I wanted to share my thoughts on the importance of mobile for the fledging music industry. YoY, CD sales are going down and down, and digital is growing, but not at the rate of what the CD business created for the industry. With digital piracy just existing as stronger then every and p2p networks offering the convenience, availability and breadth of content, this new industry form is something of constant debate.

The Mobile App

However,  I bet my money on mobile!  It has been discussed that the App is the next frontier and form of media format that gives a variety of options in addition to the music and video content that can be charged to the end-user as simply as one-click.  This has been constrained a bit as Apple is keeping these reins so strongly close to their chest that  true App innovation of delivering Mp3′s and other content as a convenient distribution channel over the quick and easy p2p networks is just at its infancy.  This was proven true with iTunes and the delivery of  ”ala carte” content as a viable option over the p2p networks where users were in fact willing to pay for content if the delivery was right. More and players are entering the game with the music download businesses to compete again the almighty Apple, and now that the playing field is evening out between Apple, Nokia-Microsoft, Google, RIM for the next gen Smart Phone devices, this new model will clearly present itself as in the next year as the most efficient way to categorically sell content via applications and not just store-fronts.

The proposition was validated with users going and buying content via an iTunes app, but for an artist to have their own App to sell music directly is part of this overall formula.   This type App merchandising and marketing will evolve and potentially drive Apple to explore more options then just the delivery via the iTunes store.  Instead of going to a store to searching for it,  the vast array of better user interfaces and offers will multiple this App experience.  The package of all the peripheral offerings ( video footage and music video’s, interviews, freebies, t-shirts, collectors items, etc…) associated with the Application as well as the ability for users to to be part of mobile dedicated fan list.     The App can breath life to the true culture and personality of the artist as the content can link to the real-time social networks and create opportunities for direct conversations back-n-forth. Fans have the opportunities to explore more then just the music, but the entire life-style and “taste-maker” trends of the Artist for just about any context ( places, fellow artists, and philosophy).  Even the charitable movements can be explored with “Gifting” as we saw with Pearl Jam and Oceans which is just the beginning of the entire business dimensions.   The App can live not only by a limits of distribution like for a physical CD, but can be delivered virally via those Fans.

Flattened by the Long-Tail ( both content and other business areas)

So in some ways with this total fragmentation it is hard to see where that $8~10 Billion completely migrated to? Direct sales of CD’s was one of the only options besides performances to have a connection with the music and the artist, and the actual CD Jacket was the starting point where Artists shared their culture to communicate with Fans in the 80′s and early 90′s.

Besides the overall business of the Music Industry being hard to grab onto for the labels, management and publishers of the past, what we are seeing is a new revolution of more and more music with more and more talented artists making their debut with hopes of that  chance to make it into the spot-light with their fans.   This opportunity is greater then ever, but much more verticalized and more focused on micro-communities around each artist that support the life-line of that artist through performances and merchandise.

Recently, I saw an Artist called Jerry Cherry, at Rockwood in NYC.  He is a mix of an Iggy Pop and quintessentially New York artist sound. What amazed me was the loyal following that he had at the performance and his dialog and show with the fans- truly entertaining.   It was that tight moment between him and the audience that was an emotional connection that just cemented in my mind that this was the “Soul” of this new music business.  More shows, more engagement with fans  is what an Artist needs to be positive  about as an entertainer  if they are to make a living  in this new era.   He was selling his CD’s at this venue and in fact sold a couple of them.    This is an angle that I see as the growth of this business;   much more long-tail  and concentrated in nitch verticals.  Performances are the fertile ground for artists to create that emotional attachment that can lead to a business strategy that is inexplicably linked back to mobile. Why mobile?  Because we all have it in our pocket, with intelligence to give us more and more.  Today, we can shoot images like a professional photographer, take video like a film maker, create mix-mashes of memories, and access web content when the moment is right during that music experience.

Selling those CD's at the Venue

The Mobile Moment…

I  like the analogy of a digital dessert. Even after a large meal, when the waitress brings around that dessert tray, that  sugary, creamy delight is hard to resist and make that impulsive buy of  several $$$ in that moment.   Like the dessert business is a long-tail, location specific business that bridges that final emotional connection between the chief and the consumer,  The Artist needs to think this way as well with the mobile channel being that waitresses serving tray…  So Jerry Cherry ( no pun intended as it is a dessert sounding name) instead of selling those CD’s can sell that mobile digital dessert.

[ AD] Canadian Music Week- Register Today  March 9~12th Toronto Canadian Music Week 2008- Rebirth of the Music Industry [ Video]

Of course that Mobile Moment is tied to location based services and social media. We all check-in with Foursquare, Facebook places and bring our entire social network into that moment for that instance.   It is the moment when a Butterfly flaps its wings and can create start to a Hurricane in the Gulf.  Artists that give birth to that experience for fans to share that moment is the new paradigm of distribution that can has become of the internet that we live with today.

