Apple, Bloomberg: Two media brands in the social era
Reading the business section of yesterday's New York Times, you couldn't help but notice the juxtaposition of two seemingly different companies, which, at second glance, have more in common that you might think. One is Bloomberg, the financial data juggernaut that has enough cash to aspire to become “the world’s most influential news organization.†The company has placed its bets on the acquisition of the venerable BusinessWeek, trusting that it will broaden its reach into a mainstream business audience. A few pages later, Digital Domain columnist Randall Stross reveals Apple’s pending patent application for a new advertising pop-up technology that forces users of devices and web sites to acknowledge the reception of the commercial message.What Apple calls “enforcement routine†is basically a radical ad-based model that offers consumers to use Apple’s products and services for free or at a discount if they “watch ads they may not want to watch.†Stross writes: “Its distinctive feature is a design that doesn’t simply invite a user to pay attention to an ad--it also compels attention. The technology can freeze the device until the user clicks a button or answers a test question to demonstrate that he or she has dutifully noticed the commercial message. Because this technology would be embedded in the innermost core of the device, the ads could appear on the screen at any time, no matter what one is doing.†As Stross points out, other brands went down this path before and utterly failed, and he is stunned that Apple, if it is serious about this technology, seems to be willing to risk its reputation of consumer-friendly “cool.â€One story can be read in the context of the other: Bloomberg and Apple not only share a zealously rigid culture and a “walled garden†business model based on selling high-grade packages at a premium price; they are also both media companies. Both have strong communities driven by the Three C’s of Communities--connectivity, content, and context--and both are wondering which of these parameters they can exploit more aggressively without jeopardizing the integrity of the community that is the foundation of their business. Both Apple and Blooomberg create value by heavily relying on network effects within an ecosystem that they tightly control. Both are distributing content to raise demand for their products. And both have a strong brand to extend â€" and to lose.With the acquisition of BusinessWeek, Bloomberg’s strategic trajectory is clear: Owning a proprietary technology platform (it sold 300,000 terminals to date), the company is looking for ways to reach more potential buyers (and sell premium services). Apple’s “terminals,†on the other hand, are its iTunes store and its user interfaces, and the recent patent application indicates that the company might explore the exploitation of attention generated through these properties. Bloomberg is buying attention to open up new sources of revenue, Apple might be selling it.The two brands have one last trait in common: They are not really embracing social media, to put it mildly. Apple, as a company, does not engage, and Bloomberg even discourages its employees to engage. Apple and Bloomberg, in some ways, are the antidotes to a marketplace that â€" propelled by the forces of the Social Web â€" is becoming increasingly atomized, hyper-distributed, open, and transparent. Secrecy, compliance, top-down hierarchies, rigid communication policies, and walled gardens are characteristics that may be somewhat outdated in this era, and yet they seem to be the very cornerstones of Apple’s and Bloomberg’s success as the two firms thrive as the surprise champions of their respective categories. Both came to save ailing industries, ripe for innovation: Apple reinvented the music industry and the Smart Phone market. Bloomberg is determined to reinvent the news business. But in the long term, can Apple sustain its community of loyal users without becoming a more transparent organization? And can Bloomberg really emerge as “the world’s most influential news organization†without going social?
