sites for expert opinion on what you should be listening to.

The problem is music reviews websites are a dime a dozen. A true music lover doesn’t want much, beyond a reliable, reputable and consistent source. As simple as that may sound on paper, you’ve no doubt found that quality review sites are rarer than albino lions. There are three sites we swear by, and you should consider them too.

Pitchfork

Pitchfork is, for our money, the best music lover’s website in the world. Their writers are peerless when it comes to discerning ears and literary abilities, while the features on the sites make them a joy to visit even if you aren’t searching for reviews.

Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone is the cornerstone of music review publications. While its editorials often come into question, and the odd review seems out of whack with what the rest of the music world thinks, their content has been top notch for decades now. Honestly, with the way information is disseminated nowadays, especially with the web, if the present-day Rolling Stone ever died, there would be none like it again. Their top 30 albums of 2010 list alone shows why they’ve managed to stay relevant for all these years.

NME

NME (New Musical Express) is a British publication that garnered relevance and clout even in an era when people refused to look beyond Rolling Stone. The magic of the NME is its constant ability to go beyond the frontmen in bands – the lead singers – and interact with the other guys who make a meaningful contribution to the music – the other band members.

This gives this particular music reviews site and its writers insight into music that often goes beyond concluding ‘that sounds good’, as lesser sites would, to being able to describe ‘why that sounds good’.

Between these three music review websites, you’ve cast a wide enough net that you won’t miss anything important, while also not exposing yourself to critics who haven’t the foggiest clue of what they’re talking about. Sure, music is highly subjective, but when it comes to figuring out what you should really be listening to, sometimes the opinion of the unversed really is less valuable than those who do this day in day out every single day.

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Music discovery is an interesting beast. Back in the days, we used to listen to what the radio and television told us to listen to. Artists had no way of getting their ideas out. The internet has fundamentally changed that, bringing much good to the music world. The problem is this liberation of music has led to an explosion in the amount of people making and promoting music, making it very difficult to discover the best stuff without some help.

Below are three world-class music discovery services everybody should be using.

Last.fm

Last.fm, with its unparalleled recommendation engine, has taken music discovery to new levels. Through technology downloaded to your computer, the service tracks what you listen to – and how frequently you listen to it – and then, tapping its user base, finds people with similar taste to yours and then recommends artists and music to you. What’s shocking is how well the service works, and it is the most important music discovery tool in my arsenal.

We Are Hunted

We Are Hunted is an interesting beast. Basically, this music discovery tool scans through the major social networks to see which emerging artists are being discussed the most. Based on what it discovers, it then ranks the musicians on its own chart – since they are hunted – which also features filters for taste according to genre. The service lets you listen to tunes from within your browser, too, making it a great tool for immediately seeing if your fellow social networkers have a clue about what’s hot and what’s not.

Shazam

Shazam is an application available for iPhone, Android, Windows Phone 7, BlackBerry and Nokia. Unlike the other two services we mention above, Shazam is not a music discovery tool in the sense that it parses through what you (or others) listen to, and making a recommendation off of that data. No, no, Shazam is far more magical than that. What this tool does is it lets you ‘sample’ any piece of music you’re hearing that you may like but don’t know the title for, and then based off a short ‘fingerprint’, tells you what the song is. Correctly. Every time.

It’s a great way for discovering those songs you hear in a club, or on radio, or in commercials that you just can’t figure out the name for, but are dying to hear more of. In this sense it is a music discovery service in the purist sense, in that it really discovers what the music you are hearing actually is.

The conduit – your smartphone

Central to all these services is a smartphone – with the best options right now being an iPhone or one of the top-end Google Android smartphones. They allow you to not only discover new music on the fly there and then through the use of an application, but the impressive browsers that ship with these handsets let you do more digging if needed immediately.

Ultimately, the more you listen, the more you’ll find, and if you use the right music discovery services, you’ll be put onto new artists you wouldn’t have otherwise found pretty soon.

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One day, some generations from now, business students will look back on the music industry and how it fundamentally altered between the late 1990s through to 2010. It will almost certainly be a case study in how external factors – the internet – can fundamentally alter your business and turn its entire model up on its head.