ButterflyCream

About a year ago I had the epiphany around this concept and have been building a “war chest” of features, concepts, prototypes with my partners over at DiscoverRock , BloomEffect and others.  The goal is about how to make this a reality for artists to make money in this business.  Nothing is formally launched yet, but the seeds of this idea to bring new-revenue streams for artists has been something I have been working on as a hobby in my spare time.  We have started this with several artists and working on this platform ( No launch date to announce yet) but rather a strategy and concept we feel could lead to the next-gen business model for the long-tail of this industry.  The goal would not be to re-invent the wheel or create another mobile app platform, but to bridge all those developers and streams for this kind of  mobile tidal wave this is amongst us.    Please email us at info@butterflycream.com or @BFlyCRM

1) I did notice that the overall event was being shot in High-Definition Video… So release a DVD for sale?  How long before that gets uploaded and shared? Sell other merchandise instead and make all content FREE?

2) Prevent people from bringing their mobile phones into events?  It reminds me of the lost umbrella room at Tokyo station, all lined up in order of date and train for pick-up? Will clubs need to have honeycomb shelves holding 10′s of thousands of phones like a cloak room?

3) DRM? This never seemed to work.

4) Better policing by the likes of Google on highly-trafficked User-Generated sites like YouTube?  Well this did not work for Viacom….. both sides have valid points, but with all the ads wrapped around the content, these seems to be some justice is sharing that revenue with the content owners and publishers in some form.

Google has loads of technology, that if a company like Viacom can prove to Google that the content was their content, should they not be paid a share of the revenue that Google is generating from it?   I do understand the reasoning and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) and the rights of the end-users to share, but for a company that is making profits via other means such as advertising, etc… surrounding the content, there must be a better mechanism to create a win-win for the original rights holders depending how the rights are set-up.

…. or I guess it all goes such that the publishing industry is just going to have to live with FREE, and all money comes from live events?  All Artists now need to become an Adam Lambert, Metallica, U2 or Lady Gaga to draw a crowd and profit in Events.  So Sell Viacom stock and Buy AEG or the local T-Shirt Merchandising company that has just gone public ? Is this the answer?

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Authored by Mark Hefflinger on June 24, 2010 – 8:02am.

San Francisco - Google (NASD: GOOG) was handed a major legal victory on Wednesday, as a federal judge granted summary judgment to the company in the $1 billion copyright infringement lawsuit filed against YouTube in 2007 by Viacom (NYSE: VIA). U.S. District Court Judge Louis L. Stanton agreed with Google’s argument that YouTube is a service provider as defined under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), and is therefore entitled to “safe harbor” — such that it cannot be held liable for copyright infringements committed by its users.

Judge Stanton noted that, while Google may have been aware of copyrighted content uploaded to its site, it has no way of knowing whether the uploads were authorized.

The judge said that the “burden is on the owner to identify infringement,” and gave his seal of approval to the current system for dealing with the issue, whereby copyright owners must notify service providers like YouTube and request that works uploaded without their permission be taken down.

“The present case shows that the D.M.C.A. notification regime works efficiently: when Viacom over a period of months accumulated some 100,000 videos and then sent a mass take-down notice on February 2, 2007, by the next business day YouTube had removed virtually all of them,” Judge Stanton wrote.

Viacom intends to appeal the ruling.

“We believe that this ruling by the lower court is fundamentally flawed and contrary to the language of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the intent of Congress, and the views of the Supreme Court as expressed in its most recent decisions,” the company said in a statement.

“We intend to seek to have these issues before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit as soon as possible. After years of delay, this decision gives us the opportunity to have the Appellate Court address these critical issues on an accelerated basis.”

“This is an important victory not just for us, but also for the billions of people around the world who use the web to communicate and share experiences with each other,” Google vide president and general counsel Kent Walker wrote on the company’s blog.

“We’re excited about this decision and look forward to renewing our focus on supporting the incredible variety of ideas and expression that billions of people post and watch on YouTube every day around the world.”

The press-release is below, but this is a true story of a  mobile music journalist to go Rock-Star!

I met Val Halla when she was doing some reporting for GoMo News for Canadian Music Week 2009.  It was the middle of the worst part of the economic storm, but Val was there to write about anything big and cool in the mobile music space that might be a spark of hope for the music industry….. I was so impressed by her, that we made her website mobile ( here is the blog-post back in March 09).   Since then I am no longer working with the Mobify team (  I do not think the site is still up), but I have a been a big believer as well that the “Mobile Moment” is a “Music and Venue Moment” tied to the anchor of an artist’s own mobile site…..where they can sell everything from content to unique goods at the Venue.

Not only have we kept close contact over the years and she has helped me in many ways with some of the Artists I have been involved with.

This is a proud day for us and the mobile marketing….music business and Val…. Good things happen to Good people… lets she if she goes mobile for this tour!

