Mike Butcher

The mbites.com podcast this week looked at how digital music is impacting both on music fans and the artists themselves. The guests (pictured) were Laura Lee Davies, former editor of Time Out magazine in London and a music journalist of 20 years experience, and Ben Drury, founder and managing director of 7digital.com, which provides digital downloading services to many leading brands and artists’ web sites.

Download the MP3 file here (approx 18MB, 20 minutes long) or subscribe to the podcast feed and download it automatically into your favourite podcasting software and/or mobile media player device (ok, iPod then), or even subscribe direct from iTunes.

This is the third in a series of regular mbites podcasts, hosted at London private members club, Adam Street.

If you’d like to be a guest on the next Bitecast, where we’ll be documenting some of the most interesting new developments in digital and mobile media, contact Mike Butcher.

Some interesting new research from Jupiter:

Jupiter thinks the European music industry is facing “a demographic time bomb”. In its report “European Music Consumer Survey, 2005″ it says that European consumers who download music from illegal file sharing networks currently outnumber those downloading from legal services such as Apple’s iTunes Music Store by a factor of three to one.

Some 15% file share while just 5% pay to download. Uh oh.

Jauntily upbeat however, Jupiter says “there is solid demand for paid downloads”, with 10% of European consumers willing to pay, rising as high as 31% in Sweden.

But file sharing penetration in Europe is highest among younger consumers (34% of 15-24 year olds) and is impacting the way they value music with many having little concept of music as a paid commodity. Among the 46% of European online 15-24 year olds who use the Internet to consume music, the CD is becoming increasingly irrelevant: 40% do not consider the CD to be a good value for money and 43% prefer to copy rather than buy CDs. Unless these consumers are encouraged to develop music purchasing behavior soon they may never develop meaningful music buying habits.

In a release Mark Mulligan, Analyst at JupiterResearch said: “Illegal activity is a key threat. The Digital Youth of today are being brought up on a near limitless diet of free and disposable music from file sharing networks. When these consumers age and increase spending power they should become key music buying consumers. But unless the music industry can transition these consumers whilst they are young away from free consumption to paid music formats, be they digital or CDs, they may never develop music purchasing behavior and the recording industry could suffer long-term harm.”

Streaming radio service Live365 is being scrutinised by the Recording Artist Association of America (RIAA) which is interested in user-generated stations that do not properly comply with various DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) statutes. The RIAA says it will “reserve the right to shut them down or otherwise restrict access” and Live365 has emailed its users with exactly that warning. What this means, of course, is that the glittering new world of ‘user generated content’ may turn out to be a mirage, killed off by a hail of lawsuits.

Is Podcasting turning into a viable media business? Maybe. Podshow this week add 30s shows to its network and plans a major marketing push to lure more podcasters into its fold, broadening the network of shows it can sell to advertisers. Meanwhile Paige Heniger and Gretchen Vogelzang, who’s “Mommycast” is about the joys of motherhood have signed a 12-month sponsorship agreement with Dixie paper products, worth more than $100,000.

Microsoft’s XBox site has published a document that shows how to turn the XBox 360 gaming device into an iPod accessory:

“We’re happy to report that the Xbox 360 video game and entertainment system works with MP3 music files on Apple iPod portable audio players, right out of the box. Just connect your iPod’s USB cable into any controller port on your Xbox 360 console, then go to the Media area of the Xbox Dashboard to select or create a playlist.”

However, it doesn’t look like it will play iTunes files, given that “Xbox 360 is compatible only with AAC files that are not protected by DRM.” We knew there’d be a catch…

[MacUser]: Apple is facing legal action of the alleged breach of two patents in its iPod, iTunes and Mac products. Illinois-based Premier claims that the Apple products violate patents which describe a system for creating lists of audio works – in other words playlists. Premier is seeking an injunction and damages, while Apple doesn’t comment on legal disputes.

Click to download the video or subscribe to the video/audio podcast.

Digital Music Weblog reviews iTunes 6: It concludes it is “functionally and cosmetically the same as iTunes 5 for the most part; the big difference, of course, is the presence of videos in the iTMS catalog. Music videos form the bulk of that catalog addition, but the most significant part of the iTunes 6 package is the TV section. It does not replace DVRs or revolutionize television habits, as iTunes 6 opposes bit Torrent distribution of TV episodes, it might not affect that distribution. As a podcast aggregator iTunes will face intense competition, but its first-mover advantage in the mainstream market will serve Apple well.”

So, to wrap up from the Apple announcements. A new iMac G5, with nice DVD controls. iTunes with music videos (2,000 of them) to buy, and the ability to subscribe to video podcasts – plus user recommendations and collaborative filtering which will increase the “Long Tail” of the store. The new iPod plays video. A deal with Disney to time-shift 6 leading US TV shows (not a big deal, but it has long term implications). Ok, a question: The event was at BBC Television Centre. We all expected a deal with the Beeb for video, but the lawyers couldn’t hammer out a deal in time for the announcement. Come on guys, get with the programme! Lastly, and not leastly, the new ability to provide recommendations on iTunes will act as an olive branch to the indie labels who have had trouble getting onto the front page of iTunes. The question is, will it cool the industry’s desire to move to subscription services. We’ll have to wait and see.

Steve Jobs, cracking jokes about Disney – movie file.