Digital and Mobile
Shawn Gee Partners With Twitch to Launch BlackStream Live
The goal of BlackStream is to “unite some of the most influential, impactful, and inspiring voices of today to craft provocative and entertaining content as projected through the lens of the modern Black experience, yet meaningful to multiple generations,” a statement announcing BlackStream reads. Through strategic alliances with tastemakers and programmers, Twitch has made significant investments in the music space. In August, the Amazon-owned company announced a partnership with the Rolling Loud festival for live hip-hop events on the platform and a month later Twitch announced a partnership with Relix magazine and its owner Peter Shapiro from (who also owns Brooklyn Bowl, Capitol Theatre and Lock’N fest) to launch a channel focused on jam bands. Twitch also has streami...
Facebook Blocks News Viewing, Sharing In Australia
“It has left us facing a stark choice: attempt to comply with a law that ignores the realities of this relationship, or stop allowing news content on our services in Australia. With a heavy heart, we are choosing the latter,” Easton added. The company’s decision to take the nuclear option and block news access and sharing has already led to a storm of criticism from the emergency services in Australia who rely on the social media platform to relay vital information on wildfires, floods, extreme weather and COVID-19 among other local interest and public safety issues. The Australian government slammed Facebook for what is a landmark local ban on viewing and sharing news. “Facebook was wrong. Facebook’s actions were unnecessary, they were heavy-handed and they w...
Vivendi Planning to Move Forward With UMG IPO This Year
The idea is to avoid the so-called “conglomerate discount,” under which a company could be valued by the market as less than the sum of its parts — especially by investors looking for more direct exposure to the music sector at a time when streaming is fueling growth and optimism. “This plan is the result of the joint efforts in recent years by the Vivendi and the Universal Music Group, under the leadership of Sir Lucian Grainge, to further the company’s position as the music industry’s undisputed leader,” Vivendi said in a letter about the move that was shared internally at Universal by Grainge, the company’s chairman and CEO. “Recently the successful opening of UMG’s share capital to an international consortium led by Tencent has confirmed its attractiveness with strategic investor...
Selena Gomez Slams Big Tech Following U.S. Capitol Siege: ‘Enough Is Enough’
In an exclusive interview with The Associated Press, Gomez said she’s frustrated by what she views as the companies’ lackluster response and that they have to “stop doing the bare minimum.” “It isn’t about me versus you, one political party versus another. This is about truth versus lies and Facebook, Instagram and big tech companies have to stop allowing lies to just flow and pretend to be the truth,” Gomez said in a phone interview from New York. “Facebook continues to allow dangerous lies about vaccines and COVID and the U.S. election, and neo-Nazi groups are selling racist products via Instagram. “Enough is enough,” she said. Facebook and Twitter representatives declined to comment. Google didn’t respond to an AP request for comment. Gomez is among a growing number of celebrities using...
Ignoring Ban, Trump Supporters Traveled by the Busload to D.C. Rally With Help of Concert App
For some hardcore Trump supporters like Ben Philips, of Bloomburg, Pennsylvania, the income earned through the site augments an existing pro-MAGA business. Philips is the owner of the Trumparoo toy company, which makes stuffed kangaroo toys with a Trump-like tuft of orange hair that he sells to passengers in the van caravans he organizes on Eventbrite, charging $25 per person. (Eventbrite typically charges $.79 per ticket sold plus 4.5% fee for ticket sales on its platform.) On Jan. 6 Philips died on the steps of Capitol Hill from a sudden stroke, hours after he dropped off a van full of Trump supporters he met on the site at the presidential rally, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer. Passengers learned of Philips’ death when he didn’t return to the van. After multiple calls to his cel...
Apple Music’s Africa Strategy Is Starting to Pay Off
“Africa has birthed a lot of special talents that have been creating amazing music for a long time and we’re happy to finally have the platforms and the means to share our music across the continent and to the rest of the world,” Tems tells Billboard. “[The Africa Rising program] allowed my music to reach new listeners and [has] also given my supporters and myself something to be excited about in these tough times.” ALL EYES ON AFRICA Over the past several years, labels, distributors and industry trade groups have turned their focus towards the African music market, and Apple Music is not the only streaming service making inroads on the continent, or supporting its local artists. (Tems, for example, was also included as part of the latest class of YouTube’s Foundry program, whi...