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Canadian Rocker Val Halla Recruited for 28 Dates on

Ted Nugent Tour After Texas Gig.

Saskatchewan Artist & Former Vancouver resident, Val Halla, will open up 28 dates of Ted Nugent’s “Trample the Weak, Hurdle the Dead Tour 2010” beginning June 16^th in Boston, and continuing through August 8^th in Wichita, KS.

Val Halla came to the attention of Nugent after performing a gig in Waco, Texas.  After hearing good things, Nugent asked Halla to sing on a demo for a song he was recording at a studio just outside of town.  Impressed by Halla, he called his management at Doc McGhee Entertainment (KISS, Darius Rucker), who then came out to see Halla perform in April in West Hollywood, CA.  Only two days later, Halla (who has served as her own manager & booking agent for the last 9 years) was asked to be the opening act on 28 dates of Nugent’s tour.

Halla is promoting her fourth album “No Place” which was just released in March 2010.  Her songwriting and guitar playing has won her coverage in both Guitar World Magazine, and Guitar Player Magazine and showcases this year at Canadian Music Week, SXSW, and the Florida Music Festival. The album features high profile players including Elliott Randall of Steely Dan, and Murray Pulver of Doc Walker.  A group of Austin, TX musicians will be backing Halla up on the Nugent tour.  The band is made up of three incredibly talented Berklee drop outs: guitarist Neal Davis, bassist Alex Ferreiro, and drummer Marty Higman.

To raise funds for tour support – Ted Nugent himself is signing “Texas flag” guitars that sponsors will receive for donating $500 or $1000, as well as other rewards packages for donations from $10 to $250 dollars. Val Halla has no record label to provide tour support, so this is a grass roots effort. Tour support is being raised through http://feedthemuse.net/valhalla

• Date                City/State                                           Venue
• June 16            Boston, MA                                        The House of Blues
• June 17            Providence, RI                                    Lupo’s Heartbreak Hotel
• June 18            Hampton Beach, NH                           Hampton Beach Casino Ballroom
• June 19            Philadelphia. PA                                 Electric Factory
• June 20            New Haven, CT                                  Toad’s Place
• June 22            Clifton Park (Albany), NY                     Northern Lights
• June 23            Wantagh, NY                                      Mulcahy’s
• June 24             Jim Thorpe, PA                                  Penn’s Peak
• June 25             Fredericksburg, VA                            Celebrate Virginia Central Park
• June 26             North Myrtle Beach, SC                      The House of Blues
• June 27             Lake Buena Vista, FL (Orlando)          The House of Blues
• June 29             Fort Lauderdale, FL                            Revolution
• July 2              Fayetteville, AR                                   Arkansas Music Pavilion
• July 4              San Antonio, TX                                  Back Stage Live (Sunken Garden Theatre)
• July 5              Donna, TX                                          Donna Corn Maze Amphitheatre
• July 7              Ardmore, OK                                      Heritage Hall
• July 13             Fort Smith, AR                                   The Rib Room
• July 14             Nashville, TN                                     The Wildhorse Saloon
• July 18             Tulsa, OK                                          Cain’s ballroom
• July 20             Merrillville, IN                                     Star Plaza Theatre
• July 23             Clear Lake, IA                                    Surf Ballroom
• July 25             Sylvania, OH                                      Centennial Terrace
• July 27               Prestonburg, KY                                Mountain Arts Center
• July 28              Cleveland, OH                                   House Of Blues
• July 29             Columbus, OH                                   LC Outdoor Amphitheater
• July 30             Pittsburgh, PA                                   Amphitheatre at Station Square
• August 4          Chicago, IL                                        The House of Blues
• August 8          Park City (Whichita), KS                      Hartman Arena

For more information Contact Val Halla Music

at 615-573-5599 or info@valhallaonline.com

Here is the website

…..and here is what the mobile view of the site looks like powered by Mobify.Me

Now what is so unique about the mobification process with Mobify.Me is that these two views are the same site! This is what makes this so special.

For CanadianMusicFest there are the artists and venue listings on the festival website that have been mobified.  When you click on the website link in the CanadianMusicFest mobified landing page, the mobified site for the band is the site that you get from your device.  This auto-redirecting completely in mobile with all the right domains  http://m.thetrewsmusic.com unique.  Could you imaging if all 600+ Bands had all theirs sites mobile?

The mobify.me product is unique in that there is no mobile website created. The service works so that a web designer is in full control of the lay-out of the site when it is hit by different mobile browsers. This enables a one-web/two-view of the site ( Online view, and mobile view). We also added a mobile-tab page in the main Canadianmusicfest.com site to for users to get the mobile-view as a Text-push and also register for alerts during the event. We do not plan on having many alerts this year unless there is a sponsor. If you are interested in sponsoring, please contact Mary Simon’s Sponsorship@cmw.net.   Below is an example of the mobile site.