Readers purchased 825 million copies of print books in the U.S. in 2021—the best-selling year for print books, NPD Bookscan says, since it began tracking data in 2004—and analysts believe young people posting about books on social media played a serious role in those big numbers.
Source: How TikTok Helped Fuel The Best-Selling Year For Print Books
Warner Music Group (WMG) has officially finalized a “label-wide partnership” with Quincy Jones-backed music NFT platform OneOf. The pact arrives about eight months after OneOf scored $63 million in seed funding. Besides the financial support from 88-year-old Quincy Jones, the likes of John Legend, Doja Cat, and the Whitney Houston estate were previously announced as early OneOf partners.
Source: Warner Music Group Inks ‘Label-Wide’ Deal With NFT Platform OneOf
Superficially, it seems odd that one low Netflix quarterly forecast would scare investors from the entire segment. But if Netflix growth is slowing, that may mean the world’s total addressable streaming market is significantly lower than previously expected. LightShed analyst Rich Greenfield told CNBC he still believes that number is “six, seven, or eight hundred million subscribers.” But it’s possible the number is actually far less.
Source: Streaming video no longer impresses investors, so media companies need a next act
Looking at the volume of e-books released each year since 2008, many titles are published directly on self-publishing platforms such as Smashwords or Kindle Direct Publishing. This has created a plethora of new information for traditional publishers—not only about which books are released but also about how individual titles, authors, and entire genres are perceived by readers.
Source: Digitization Can Support Publishers with Decision-Making
The reality that Sundance has become a playground for streamers, many of whom have content libraries to fill and cash to burn, isn’t exactly new. But the trend has become increasingly noticeable during the pandemic, which shook up the movie theater business and perhaps permanently shifted audience’s already changing tastes.
Source: Has Sundance Become a Film Festival for Streaming Services?
In a nearly ten-minute video uploaded to Instagram, Rogan defends his decision to book contentious guests, apologizes to Spotify for the backlash, and details how the podcast may change in the future. He says he agrees with Spotify’s plan to label episodes that include COVID-19 discussion with content advisories and disclaimers. He also says he wants to “have more experts with differing opinions, right after the controversial ones.”
Source: Joe Rogan defends podcast and apologizes to Spotify for backlash
Illinois has become the latest state to introduce a library e-book bill, with state legislators last week introducing the Equitable Access to Electronic Literature Act. In addition, Rhode Island legislators have re-introduced its library e-book bill in the new legislative session after a previous effort stalled last year.
Source: Illinois, Rhode Island Introduce New Library E-book Bills
There can be no doubt that Neil Young has yanked his music from Spotify on a point of principle. Nor that he’s fully prepared to sacrifice his earnings as a result. Yet he’s also just laid the groundwork to shatter erroneous music biz dogma that’s lain unquestioned for too many years. In fact, I suspect that Neil Young is about to prove that a swathe of established artists – namely prestige catalog artists – really don’t need Spotify to survive anymore.
Source: Neil Young’s Spotify exodus is a test case for artists who dare question music industry dogma.
Twitter’s semi-annual transparency report reveals that the number of takedown notices received by the service continues to go up. However, the percentage of ‘withheld’ tweets and media has dropped to an all-time low. Roughly two-thirds of all requests are rejected, as they are either incomplete, fraudulent or not actionable.
Source: Twitter Now ‘Rejects’ Most Copyright Takedown Requests * TorrentFreak