From Adele to the streaming wars to a call for revision of arcane music licensing laws from the U.S. Copyright Office — in our final episode of the year Larry Miller talks with Neil Shah of the Wall Street Journal about the three most important music industry stories of 2015.

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Monday Reading List

On today’s Monday Reading List: Music Business Worldwide tells us why this week will be so important for the industry, Taylor Swift and Apple join forces (again), a new study suggests that streaming might actually help record sales, and the RZA considers stealing back the Wu-Tang album that recently sold for millions.

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It’s Monday, and that means it’s time for another Musonomics Monday Reading List. This week, we check in on the Grammy nominations, Bloomberg explains why Spotify is so desperate to cling to their freemium model, Facebook launches a concert ticket service, Adele feels “eh” on streaming, and Music Business Worldwide releases their shortlist of candidates for the MBW Young Executive 2015 Award.
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Episode four is here, and it’s just in time for the launch of Apple’s new music streaming service, Apple Music.

Apple Music launches Tuesday, and we’re taking a deep dive into what the app will mean for the industry. We look back at Apple’s prosperous relationship with music, from the first iPod ad through to last month’s WWDC keynote and launch announcement. We’ve got a ton of great guests.  Josh Friedlander of the RIAA chats with us about the emergence of the streaming industry, and artist manager Emily White gives us a view into Apple’s relationship with artists. Dick Huey of  the Toolshed marketing agency sheds light on what stats to watch in the wake of Apple Music’s launch, and David Pakman sits down for an insightful chat about what success will look like for Apple Music.

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swift

 

Taylor Swift is more powerful than we could have imagined.

Sunday, Swift penned an open letter to Apple, condemning the Cupertino company’s decision not to pay artists royalties for music streamed during Apple Music’s 3-month free trial. She ended the letter with a firm charge for Apple’s decision-makers: “Please don’t ask us to provide you with our music for no compensation.”

Continue reading “Apple’s Swift Turnaround: Episode 4 is On The Way”

Apple might not be very used to this. Following the acquisition of Beats Music, the company has been trying to develop a new streaming service. In what seems like an attempt to keep up with Jay-Z’s Tidal, Apple has been throwing money at artists for exclusive content, but no one is really interested so far. The New York Times Magazine reports that Kanye claims to have turned down a “multimillion dollar partnership with Apple”. According to Bloomberg, Apple “has asked Florence and the Machine and more than a dozen other artists for exclusive deals to promote a revamped Beats Music, and persuade people to ante up for what they’re accustomed to getting pretty much for free.”

Apple might have a lot of catching up to do in the world of streaming, and they’re not being shy about approaching some of the artists that aligned with Tidal, perhaps hoping some will jump ship.