4 ms·
Pandora raises $35 million
- latortuga 17y agoIs the assertion that terrestrial radio "pays zilch" accurate? I've never heard that and it actually surprises me.
- e1ven 17y agoBefore it was made illegal, music companies used to pay Radio Stations in order to get their music on the air! When Pandora/etc argue that it adds popularity to music, they aren't lying- You can see this effect in the national music sales numbers- Music used to be primarily local- A DJ in a regional market would start playing songs, and they'd catch on in that area. You can track songs such as Louie Louie, which started on the west coast and moved east.
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- sachinag 17y agoTerrestrial radio stations in the States don't have to pay performance fees in the United States - essentially, a fee to the record label that owns the recording of a song. Say, Whitney Houston's version of _I Will Always Love You_. In all other countries, they do. U.S. radio still has to pay a "mechanical" fee to the songwriter - in this case, Dolly Parton, who originally wrote the song. (ASCAP or BMI probably handles this on Dolly's behalf, as they do for the vast majority of songwriters.) The fact that U.S. radio doesn't have to pay performance fees is an accident of history. There is a bill in Congress that would make terrestrial radio pay performance fees. (Satellite radio has to pay, so it's not really a "we hate the internet" thing.) In Chicago, there's a radio PSA every half hour asking listeners to call their Congressperson to express their concern against it.
- antidaily 17y agoIs it me or has Pandora completely surpassed Last.Fm in terms of popularity?
- jcapote 17y agoWhen was last.fm more popular than pandora?
- windsurfer 17y agoNot in Canada, where we can't listen to Pandora, but we can listen to (the now limited) Last.Fm.
- jpwagner 17y agoDon't get me wrong, I'm fond of Pandora's service, but isn't it strange that our society loves to throw money at sinking ships. Pandora has now been funded over $55MM and cannot possibly be profitable if it boasts 70% of it's revenue goes to royalties. Personally I'd also argue that these guys are hardly revolutionary. They have not developed any different business model from radio, but still gripe about lowering royalties. I'm not saying there's an obvious new way to distribute music, but historically a company should succeed because of innovative technology or an innovative business model, and their song attributes rated by-hand by "music professionals" should not be considered innovative technology. But like I said, I'm fond of the service. They're pervasive and I'm personally a daily user.
- TomOfTTB 17y ago70% was under the old deal and they admit they weren't profitable under that. The new deal is 25% of revenue or a song fee that increases each year (as you'd have seen if you'd read the article's 4th paragraph) As for revolutionary, I don't care. It's a good service. I show it to normal, non-tech people and they almost universally start using it themselves. That says it all for me.
- jpwagner 17y agoThe "new deal" meaning that historically it's been 70%. Base projections on past data. "They are going to be profitable" sounds great, but isn't great until it happens. (And spare everyone the attitude please.) The reason I bring up "revolutionary", is because without something that sticks, the investments are going towards a fad.
- abossy 17y agoHow are you defining "fad" and "revolutionary?" These are strong words, not to be strewn lightly.
- jpwagner 17y agonoun: http://www.thefreedictionary.com/FAD http://www.thefreedictionary.com/FAD adj, def2: http://www.thefreedictionary.com/revolutionary http://www.thefreedictionary.com/revolutionary