Rob Wells on Spotify and Piracy

“What I do know about Spotify is that 80 percent of the user base of the free service have come in from file-sharing services.”

– Rob Wells (center)
Senior Vice President, Digital, UMGI
on Spotify user-base

Newsflash: Universal Music to lower CD prices all-round

Universal Music is embarking on an ambitious but expectant programme called ‘Velocity’ to lower prices of all CDs to between USD$6-$10. This new policy was to help offset the unstoppable and incremental loss of revenue from falling CD sales.

The programme is said to begin in the second quarter of 2010, and will continue to year-end.

“We think it will really bring new life into the physical format,” says Jim Urie, the Distribution CEO of Universal Music Group.

Pitbull’s “I Know You Want Me” Most-Viewed Youtube Video

Toronto-based social media research company Sysomos has reported that the Music category is the most-viewed on Youtube. This free and interesting report lays out some intriguing social trivia, such as:

• Music (27.6%) and Entertainment (14.4%) videos receive the most number of embedding
• These two categories are also the most popular in Europe, South America and Asia
• A tag cloud analysis showed that “Michael Jackson” and “Health Care” were the issues on most Youtubers minds (“Lady Gaga” and “Black Eyed Peas” rank somewhere below
• Top music video is – alas – Pitbull’s “I Know You Want Me”, a senseless but very popular song worldwide, with 97.3million views

More from their report here.