It will also undoubtedly be a case study on how influential the internet has become to modern society, at a consumer level and enterprise. Having said that, we think this often sharp cocktail of music plus the web shows how folks will soon consume music.

Streaming music is unavoidable

The sharp rise to fame and mass market notoriety for streaming music services like Spotify, Rdio, Rhapsody and Pandora in 2010 is proof that these businesses will be viable, and are the next step in the evolution of music. You will no longer purchase music, but will rather stream it for either a flat monthly fee or on an ad subsidised model. Furthermore the primary consumption device will shift from mp3 players like the iPod, which dominated throughout the early 2000’s, to modern smartphones.

Digital download will remain

However, in the face of streaming music services, we do not believe there will be a sharp decline in the amount of digital downloads sold. Sure, this curve will eventually flatten out, but there will always be people who want to ‘own’ their music in addition to (or in lieu of) merely streaming the content. iTunes, which perfected this model for music distribution, will likely continue to be the big player in this space.

Physical media sales will keep shrinking

Finally, just like there will be those who prefer to download tracks in lieu of using streaming music services, there will always be an audience for CDs. The problem is, as broadband penetration increases around the world and more and more people get online, the decline of the CD business will only accelerate.

What’s really sad about this is that record labels still hold onto this business with both hands – since there is still much money to be made here – at the expensive of digital downloads and streaming music services. The issue will only come to a log for these execs when CD sales are dramatically eclipsed by digital downloads and streaming music.

The democritisation of music

All of this will result in the democritisation of music, where power is returned to the listeners and content creators, from the executives who once made all the big bucks. What’s more, a new crop of web savvy entrepreneurs will also muscle their way into this business as they mull over how to build even more disruptive software.

It’s only right if you think about it. Napster started it all, and it makes sense an internet entrepreneur finishes what was started with the file-sharing service.

Photo: Krijn Schuurman / Flickr

We love that the gap between technology and the real world is always getting narrowed. We’ve become particularly enthralled with the growing number of fitness apps that accompany smartphones. One thing that has long been obvious is that music has a positive effect on your workout. Have you ever wondered why this is so? This guide explains.

First, the obvious

Generally speaking, people do not enjoy exercise. If they did, most everyone would be fit and healthy. Alas, we aren’t. Music, on the other hand, is universally loved. So pairing music and exercise makes the exercise part bearable.

The game is about disassociation. Making the gym look like a ‘media centre’ is fine, insofar as it gets people who would otherwise not be working out, working out.

Beat rates and exercise exertion

Another reason music and exercise go so well is its ability to regulate our workout. Fast-paced music encourages people to go at a similar beat. Similarly, slower paced music regulates your pace and breathing accordingly. So, where you’re performing high-powered sprints or cycles, a touch of upbeat music will be a motivator, while for lengthy marathons, a generous serving of mellow music will help you find a steady balance.

The not-so-obvious

Music is also notable for being a fantastic memory device. That’s why people often remember certain experiences when they hear certain pieces of music. By playing a certain piece of music you like every time you work out, your brain will soon associate that music with working out.

Thoughts and recommendations

Working out with music is not for everybody, though. While it’s great for beginner and novice athletes, elite athletes at hyper competitive levels may find music a distraction from the incredible levels of focus they need throughout their race.

If you’re not an elite athlete and just want a way to enjoy your jogs more, grab an MP3 player or even a smartphone that supports exercise apps. Music and exercise go really well together.

Sony Ericsson w995 packs many features. It is fully loaded with connectivity options, the biggest screen on a Sony Ericsson feature phone, GPS, Wi-Fi and a great user interface. A balanced combination of music and imaging, the phone has a 8.1 mega pixel camera with auto focus, LED flash, geo-tagging, face detection. Wi-Fi with DLNA support and Bluetooth (with A2DP) and USB v2.0 are other helpful features of this phone. The phone has a Walkman 4.0 music player with Shake control and SensMe and an Accelerometer sensor. The phone has brushed metal body parts and offers quad-band GSM and dual-band HSDPA.

