Audiences trusted that they were watching independent content, but instead of being an unpaid ad, the influencer had a secret partnership with Polymarket to create fake gambling opportunities for their followers. The “bet” could be something as ridiculous as how many times Donald Trump said “McDonald’s” at a press conference. If you earn your income based on people trusting you, then when someone else is secretly taking money from them by placing an undisclosed bet, it’s an unfair advantage.
News
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David Barbe to head University of Georgia music business program full-time.
I’ve written in the past about the music business major degree programs popping up at colleges and universities all over the United States. While it still worries me that we may be creating a bigger supply of would-be music managers…
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Chris Brown gets uncomfortable on Good Morning America
Have I mentioned lately that I love subscribing to the Wall Street Journal, if only because it subsidizes Speakeasy? It’s my favorite pop culture blog of the moment, because it’s got such a wry sensibility while filtering the insanity of…
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The Orchard Lays off 20% of Staff, CEO Exits
It’s hard to read the tea leaves on this one, since this company has survived and evolved through things far worse than this: CEO Greg Scholl is leaving the company, which is also laying off one-fifth of its team. News…
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No American Idol Songwriter Competition for 2009
Andy Dehnart at Reality Blurred confirmed with both Fox and with American Idol judge Kara DioGuardi that there will be no American Idol songwriting competition this year. In fact, Andy’s report indicates that Kara herself will be taking on the…
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Lou Pearlman Can Buy His Way Out of Jail
All of Lou Pearlman’s crazy schemes have finally earned him something — 25 years in jail. Here’s someone who was, at best, a shrewd but successful music manager who bilked artists out of earnings and sought to get his company…
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Bebo Sale Spotlights Online Music Licensing Controversy
Two years ago, as Billy Bragg tells it, the founder of British social networking site Bebo came to him for advice about avoiding the same music licensing pitfalls that Bragg had railed about during the evolution of MySpace. As I…
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SXSW in the Wall Street Journal
Jim Fusilli offers a great write-up of his experience last week in Austin, where Daniel Auerbach from the Black Keys tells him that SXSW “has morphed into something else.” Twenty-one years after the first festival, it’s now an overstuffed parade…
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There was that one time I took the summer off and the record industry exploded…
Quick housekeeping: 1. Yes, posting’s light because I actually accepted a cushy corporate gig that’s only marginally related to the recording industry. I’m having a blast, and that’s helping me love music again. Truth be told, I was dangerously close…
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Burnlounge Really Is a Pyramid Scheme, Says FTC in Lawsuit
While I was away, David and Bob both covered the announcement from the Federal Trade Commission, confirming what we already knew. Burnlounge has barely sold any actual songs, and pretty much all of the money it ever generated was from…
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Lou Pearlman at Large
Depending on whom you speak to, Lou Pearlman‘s been guilty of swindling money from people for years. When Lori and I lived in Orlando, his Trans Continental Entertainment organization cast a shadow over the entire region’s creative scene. Pearlman often…
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Where can you still make money in the music business?
While our regular readers ask me that question all the time, another group of people is just as curious about the answer — Wall Street. Clem Chambers from the investment website ADVFN offers a guest commentary in Forbes Magazine about…
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links for 2007-04-06
Nine Inch Nails Tell a Transmedia Story (tags: musicbusiness) Animal Video Stuns McGraw and Hill on Tour Another reason why stage visuals should always be a group decision. (tags: musicbusiness) The Music industry: spinning into oblivion (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2007-04-05
By Ken Levine: American Idol this week (tags: musicbusiness americanidol) Hawaii Business Magazine Profiles iTunes Artist “The music business is costly. To make the master copy of a CD usually runs around $30000.” (tags: musicbusiness itunes) PoughkeepsieJournal.com – Film takes…
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links for 2007-03-30
A Tale of Two Press Releases – Who Is A Musician to Believe? Two very different lobbying groups would like your support over webcasting royalties. (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2007-03-27
Indie Bands Reach New Sales Heights Through iTunes (tags: musicbusiness) Superstar guitarist Satriani reflects upon industry changes (tags: musicbusiness) Shake-up in music business with the breakup of the album (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2007-03-23
Rachel Platten: Launching The Band What do you need to succeed? “Balls. Serious Balls.” (tags: musicbusiness)
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American Idol Songwriting Contest On Hold
UPDATE 4.4.07: American Idol Songwriting Competition Signups Open!! We figured as much, but reality blurred points us to an interview with American Idol Executive Producer Ken Warwick, who tells TV Week that “it still may happen, but at the moment,…
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links for 2007-03-22
Bruce Springsteen Book: For You One of the cool things from the Springsteen discussion — some fans are putting together a very cool book of personal Bruce experiences. (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2007-03-18
American Idol Songwriting Competition Details Getting Clearer (tags: musicbusiness americanidol)
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links for 2007-03-17
Getting Made at SXSW While SXSW is probably the music conference that is most “open” to the public, it’s still a staging ground for new acts, carefully organized by labels that want their recent signings to come off as the…
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links for 2007-03-16
Where did the music industry go so wrong? (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2007-03-14
FMQB: The Effect of American Idol on Pop Music (tags: musicbusiness americanidol) Lily Allen slates Apple’s iTunes tactics (British singer Lily Allen has accused Apple of bullying musicians into providing exclusive content for iTunes.) Um, Lily? You have a really…
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Where does college radio fit in to the streaming radio shutdown?
