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Believe it or not, Apple iTunes might have some competition coming from some new/old players in town!
In recent news, rumors are rumbling about Google possibly getting into the music service business. Potentially, with search results there could be an opportunity to purchase music from your favorite artist. This is big for Google and possibly something Apple will need to worry about.
If it wasn’t enough having recent news about Google and music services, Facebook is now in the news for it’s interest in music sales too! This is no rumor because Facebook has already started selling music in it’s online gift store. This is great news with the idea of how innovative online companies are trying to be, however possibly a little nerve racking for the online music mogul- Apple iTunes. May the music race BEGIN!!!!

Yahoo has come out ahead in a recent court case involving it’s Launch Media division and major record labels. These record labels wanted to be able to mandate a “status” of the media division (Launchcast Webcasting Service) as an “interactive service”. This title would have then made it a requirement for Launchcast to pay higher fees to broadcast it’s music. Instead the court ruled that the webcasting service would be treated as that, a web service, and only be required to pay some small royalty fees. This is great news for Yahoo who could have had to pay a lot more money to run their internet radio service.
This court case, and others involving major record labels, has really put a damper on the record label’s ability to earn revenue from their music being played. This opens up more conversations in the fact that how can record labels continue to earn revenue? Are we potentially looking at a whole new outlook on record labels and what they do to create music? What about the idea of them being run by internet companies? Distribution of CDs has really dropped off in recent years, and court cases like this one will continue to add fuel to this uphill battle the record labels and their artists are going through.

While the record labels are struggling to bring in revenue, social networking sites are where many companies are turning to help save them. According to Business Week, “The record industry has been hammered in recent years by online piracy and a dearth of mega-hits, with sales sliding steadily since their peak of $14.6 billion in 1999. As CDs sales have dropped, the labels have tried repeatedly to develop digital strategies to make up the difference, and they’ve all come up short. Last year was the industry’s worst yet in terms of revenue losses. The total value of digital and traditional sales dropped 12% in 2007, to $10.4 billion, compared with a 4.4% slide the year before, according to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).”
Record labels are looking to utilize the internet to help this struggling industry, and why not partner up with social networking? Will MySpace Music be able to handle such a large partnership? They certainly have the audience for the record companies, but will it be used effectively? I guess we will all see how successful this partnership is, and if it works I am sure the rest of the record labels will be looking at social networking to increase sales.
Leadpile Lead Exchange works in affiliate marketing, and this sounds like another form of affiliate marketing that could also work effectively.