US record labels and others in the music industry are considering launching their own charts as an alternative to the iconic Billboard lists, according to multiple sources. The discussions come at a time when Billboard has come under fire for rumored changes in chart calculations that could include YouTube plays.
Music 360 – 2017 Highlights
Nielsen
Nielsen Insights
Technology continues to drive changes for how listeners are crafting and shaping their own music experience. Listening to music is more of an individual experience than ever before through playlist creation, choice of listening device and the management of what is shared across social media channels.
U.S. Music Industry’s Revenue Growth Accelerates As Paid Streaming Subscriptions Rise 50 Percent
Billboard
Dan Rys
In what’s now become a familiar story, the U.S. recorded music industry has seen revenue growth accelerate again in the first half of 2017, up 17 percent over the first half of last year to $4.0 billion, according to the RIAA’s 2017 mid-year report.
Edison’s Analysis of Queries From Nearly 500 Voice Devices Revealed Good News for Pandora
ADWEEK
Marty Swant
It might sound like an echo chamber at this point, but the rise of voice-enabled devices seems to be good news for music streaming.
Pandora’s Artist Marketing Platform Hits 1 Billion Impressions
Variety
Jem Aswad
The program (AMP), one of the first of its kind in the streaming world and a frequent talking point from recently departed company co-founder and former CEO Tim Westergren, enables artists to learn about their audience via listener data and make better decisions about where to advertise or tour.
Live concerts are music tech’s next frontier
VentureBeat
Jaja Liao
With recent speculation about Spotify soon going public (without an IPO) and the belated launch of Pandora Premium, the music streaming space is increasingly nearing both maturity and saturation.
How the rise of streaming has radically changed Nashville’s music industry
Tennessean
Nate Rau
For the first time ever, streaming accounted for more than half of music industry’s revenue, leaving digital downloads and physical sales of CDs by the wayside.
The 25-year reign of CDs is over as low-cost digital music takes over and makes us all ‘music millionaires’
AEI
Mark J. Perry
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) recently released recorded music sales revenue figures for 2016 and some of the historical music sales data from the RIAA are displayed in the two charts above (press release here). Here are some observations.
Pandora’s on-demand streaming service is available to everyone
Engadget
Nathan Ingraham
Pandora Premium is now available for anyone to try. Like just about every other streaming music service, it’ll run you $9.99 per month and the app is available for Android and iOS (a web version of Pandora’s on-demand service is coming soon).
It’s a streaming world
VICE News
Noah Kulwin
Streaming services accounted for 51 percent of total U.S. music revenue in 2016 — about $3.9 billion — from a mix of paid subscription services (Spotify Premium, Apple Music), ad-supported services (free Spotify, YouTube), and internet radio (Pandora).