This is where things get very sticky. Until now, college broadcasters were able to pay a flat rate royalty based on the size of their campus and the maximum number of listeners supported by their streaming hardware. I can’t find…
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links for 2007-03-10
Bob Baker’s Indie Music Promotion Blog: YouTube, Dating Tips, and Gym Class Heroes As long as you make great video, YouTube offers you a better shot at reaching your perfect audience than MTV. (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2007-03-08
Endemol and INgrooves Strike Partnerships With MySpace Superstar Tila Tequila (bypassing record industry traditions) We saw this starting to happen a few years ago, but watch these deals accelerate through the end of the decade… (tags: musicbusiness) Latin record shops…
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Is the FCC’s Radio Payola Settlement Really a Watershed Moment for Independent Music?
Breaking news: Four very big media conglomerates are getting their hands slapped by the FCC for accepting money, gifts, trips, and promo items in exchange for adding major label songs to their playlists. (Whether or not the songs even got…
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Another Case Study: Why MySpace Should Be Your SECOND Online Home
Laura Grillo’s a model, not a musician, but the cautionary tale is still the same. MySpace pulled her profile from the site, claiming she violated terms and conditions by posting racy photos of herself. Since her own site isn’t fully…
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Selling Older Music to Older People
PaidContent.com’s Jimmy Guterman on the GrammyCast: “the record industry is still run by people still trying to sell older music to older people.” He rightly points out how sales charts in other countries reflect online sales, which is one reason…
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Bold as Love: Exploring Black Rock in America
Rob Fields, who once handled PR for the Black Rock Coalition, has just launched a new blog called “Bold as Love,” where he’s exploring the question of “how to bring more black folks to the music.” As Rob points out,…
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links for 2007-02-09
The Anderson Switch (tags: musicbusiness longtail) Triple Your Odds of Getting Music Media Coverage The most powerful question you can ask in the music business. (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2007-01-13
Perform Act (tags: RIAA musicbusiness podcasting radio idiots)
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links for 2006-12-07
Warner Music CEO Admits His Kids Stole Music (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2006-12-06
Club’s abrupt end surprises customers, city (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2006-11-30
What Universal does with digital royalties (tags: musicbusiness) Should Unversal ‘Music’ Group Change its Name to Better Reflect its Litigious Crapulence? (tags: musicbusiness) 30 seconds is not enough (tags: musicbusiness) Do you need a Web publicist? (tags: musicbusiness) Five resaons…
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links for 2006-11-29
Jimmy Iovine Gets It…The Music Biz Needs a New Biz Model…FAST (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2006-11-21
NPR on Barenaked Ladies unconventional indie marketing (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2006-11-17
The Intricacies Of Label Tax Beware The Label Tax – Forbes.com (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2006-11-16
No Money in the Middle …and the exact same thing is true for making albums for today’s marketplace… (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2006-11-15
Government subsidized rock (tags: musicbusiness) Now This Is Different For a Major Label (tags: musicbusiness) Zune Marketplace’s Absurd Pricing Scheme (tags: musicbusiness zune ipod) I’m Not Buying a Zune!!! (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2006-11-11
Microsoft, Zune & The Music Mafia (tags: musicbusiness zune Microsoft RIAA) Daring Fireball: I’d Buy That for a Dollar (tags: Microsoft zune musicbusiness) Techcrunch » On Universal Music Group’s Zune Tax (tags: zune Microsoft musicbusiness) NYT : David Pogue takes…
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MySpace Bands: It’s Not Your URL!
When the Fox television network wanted to promote the TV series Bones online, it turned to its corporate sibling, MySpace, for help. Obligingly, they offered up the screen name “Bones,” which would be pretty easy to remember. Except, that screen…
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links for 2006-11-04
Are Rappers Ashamed of College? (tags: musicbusiness) Zuzula enters artist-to-consumer market (tags: musicbusiness) Radio still big, but no longer needed for hits John Legend’s appearing on Oprah and in the Wall Street Journal — where his perfect audience is hanging…
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links for 2006-11-02
Everyone was friendly when we played follow the loss leader. If the business of music is motivated by fear of looking bad more than fear of losing money, what happens if everybody runs out of money? (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2006-11-01
HOWTO: Make your audio play in IE7 with one click. (tags: flash IE7 javascript howto music business)
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HOWTO: Make your audio play in IE7 with one click.
Correspondent Scott Andrew penned this little tutorial a few months ago to help musicians and non-techies get flash music players and other “embedded” widgets working properly inside Internet Explorer 7. Just a quick bump, since lots of folks seem to…
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links for 2006-10-19
Details from AllofMp3 press conference Sure, they’re on the run. But the folks behind AllOfMP3 have tapped in to an interesting audience — folks that view music as a utility, like water or electric. They’re willing to pay, but not…
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links for 2006-10-11
Major Music Deals for Google and YouTube (tags: musicbusiness) Study: Smoking Ban Improves Bar Workers’ Health (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2006-10-10
La La aquires WOXY, streaming radio gets kick in the pants (tags: musicbusiness)
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links for 2006-10-09
Kives took K-tel from grassroots to iTunes (tags: musicbusiness)