Tag: The Bot Platform
Posted inNews

Messenger bot makers reveal ‘pause’ in new bot launches

Avatar photo by Stuart Dredge

Want to launch a new Facebook Messenger bot in the next few weeks? Good luck with that.

As part of the fallout from the ongoing Cambridge Analytica revelations, the social network has “paused” app reviews while it implements changes to its platform. It has now emerged that this also applies to the approval of all new bots launched for its Messenger app.

Startup Botsify alerted its customers to the news yesterday. “Basically, all the pages and chatbots that are connected to Botsify will be working fine, but you cannot connect new pages until Facebook updates their policies or resume the app-review process,” it explained in an email. “We expect this process should not take more than 1-2 weeks.”

Posted inNews

Messaging, bots and AI’s music evolution in 2017 (#midem)

Avatar photo by Eamonn Forde

Hundreds of thousands of music fans are already interacting with their favourite artists through bots on messaging apps like Facebook Messenger. So how might this trend develop in 2017 and beyond?

A panel at Midem today explored the trend. Moderated by Music x Tech x Future’s Bas Grasmayer, it included The Bot Platform’s Syd Lawrence; Sony Music’s Ricardo Chamberlain; Polydor’s Luke Ferrar; SuperPlayer’s Gustavo Goldschmidt; The Orchard’s Nikoo Sadr; and Pop’s Tim Heineke.

Posted inNews

Midemlab 2017 pitches: marketing and data / analytics (#midem)

Avatar photo by Stuart Dredge

Every year, the Midem conference’s Midemlab startups contest highlights a new crop of music/tech firms hoping to make their name with a well-crafted pitch. Today’s third session saw marketing and data/analytics startups showing their wares.

Soundcharts, Rotor Videos, NPREX, The Bot Platform and Instrumental were the five finalists pitching to a panel of judges. The latter included Bansintown’s Fabrice Sergent; Marathon Artists’ Jimi Mikaoui; Station F’s Marwan Elfitesse; and OVH Digital Launch Pad’s James Mackenzie. Bluenove’s Martin Duval hosted.

Posted inNews

How will AI and chatbots have an impact on the music industry?

Avatar photo by Stuart Dredge

AI and bots are two of the technological buzzwords currently at large in the music industry, but what impact will they really make on the way we discover, listen to and share music – as well as connecting with the artists that make it?

This morning, Music Ally hosted a conference panel at the by:Larm festival in Oslo to kick those topics around.

The panel included Ieva Martinkenaite, VP of Telenor Research, heading up its AI lab; Syd Lawrence, founder of The Bot Platform, which is powering Facebook Messenger bots for a growing number of musicians; Lucy Blair, head of international marketing at The Orchard; and Gregor Pryor, partner at law firm ReedSmith.

Posted inNews

Music’s future in a world of bots, smart assistants and invisible interfaces

Avatar photo by Stuart Dredge

The ‘future of technology’ session at last week’s FastForward conference in Amsterdam, moderated by Music Ally, started off with a discussion about virtual reality. You can read our writeup of that here.

The conversation moved on to chatbots and voice-controlled devices with smart assistants – think Amazon’s Echo and Alexa – and what they’re going to mean for musicians and the music industry.
We Make Awesome Sh’s creative director and head of design Rob Hampson talked about the company’s spin-off The Bot Platform, which has run chatbots for artists including Hardwell, Axwell Ingrosso and Olly Murs. We recently profiled the company.

Posted inMarketing, Sandbox

Sandbox 173: The GIF that keeps on giving

Avatar photo by Music Ally

Lead: GIFs might seem like a way of flooding the web with the most trivial of content, but they are a hugely important part of building fan communities around artists. While pop acts like Drake, Beyoncé, Little Mix and Lady Gaga are seeing their younger fans churn them out by the bucketload, older musicians like Paul […]

To access this post, you must subscribe. If you are already a subscriber, log in here.

Posted inAnalysis, News, Reports

Music Ally report: 30 music startups worth watching in 2017

Avatar photo by Stuart Dredge

The state of the current music/tech startups scene was a big theme at the recent NY:LON Connect conference that Music Ally and the Music Business Association co-organised.

Six British startups pitched their technologies at the event, and we’ve since published our opinion on why we feel optimistic about the music/tech landscape in 2017.

If that’s not enough startup talk for you, try this: Music Ally has compiled a mini-report about 30 of the music and music-related startups that we think are worth watching in 2017 (and hopefully beyond).

Prepared for NY:LON Connect, we’re opening it up to our readers and the wider world. From music creation and live video-streaming to blockchain-based systems, chatbots and artificial intelligence, the 30 included startups are a snapshot of the innovation going on in and around music.

To access this post, you must subscribe. If you are already a subscriber, log in here.

Posted inAnalysis, News, Startups

Six British music startups pitch their wares at NYLON:Connect

Avatar photo by Stuart Dredge

The final session at our NYLON:Connect conference in London today saw six music startups from the UK showing off their technology, and explaining how it could work for the music industry.

The Bot Platform, Mbryonic, Jaak, Gearbox, Rotor Videos and Tido are building businesses around chatbots, virtual reality, blockchain tech, hardware, algorithmically-edited videos and educational apps. Here are the highlights from their presentations.