It has a 2.6 inch screen with 256K-colour TFT display of QVGA resolution. It offers WQVGA video recording at 30fps and has built-in GPS with A-GPS functionality. It has 118MB of internal memory and M2 memory expansion (8GB card included). As for audio, the Sony Ericsson w995 has stereo speakers and a 3.5 mm audio jack along with a kickstand. It also offers FM radio with RDS and multi-tasking support. Smart dialling, a comfortable keypad and nice sliding mechanism are other features of the phone. TrackID music recognition, picture editor/blogging, YouTube mode, organizer and a voice memo/dial are other features of the phone. However, the phone does not have an infrared port and its video recording limited to WQVGA. It does not have lens protection, no DivX/XviD video support and no office document viewer. All in all, an attractive phone, Sony Ericsson w995 packs many features and is a delight to use.

The world’s leading video sharing portal, YouTube, has recently shocked its UK fans by declaring that its UK web site will not host any music videos. The Google owned web site took this decision because it failed to renew its license due to a disagreement between YouTube and the UK’s Performing Right Society (PRS for Music), which is responsible for collecting licensing fees for artists and labels. Although YouTube wants to continue to serve people in the UK, it cannot do that because of the restrictions imposed by the PRS.

The previous license of YouTube is expired and this time the YouTube says that the PRS is demanding too much for the renewal. This means millions of owners in the UK of YouTube viewing capable phones, like the Nokia N96, will no longer be able to enjoy their music videos. YouTube says it cannot reach a renewal deal because there is no transparency in its deal with the PRS. Moreover, the renewal fee is so high if the YouTube pays it then it will become financially unstable. The PRS has refused to tell Google what songs are included in the license. So the Google finds no valid reason to renew its license which will finally affect the music video fans in UK.

On the other hand PRS justifies itself and the music row by commenting that Google is not willing to pay enough amount for the renewal of its license. According to the PRS foundation, “PRS for Music is outraged on behalf of consumers and songwriters that Google has chosen to close down access to music videos on YouTube in the U.K. Google has told us they are taking this step because they wish to pay significantly less than at present to the writers of the music on which their service relies, despite the massive increase in YouTube viewing.”

Tags for this article: bluetooth peripheral device iphone, iphone bluetooth peripheral device, bluetooth peripheral device ipod touch

Are you a music enthusiast? Do you want to access lots of radio stations on your PC, laptop, notebook or netbook? If yes, then it’s the right time for you to grab the Aluratek AIRJ01F USB Internet Radio Jukebox. This device is an ultra portable jukebox which is designed to fulfill all your music demands on the go. Since it has a USB interface, you can use it with any PC or portable computing machine.

As soon as you hook in the Aluratek AIRJ01F USB Internet Radio Jukebox to your PC, it will instantly give you access to over 13,000 radio stations spread in over 150 countries around the world without any hassles. That is far more variety and selection than you would ever receive on an ordinary car radio. The best part is that you won’t be charged anything for accessing these music stations. All you need is the AIRJ01F USB Internet Radio Jukebox and Aluratek’s Internet media player.

Aluratek AIRJ01F USB Internet Radio Jukebox main Attractions:

• No software installation
• Plug n Play support
• Offers music search by genre
• Access over 13,000 radio stations in over 150 countries
• Playlist creation and maintenance
• Vote for your favorite music station

Tags for this article: internet, radio, music

Does your mobile phone leave a lot to be desired? If yes, then it might be time to go for a new very impressive model that just hit the market. One of these happening gadgets is the Sony Ericsson W890.

The first thing that strikes one’s mind hearing when hearing of a Sony Ericsson gadget is music, on account of the many music phones released by the company. But the Sony Ericsson W890 is a master of all, not just music, with its excellent style, incomparable appearance, and fantastic features. Once you check the Sony-Ericsson W890i out, you won’t be able to stay away. While checking up on the product, you’ll find it naturally includes fast paced and advanced 3G technology. Its integrated 3.15 megapixel camera will also make you jump off your seat with its high resolution images and snapshots. The battery is equally high-end, offering a rather long 9 and an half hours of talking time, and 360 hours of standby time.

Despite being far more than just a music phone, the Sony Ericsson handset doesn’t neglect its musical duties either. Using memory stick micro memory card, the device’s memory is expandable by up to 2GB, on top of the 32 MB of integrated memory. In addition to playing music, the mobile, with its 2.0 inch TFT display, includes internet access and Bluetooth. Overall, it is the perfect option for those who are quality and brand conscious.