Music Ally

Having jettisoned CEO Owen Van Natta, MySpace is now focusing on discovery to recapture its mojo in 2010. Specifically, the company’s new slogan will be ‘Discover and be Discovered’. TechCrunch has details of what it means:

“The idea is to hit users over the head with new stuff when they come to MySpace. New people they should be meeting. Movie trailers they should watch. Games they may want to play (perhaps against other MySpace users), music they should listen to, articles they should read. Etc.”

In other words, MySpace is evolving into a social recommendation engine. The first sign is a new feature called ‘Stream’ – a real-time stream of what your friends are listening to, watching and linking to on MySpace.

Every morning, Music Ally subscribers are sent our daily email bulletin, offering a snapshot of news, analysts and rumours from the last 24 hours. We’re sharing today’s for free on this blog, to give an idea of what subscribers get in their inboxes by 9.30am GMT. If you’re interested in subscribing, you can sign up for a free two-week trial here.

Read on for today’s Bulletin, and do pass this link on to any colleagues or contacts who  you think would be interested too.

(more…)

Should we start talking about the curse of MidemNet? MySpace CEO Owen Van Natta has left the company suddenly, seemingly following a clash with News Corporation’s digital media boss Jon Miller.

“In talking to Owen about his priorities both personally and professionally going forward, we both agreed that it was best for him to step down at this time,” said Miller in a statement. Van Natta is being replaced by two co-presidents, Mike Jones and Jason Hirschhorn, who both joined the company last April alongside Van Natta as chief operating officer and chief product officer respectively.

“We joined MySpace last April with very a specific set of goals in mind, and are anxious to continue working together to make those goals a reality,” they say in a joint statement. Let’s hope that’s true: the last thing MySpace needs at this point in time is another big strategic change of direction, following its shift to a more music-focused strategy.

Rupert Murdoch was bullish, to say the least, in the latest financials earnings call for News Corporation, saying that “content is not just king, it’s the emperor of all things electronic… devices and platforms are proliferating but this clever technology is merely an empty vessel without any great content.”.

However, that didn’t stop the company admitting that revenues from its digital media group were down thanks to “lower advertising search revenues at MySpace” which were only partly offset by savings from its restructuring.

However, Murdoch is hopeful, saying that News Corp has seen “signs of traffic stabilization”, representing progress in “repositioning MySpace as the prime place where people share thoughts and ideas about music, entertainment and other popular content”.

Music Ally’s latest offshoot is Sandbox.fm, which focuses on digital music marketing – with a fortnightly report and blog. Every day, we’ll be rounding up the latest stories from the latter of those.

Today, Sandbox reports on a new iPhone app called Tweeb, which provides people with analytics and follower management for their Twitter account, on the go. There’s also news of livestreaming firm Ustream’s new Ustream Producer app, which helps artists produce better interactive webcasts.

Meanwhile, trance DJ/producer Markus Schulz has released a new iPhone app that, rather than simply promote himself, actually offers 15 of his favourite tracks to listen to. Universal Music Group is also going mobile, but with mobile websites rather than apps, via a deal signed with mobile technology firm Netbiscuits.

Finally, Sandbox has published its interview with Michael Schneider of DIY apps firm Mobile Roadie, and also its analysis of MySpace’s plans to make a comeback with a more artist-focused approach.

MySpace announced a partnership with US collecting body SoundExchange today at MidemNet. The two companies will be working together to find bands who are owed money by SoundExchange, but who the body can’t find.

CEO Owen Van Natta said that MySpace has already found 25,000 artists for SoundExchange – which does beg the question of why on earth some of those names hadn’t been typed into MySpace’s search engine already.

“We’re going to be using the MySpace platform to get those connections and get the money into the right hands ,” was Van Natta’s take on the deal.

(more…)

Mobile content firm Myxer has launched a new service called MobileStage, which aims to help artists and labels market themselves for mobile users.

It’s a bit like MySpace’s web version, allowing artists to create mobile websites, manage their fanlists, and even create their own apps for iPhone, BlackBerry and Android. “We listened very carefully to a large cross-section of artists, and one universal theme we heard was the artists’ desire for more engaging and personalized ways to connect with their fans,” says Myxer CEO Myk Willis.

Although it sounds interesting, the danger for Myxer is that the actual MySpace may ramp up its mobile activities in the future. Thus far, MySpace has only taken its social networking aspects to phones, but having bought iLike – which already helps bands make iPhone apps – it may well expand in the coming months.

MySpace finally completed its acquisition of music service Imeem last week for a reportedly super-low sum. However, it seems that indie artists won’t be seeing a payday from the revenues they were owed from sales of their music through Snocap widgets – Snocap was bought by Imeem last year, remember.

MySpace only bought the Imeem domain name, technology and trademarks, it turns out. “MySpace Music did not acquire imeem’s outstanding debts, including the money imeem owed to artists under the Snocap relationship,” confirms a spokesperson.

Some bands are reportedly owed up to a year’s worth of revenues. Usually it’s consumers who get stiffed when a digital music service shuts down – e.g. stores that have sold DRM’d tracks. In this case, it appears to be artists who are losing out.

Received wisdom has it that now Facebook has overtaken MySpace, the latter is doomed to a Friendster-style slide into irrelevance. However, with a new CEO and executive team in place, MySpace is aiming to make a comeback in 2010.

A group of social media experts have been giving CNET their views on what MySpace needs to do, including sorting its design out, opening up more of its APIs, and adopting a more counter-cultural role.

However, music is seen as one of its main strengths: Digital Outlook MD Jens Bachem says it should “aim to own music for today’s connected generation. The real fight is with the likes of MTV and iTunes, not Facebook, Twitter or any other social network.”

The speculation last week about Google’s music search plans was pretty much on the money. Announced officially last night, the company’s new search features will provide streaming previews when people search for song titles or artists – or even specific lyrics. iLike and Lala are the two main partners as previously reported, although the iLike element will be branded as MySpace. However, Pandora, Imeem and Rhapsody are also on board, providing links to “music related to your queries as well” – a recommendation element, in other words. The new feature is only available in the US for now. So how does Google decide which partner to serve links up for each query? A virtual coin toss, apparently.