Music Ally

If you can’t get even, get mad. And then get away with their fast food.

US label Dovecote Records has posted an account on its blog of accidentally filching pizza in a bar that belonged to a company having an event there. Cue someone allegedly shouting at them “You STOLE our pizza… You can’t steal other people’s things. You can’t take what’s not yours.” The company in question? Lime Wire.

Cue Dovecote outrage, an attempt to make off with an entire pizza, and an (again, allegedly) aggressive laptop-beer-drenching.

Obligatory disclaimers: we’ve only heard the label’s side, and it should be noted that Lime Wire has a legal music store these days that sells music by indie labels very much like Dovecote. In fact, it may even sell music by that label.

Even so, for an anecdote containing the retort “Well when are you going to figure out how to download pizza into my stomach?”, we love it.

Global Gaming Factory CEO Hans Pandeya has been explaining his company’s plans for taking The Pirate Bay legit, following its acquisition earlier this week.

In short, he plans to pay users for sharing files, and pay rightsholders who provide the files that are shared. And he’ll raise money from ISPs in return for reducing the strain on their networks.

“Let’s say a popular song comes out. Rather than a million downloads from a site – which would cause a considerable strain on that ISP – we can take that song and put it out on P2P,” he says.

As Mashable points out, this strategy depends on a.) users sticking around, b.) rightsholders agreeing to such a deal, and c.) ISPs seeing enough benefits to pay for it. Meanwhile, Business Week highlights more potential legal and commercial obstacles to the new plan.

Having splashed out big bucks on sponsoring U2’s latest world tour, BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion is hoping to reap the rewards. Starting with something described as “The U2 Mobile album”, for which RIM has launched a teaser website.

It’s light on detail and heavy on slogans (the site, obv, not the album. Although…) So it will let users “show the world what the music means to you” and “experience the tour from all angles”.

Having trumpeted its commitment to music at MidemNet this year, RIM has since flattered to deceive, with many of the music apps on its BlackBerry App World store already available on other handsets. Maybe U2 can help to change that, along with Will.I.Am’s Dipdive app, which is already available.

If you follow our buzz chart in the Music Ally Report, you’ll know that Lady GaGa has reigned supreme in recent months as the most popular artist online. At last, there’s some bad news: she was also one of the artists most often deleted from people’s Last.fm scrobbles in June.

That’s according to a top ten released by the music service, showing tracks that people played, but then deleted presumably out of embarrassment. GaGa’s Poker Face tops the chart, and she has three more tracks in the top ten.

Britney Spears has three. In fact, it’s notable that nine of the ten are by female singers (and the tenth is by Paramore, a female-fronted band). Are Last.fm’s male users a bit sensitive about their penchant for girly pop?

Something tells us buying The Pirate Bay may end in tears for Swedish firm Global Factory X.

The public company is facing an insider trading investigation after its stock saw a huge upswing in trades on Monday, the day before the deal was announced. “There are reasons to suspect that information was leaked,” says an official at the Swedish AktieTorget stock exchange.

Meanwhile, The Register reports that the site has been “flooded with account deletion requests” from angry users since the deal was announced.

This is the real problem for TPB’s new owner – the site’s users have been fiercely loyal, but if they abandon ship now, GFX’s acquisition starts to look much less of a bargain.

Lime Wire has announced that it will be selling music from CD Baby’s roster of 240,000 independent artists in its LimeWire Store, after striking a deal with the digital distribution firm. That means Lime Wire now offers more than 3.5 million licensed tracks in its store, even if none of the majors have yet signed up. “CD Baby and LimeWire Store both champion independent artists and give them access to new customers and revenue opportunities, so it’s a perfect partnership, really.”

Sony Music Entertainment has taken an undisclosed stake in digital distributor, and plans to integrate parts of the latter’s platform with its RED distribution subsidiary. Sony says the deal shows its commitment to expanding its services to indie labels. “Sony Music is committed to offering independent labels and distributors the most compelling package of distribution services in the industry,” says Sony’s Thomas Hesse.

EMI Publishing is refusing to make its catalogue available for streaming under the new 0.085p minima rate proposed by PRS for Music in the UK. The publisher will now administer its own royalty collections with the aim of securing higher rates from streaming services.

“We are not currently satisfied that the new rates – in particular the minima – proposed by PRS for Music for streaming services are appropriate,” says general counsel for Europe Antony Bebawi. Universal Music Publishing and Sony/ATV are also thought to be unhappy with the new rates.

This is a serious problem. The new rates were hailed as a chance to give innovative new streaming services a chance to thrive. EMI’s decision to snub them shows that the problems facing online licensing aren’t just about technology firms versus the music industry – they’re as much about the infighting within the music industry itself.

Spotify co-founder Daniel Ek has been talking frankly about his company’s business model and future plans. Is it on target with its revenue forecasts? “Not really, to be honest. We’re in one of the world’s worst recessions, and it’s taken longer to get started. We view it as we haven’t really started yet.” Ek said video content and an IPO are possible in the future, and said it’s working with 7Digital on one-click song purchases – “The download integration we have now is not very good”.

Source: The Register – http://tinyurl.com/murtbn

Well, who saw this coming? The Pirate Bay has been sold to Swedish company Global Gaming Factory X for £4.7 million, and the site’s new owners say they plan to take it legit, with a new business model.

Specifically, GGFX said that the site needs a new model that “satisfies the requirements and needs of all parties, content providers, broadband operators, end users, and the judiciary”, while CEO Hans Pandeya backed that up with this statement: “We would like to introduce models which entail that content providers and copyright owners get paid for content that is downloaded via the site.”

So what’s going on here? The co-founders of The Pirate Bay are facing a £2.2 million fine and a year in jail following their recent conviction in Sweden – which they’re appealing – but say the sale is about ensuring the site itself survives.

(more…)