Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen collaborates with Heart, Joe Walsh and other rock stars on new album

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Paul Allen, the Microsoft co-founder, Jimi Hendrix aficionado and avid guitar player, is coming out with a new album in August — and he has some pretty impressive collaborators helping him out. Chrissie Hynde, Joe Walsh, and Anne and Nancy Wilson of Heart are among the big names who perform with Allen and latest his band,… Read More…

Who wrote that song? Rhapsody becomes first music service to offer liner notes

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To many listeners, one benefit of purchasing physical music is the ability to learn who was responsible for the behind-the-scenes production, like the names of songwriters, background vocalists or song producers and engineers. Unfortunately for those music fans, often-used digital players today now only include basic information like song title, artist name and album. Now, though,… Read More…

Rhapsody exec advises Spotify, Rdio: You’re doing it wrong

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Jon Maples, Rhapsody VP of Product and Content, has some veteran advice for fellow music streaming competitors Spotify and Rdio: Stop making the same mistakes we did. In this blog post, Maples takes a trip down memory lane and discusses how Rhapsody put out costly advertisements from 2008-2010 that share similarities with the TV spots Spotify… Read More…

What startups can learn from rock ‘n’ roll bands

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So what can startups learn from the local do-it-yourself Rock N Rollers? You think it’s hard to get people to click on your link, imagine inviting hundreds — or even thousands — of people to your show and knowing that your income is determined by how many of those people show up and buy merchandise. Trust… Read More…

Twitter unveils sleek new #music discovery app for web, iOS

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There’s a new way to find the tunes and tracks everyone is talking about. Twitter today debuted a new music discovery platform for both browsers and iOS devices. The service uses Twitter activity to aggregate the most popular music. You’re also able to preview the songs right through the app via iTunes, and subscribers to… Read More…

iTunes rival: AmazonMP3 growing with 22% of online music downloads

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iTunes has been the king of digital music downloads for the past ten years, but the latest numbers show Amazon slowly gaining ground. The NPD Group is out with its 4Q digital music downloads numbers and AmazonMP3 held 22 percent of the paid music market. While that’s considerably lower than Apple’s 63 percent market share,… Read More…

Sorry, Amazon: Court frowns on resale of ‘used’ digital music

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A federal judge’s ruling in favor of Capitol Records in a suit against the ReDigi digital music service could have implications for Amazon.com and other companies that have been eying the market for “used” digital goods. Siding with the record label’s copyright claims, U.S. District Court Judge Richard Sullivan found, in essence, that transferring ownership… Read More…

Microsoft amps up Xbox Music app with performance improvements, cloud syncing

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The updates are flowing for Microsoft. Just a day after releasing fixes for its Windows 8 Mail, Calendar and People apps, the Xbox team today announced some improvements to the Xbox Music app. Updates include performance enhancements for Windows RT devices, the ability to add and sync songs from your library to the cloud and… Read More…

Report: Amazon.com in talks with music labels about new subscription service

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The music subscription business is a tough one, as evidenced by our report earlier today that industry pioneer Rhapsody continued to lose cash even as revenues hit a record of $143 million last year.  Despite the trials and tribulations of online music, Amazon.com appears poised to expand its efforts in the arena. The Verge reports that… Read More…

Amazon debuts Cloud Player app for iPad, iPad Mini

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Already available on the iPhone and iPod touch, today Amazon launched its free Cloud Player app for the iPad and iPad mini. “Our goal is to make Cloud Player the most widely compatible cloud playback solution available, giving our customers the ability to buy their music once and enjoy it everywhere,” Steve Boom, VP of Digital… Read More…