You may have heard about two men (one of whom pleaded guilty) jailed in the UK for operating a Bit “We Know Nothing” Torrent site called “Dancing Jesus” that seems to have specialized in pirating pre-release copies of famous recording artists. According to News.com: Site owner and administrator Kane Robinson, 26, was jailed for two […]

Once again, Eric Schmidt (call sign “Uncle Sugar”) shows us why he will never understand the music business. Many, many years ago, I attended a panel that included a finance executive from a major label.  He was describing how the record company allocated resources to the records they were working. As he explained it, 90% […]

[Ed. Note: Chris Castle says:  We are so lucky to have the opportunity to publish this illuminating post by Doria Roberts, an outstanding discussion that shines a light on the issues facing all professional artists. I’m sure we’ll hear Doria’s strong voice many times in the future and will be the better for her.]  “The most […]

Order Denying Sirius Certification While the Court is largely unpersuaded and sometimes baffled by Sirius XM’s repetitive or off-point theories about how reasonable jurists might read an unwritten exclusion into §980(a)(2), the Court will not analyze the potential grounds for difference of opinion because certification of this Order suffers from an even more basic deficiency. […]

Is Irving sending a signal to all digital services?  Oh, I just betcha he is. There’s actually a pretty simple answer to the very public demand letter to YouTube from Irving’s Global Music Rights.  If Irving’s GMR has the public performance rights to these high profile songwriters it’s probably because the writers transferred their songs […]

Well, we thought about this.  Here’s another preliminary snapshot from the Music Fan Survey, this time about Bit Torrent.  (Take the survey here.)

As some of you may have noticed, we are conducting a casual survey of music fans.  While we are still collecting data, here’s an interim look at a couple of the results. I have to say that I’m not surprised by any of these results, but it is worth noting that some are wildly opposite […]

As we know, Google spends hundreds of millions every year to extend its influence through government, academia and the media.  (Although sometimes with the media it extends its influence through theft wrapped in a bunch of excuses). The venerated good government group Public Citizen released a comprehensive report entitled “Mission Creep-y” that measures many dimensions […]