Last.FM is boosting CD sales?

In January, Last.FM began offering music streaming on-demand instead of by simple genre or keyword searches. Three times a day users can listen to a track of their choosing regardless of artist or genre.

With the format change also came affiliate partnerships with iTunes, Amazon and 7Digital that allows Last.FM users to click through from any song they are listening to and purchase the tracks from said affiliates.

It seems the recent change in format has led to substantial added sales, a 119 percent overall increase in cd and download sales through the affiliates.

Martin Stiksel, Last.fm's founder, feels the stats demonstrate that free on-demand music will encourage physical purchases and that the music industry should adopt more on demand models. "In just over two months it's become clear that people will buy CDs and downloads if they get access to the kind of service we offer. No one else can give music fans this amount of music for free -- but more importantly also drive their discovery, as we do through our unique recommendation engine. That's why people are sticking around on Last.fm -- minutes spent on site are up 118% month-on-month -- and discovering new music to listen to and buy," he added.

Lets hope the trend continues.

Written by: Andre Yoskowitz @ 13 Apr 2008 18:43

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7 comments

nobrainer

Stop The Press, OMG Amazing news, being able to listen to music freely actually encourages ppl to purchase media they enjoy, holy crap what will they think up next.

And i thought that free media was destroying music that's why the RIAA (soundexchange) lobbied to charged huge amounts to web broadcasters, basically forcing most of them off the web, except for a few courporate owned ones like last.fm that is owned by none other than CBS.

New RIAA royalty fees may bankrupt Internet radio industry

Radio royalties: the ticking timebomb under the RIAA

RIAA Claims Ownership of All Artist Royalties For Internet Radio

Basically they want to remain in control (gatekeepers) of the media, and if its an indie band the RIAA wants to block them from being able to be played unless they have a courporate backer to steal all the artists monies for their hard work. Kinda like how the central banks (federal reserve, bank of england, ect) work, well they do very little and cream off all the rewards.

Originally posted by bottom link: So how it works is that SoundExchange collects money through compulsory royalties from Webcasters and holds onto the money. If a label or artist wants their share of the money, they must become a member of SoundExchange and pay a fee to collect their royalties (http://soundexchange.com/faq.html#b6). But, and this is a big "but," you only get royalties if you own the sound recording copyright. If you are signed to a major label, chances are you don�t. Even if you do own the copyright to your own recording of your own song, SoundExchange will collect Internet radio royalties for your song even if you don�t want them to do so.Originally posted by top link: How does this affect medium-size webcasters?
Radio Paradise's Bill Goldsmith notes, "This royalty structure would wipe out an entire class of business: Small independent webcasters such as myself & my wife, who operate Radio Paradise. Our obligation under this rate structure would be equal to over 125% of our total income. There is no practical way for us to increase our income so dramatically as to render that affordable."

And Radio Paradise is perhaps the most-successful webcaster in its class! For most operators, this rate looks as if it would be >150-200% of total revenues.don't let big media dictate our culture ppl, boycott the anti-consumer, anti-artist, big media, they are listed in my sig.

The BPI Are: SONY, UNIVERSAL, WARNER GROUP, EMI.

The RIAA Soundexchange Are: SONY, UNIVERSAL, WARNER GROUP, EMI.

The IFPI Are: The same anti consumer lot as listed above!

The MPAA Are: SONY, UNIVERSAL, WARNER GROUP, DISNEY, PARAMOUNT, FOX.

How do you stop anti consumer = its easy purchase only second hand media and avoid their propertarian hobbled by DRM hardware! http://www.boycott-riaa.com/

13.4.2008 19:28 #1

atomicxl

This is free music provided by a site that facilitates and makes it easy to purchase music. Not some random P2P or torrent page. If illegal downloading (which this is not) helped CD sales you wouldn't see CD sales dropping. This type of thing is a good move. It seems like if you support it and make it easy to purchase/listen almost at the same time, you can see sales.

You're kind of living in a dream world with the stuff suggested in your sig. I'd never encourage people to take money out of artists hands and not buy music and other media. Why buy 2nd hand when you can support the artists? You say the labels rob them, yet buying 2nd hand gives them ZERO money. Who's the real thief? At least the label paid for studio time, paid for art design, puts up money for them to tour, pays for record promotion, pays for... and the list goes on.

13.4.2008 20:59 #2

nobrainer

@ atomicxl

it was sarcasm, as its obvious that radio and web streaming HELP sales, but the RIAA has done everything in its power to diminish streaming to a few courporate sites in another grasp at being the GateKeepers of media, which is what i am moaning about, don't get me wrong i think last.fm is a good service (poor since the sell out to CBS) as is pandora which can no longer operate outside the US because of the royalty hike.Read the Links, do some research.

boycott manufactured music that relies on devices like auto tune, teams of writers with music aimed at teenagers, and a pretty face/six pack to sell talentless rubbish that Big Media churn out every day simply to generate cash for them not real artistsm and this is what ppl should boycott.

13.4.2008 22:34 #3

sgriesch

Quote:being able to listen to music freely actually encourages ppl to purchase media they enjoyQuote:Yeah. I wish this was around 15 years ago. I would own a lot fewer CD's than I have now. THEY ENJOY are key words. Now that we can download just the songs we want, we can skip the crap and just buy the good stuff. It makes the artist have to try and make only good stuff. The industry needs to listen to the consumer instead of suing them. I might actually buy more music if it were reasonably priced, DRM free, and high quality. Hint, hint RIAA.

14.4.2008 22:12 #4

lilyqweas

Do you want to have a good music software? please try this software HexLovE Music Converter,
HexLovE Music Converter is a powerful, yet easy to use CD Ripper and Music Converter supporting conversion between LAME (MP3), OGG, WMV, FLAC and FAAC (AAC, MP4).
you can find it here http://www.qweas.com/download/audio_mp3/...c_converter.htm

15.4.2008 00:51 #5

nobrainer

@ lilyqweas

hu.

BTW ppl if you download winamp there are tons of free music and video stations via shoutcast and also includes AOL radio for the time being.

AOL stated that due to the royalty hike they would have to can their radio stations.

http://www.wired.com/entertainment/music/news/2007/03/72879

15.4.2008 15:38 #6

Mez

Hey nobrainer all good points. The RIAA has slowly killed everything it touches due to their unlimited greed. They just need to suck the life out of everything they can get their hands on.

Even their P2P attacks have probably backfired. Not that they have slowed down or losened up any. They have probably been punishing 80% innocent and 20% stupid. That is my wild guess. I know they have not given any slack to persons with unsecured wireless networks and parents of kinds who download. I am only guessing, but I bet they have created a huge population of new enemies who have been complaining to law makers. This is all pure speculation on my part. However, no good laws have come their way in a while. I am sure it is not due to lack of trying. They have shown themselves to be the lowest of the low at every turn.

21.4.2008 09:16 #7

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