Music apps pumped up the volume -- and dollars -- in 2013
Music apps pumped up the volume -- and dollars -- in 2013
An influx of new music apps may be raising the competition, but they're raising money as well. App Annie, an analytics company that monitors app rankings, found music app revenue jumped 77 percent last year from 2012, in a review of app data. The category moved up to the third most popular type of app last year, after being ranked seventh in 2012. Social networking apps moved up the same number of steps in the rankings to the No. 2 spot, with games continuing to dominate the chart. That music-app growth was led by Pandora. Worldwide, the Internet's top radio service was also the second biggest generator of revenue in the app universe, excluding games. It trailed only Line, the social messaging service ubiquitous in parts of Asia. That's a pretty good showing, but the ranking is more impressive if you consider a few factors. Pandora is operational only in the US, Australia and New Zealand. The App Annie data primarily measures revenue from downloading a paid app and in-app purchases -- in the case of Pandora, which is free to download, that simply means subscriptions, which is Pandora's secondary source of revenue. The App Annie ranking doesn't take into account advertising revenue generated with an app, the company's real revenue engine. Granted, had ad revenue been included in the rankings, Pandora would face stiffer competition from the likes of Facebook and YouTube.See also: Spotify, Rdio, Beats Music, and more: How to get started with subscription music servicesCompetition in online music services is only increasing. Pandora continues to lead the market, but giants like Apple and Google added new services like iTunes Radio and All Access last year. Longtime players like Spotify and Slacker launched new features or shook things up with updates, and more have launched this year already: Beats' paid subscription-only service rolled out earlier this month. Google is said to be rolling out another subscription service through YouTube, and French hit Deezer is said to be exploring an expansion to the US.Unsurprisingly, Deezer was one of the most popular downloads in France, where Shazam -- the music recognition service -- was also in the top five. The App Annie review of 2013 also found messaging apps were evolving into social platforms that added e-commerce, books and music. Gamers are more often preferring their iPhones and Android devices to a Nintendo 3DS or Sony Vita: iOS and Google Play app stores both saw a surge in game revenue that lifted them above handhelds for the first time.
An influx of new music apps may be raising the competition, but they're raising money as well. App Annie, an analytics company that monitors app rankings, found music app revenue jumped 77 percent last year from 2012, in a review of app data. The category moved up to the third most popular type of app last year, after being ranked seventh in 2012. Social networking apps moved up the same number of steps in the rankings to the No. 2 spot, with games continuing to dominate the chart. That music-app growth was led by Pandora. Worldwide, the Internet's top radio service was also the second biggest generator of revenue in the app universe, excluding games. It trailed only Line, the social messaging service ubiquitous in parts of Asia. That's a pretty good showing, but the ranking is more impressive if you consider a few factors. Pandora is operational only in the US, Australia and New Zealand. The App Annie data primarily measures revenue from downloading a paid app and in-app purchases -- in the case of Pandora, which is free to download, that simply means subscriptions, which is Pandora's secondary source of revenue. The App Annie ranking doesn't take into account advertising revenue generated with an app, the company's real revenue engine. Granted, had ad revenue been included in the rankings, Pandora would face stiffer competition from the likes of Facebook and YouTube.See also: Spotify, Rdio, Beats Music, and more: How to get started with subscription music servicesCompetition in online music services is only increasing. Pandora continues to lead the market, but giants like Apple and Google added new services like iTunes Radio and All Access last year. Longtime players like Spotify and Slacker launched new features or shook things up with updates, and more have launched this year already: Beats' paid subscription-only service rolled out earlier this month. Google is said to be rolling out another subscription service through YouTube, and French hit Deezer is said to be exploring an expansion to the US.Unsurprisingly, Deezer was one of the most popular downloads in France, where Shazam -- the music recognition service -- was also in the top five. The App Annie review of 2013 also found messaging apps were evolving into social platforms that added e-commerce, books and music. Gamers are more often preferring their iPhones and Android devices to a Nintendo 3DS or Sony Vita: iOS and Google Play app stores both saw a surge in game revenue that lifted them above handhelds for the first time.