Reddit Acquires TikTok Competitor Dubsmash
“Both Reddit and Dubsmash share a deep-rooted respect for how communities come together,” said Reddit CEO Steve Huffman. “Dubsmash elevates underrepresented creators, while Reddit fosters a sense of community and belonging across thousands of different topics and passions. It’s clear that our missions closely align and that our community-focused platforms can coexist and grow as we learn from each other.” While Dubsmash launched as a creation tool for lip-synching videos in 2015, its founders retooled the offering two years later to add social media elements. It has since emerged as a strong competitor in the growing social video app market, which is dominated by TikTok (with 100 million monthly active U.S. users and 2 billion global downloads) but also include...
Shakira Crowned Google’s Most-Searched Artist of 2020: See Full List
Google has unveiled its Year in Search List, revealing all of the trends of 2020 including music, movies, sports teams, and more. In the U.S, Shakira tops the most-searched artist and band list, followed by August Alsina, Adele, Doja Cat, Grimes, Van Halen, Lizzo, Tamar Braxton, Quando Rondo, and Tory Lanez. Shak is also the No. 7 most-searched person of the year, just above Tom Brady, Kanye West, and Vanessa Bryant. But the Latina superstar, who’s currently making the rounds with the Black Eyed Peas-assisted “Girl Like Me” single, is not the only Colombiana on the list. You Deserve to Make Money Even When you are looking for Dates Online. So we reimagined what a dating should be. It begins with giving you back power. Get to meet Beautiful people, chat and make money in the process. Earn r...
Hip-Hop Streaming Platform Spinrilla Found Liable for Users’ Copyright Infringement
On Monday, U.S. District Judge Amy Totenberg granted summary judgment in favor of the RIAA on the issue of liability and rejected Spinrilla’s DMCA Safe Harbor defense. Totenberg notes that the 11th Circuit hasn’t yet considered whether direct copyright infringement must be willful, but finds “even if volitional conduct is required to prove direct infringement, the cases on which Plaintiffs rely have all held that the affirmative act of streaming constitutes direct infringement of the copyright holder’s exclusive right of performance regardless of the fact that the streaming occurs at the request of the user.” She continues, “Defendants have created an interactive internet player that streams copyrighted content directly from its website and mobile app. In doin...
BMG Acquires Catalog of Cheyenne Records, Including Songs by Germany’s No Angels
“The catalogue of Cheyenne Records is among the crown jewels of German pop music of the 2000s, and we are delighted to bring them back to the public,” Maximilian Kolb, BMG managing director GSA, said in a statement. “The acquisition shows BMG’s commitment to delivering the best service to artists and songwriters in the digital world.” BMG says the deal will bring back streaming availability to No Angels, which has been absent from digital streaming platforms for five years. The company notes the group had sales of more than five million, making it the biggest-selling German girl band of all time. No Angels’ 2002 debut single, “Daylight In Your Eyes,” sold more than 500,000 copies within a week after its release, according to BMG. Other hits that will now be available on digital platf...
Wixen Music Publishing Hits Triller With $50M Copyright Lawsuit
Wixen Music Publishing is suing short-form video-sharing app Triller for $50 million alleging copyright infringement on more than 1,000 songs. Wixen claims that Triller has been “willfully infringing” its musical compositions by allowing its users to include them in videos without authorization or compensation, according to the 15-page federal complaint filed U.S. Central District of California Western Division on Tuesday. Triller’s app, similar to TikTok’s, allows users to create and share short videos that typically include music. Wixen, who administers more than 50,000 songs written and owned by its more than 2,000 clients — Tom Petty, Neil Young and Missy Elliott among them — alleges that many of their compositions are being used in the app without the proper licenses...
Tencent Music Entertainment Grew Subscribers 10% to 4.6M In Third Quarter
Tencent Music’s music apps fared relatively well, with paying users growing 7%, 10.3% and 9.8% in the first, second and third quarters. Revenue didn’t keep the pace as third quarter paying users were just 0.3% over the final 2019 count. Music subscribers grew by 4.6 million to 51.7 million, up 46% year-over-year and up 9.8% from the second quarter. In unit terms, subscriber growth improved on the 2.8 million in the first quarter and 4.4 million in the second quarter. Music monthly active users (MAU) fell 2.3% to 646 million, down from 661 million in the prior-year period Monthly music ARPU (average revenue per user) grew 5.6% to 9.4 yuan ($1.42) Signs of the COVID-19 pandemic are visible on Tencent Music’s metrics. In the first quarter, as much of China was under lockdown orders, Tencent M...