Bandloop vs. JamBase for online show tracking
Bandloop vs. JamBase for online show tracking
Now it looks as if JamBase has some strong competition in the form of Bandloop. It's hard to improve upon JamBase's near-perfection, so Bandloop works in basically the same way, with a few improvements here and there. Artists and fans populate the show database, which keeps it up-to-date--the site has more than 50,000 gig listings, the company claims. Once registered, fans can search among more than 500,000 artists and add any of them to their "loop" by clicking a big plus symbol--a bit easier than the similar tracking method on JamBase, which requires you to enter band names in a blank field. Once you've added 20 bands to your loop, you can become a VIP member, which allows you to post your own listings. To encourage participation, Bandloop is offering gift cards for Amazon.com, iTunes, Ticketmaster, and InSound.com. The more shows you list, the more VIP rewards you earn.I still think JamBase has a much better story with local listings: it automatically lists all shows happening tonight in your area, while Bandloop only lists shows from artists that you've selected. I guess that prevents you from getting overloaded--JamBase can be a bit daunting, if you're in a city with lots of live music--but what about serendipity? I simply can't remember to list all the bands I might be interested in seeing.But Bandloop tops JamBase with its on-site song samples. JamBase uses an embedded control from Lala.com which won't let you fast-forward to a specific point in a song. This is a problem if, for instance, you're checking out Phish and want to skip through the applause at the beginning of its cover of the Rolling Stones' "Loving Cup." Bandloop's audio samples are powered by Seeqpod, which scours the Web for fan uploads. This might lead to some bad title information--this Phish songlist displays a couple of incomprehensible garbles--but it also leads to some great finds, like a 23-minute cover version of the Talking Heads' "Crosseyed and Painless" (I'm still reeling from seeing David Byrne play that song earlier this week, but it wasn't anything like this). And if you get bored with the space jam breakdown in the middle of the song, there's a slider that lets you fast-forward it to the part where Trey starts mumbling the lyric "still waiting" again and again. I'm guessing that the Lala.com control is hampered by business rather than technical limitations--the U.S. record industry for some reason continues to resist the experience of easy on-demand music, and Lala is attempting to work legally with the industry. Seeqpod's just a search engine, and it doesn't seek any approval from the record industry--which, unsurprisingly, landed it a lawsuit from Warner Music last year.
Now it looks as if JamBase has some strong competition in the form of Bandloop. It's hard to improve upon JamBase's near-perfection, so Bandloop works in basically the same way, with a few improvements here and there. Artists and fans populate the show database, which keeps it up-to-date--the site has more than 50,000 gig listings, the company claims. Once registered, fans can search among more than 500,000 artists and add any of them to their "loop" by clicking a big plus symbol--a bit easier than the similar tracking method on JamBase, which requires you to enter band names in a blank field. Once you've added 20 bands to your loop, you can become a VIP member, which allows you to post your own listings. To encourage participation, Bandloop is offering gift cards for Amazon.com, iTunes, Ticketmaster, and InSound.com. The more shows you list, the more VIP rewards you earn.I still think JamBase has a much better story with local listings: it automatically lists all shows happening tonight in your area, while Bandloop only lists shows from artists that you've selected. I guess that prevents you from getting overloaded--JamBase can be a bit daunting, if you're in a city with lots of live music--but what about serendipity? I simply can't remember to list all the bands I might be interested in seeing.But Bandloop tops JamBase with its on-site song samples. JamBase uses an embedded control from Lala.com which won't let you fast-forward to a specific point in a song. This is a problem if, for instance, you're checking out Phish and want to skip through the applause at the beginning of its cover of the Rolling Stones' "Loving Cup." Bandloop's audio samples are powered by Seeqpod, which scours the Web for fan uploads. This might lead to some bad title information--this Phish songlist displays a couple of incomprehensible garbles--but it also leads to some great finds, like a 23-minute cover version of the Talking Heads' "Crosseyed and Painless" (I'm still reeling from seeing David Byrne play that song earlier this week, but it wasn't anything like this). And if you get bored with the space jam breakdown in the middle of the song, there's a slider that lets you fast-forward it to the part where Trey starts mumbling the lyric "still waiting" again and again. I'm guessing that the Lala.com control is hampered by business rather than technical limitations--the U.S. record industry for some reason continues to resist the experience of easy on-demand music, and Lala is attempting to work legally with the industry. Seeqpod's just a search engine, and it doesn't seek any approval from the record industry--which, unsurprisingly, landed it a lawsuit from Warner Music last year.
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