Net, Blogs and Rock'n'Roll

Bandwagon blogging

I think we're going to see more of this kind of thing. Bandwagon is offering free accounts to bloggers who post their logo (see left), link to their site (see previous sentence), and send a trackback to their blog. This offer lasts until 22 February, so if you're a blogger and want to take advantage of it, be quick about it. (I found it via cityofsound.)

In my book (sorry, you're going to get sick of that phrase if you keep reading this blog, but it's part of the deal here: I have to promote it) I speculate about a scenario where, instead of gig promoters handing out flyers saying "£1 off with this flyer", they will blog on MySpace etc saying "£1 off with a trackback to this blog". It's a handy and easy way to enlist your audience as co-promoters. In fact, I suspect this may not be a future scenario; it may well be happening already. Does anyone have any examples they could point me to?

I'm also interested in how these kinds of blog promotions affect the much-vaunted authenticity of 'blog culture' — something I've written about before here and here. The you-scratch-my-back-and-I'll-scratch-yours deal offered by Bandwagon is not quite as directly commercial as, say, PayPerPost (which only recently started requiring bloggers to disclose the payments they receive), but it clearly introduces the scope for bias and dilution of authenticity.

As for Bandwagon's service itself, it's a useful model. I'm not sure whether I'll use it, as it requires iTunes 7, and I've avoided upgrading to that since my creaky old iMac struggles even with iTunes 6. I use an MP3tunes locker, which works for backing up your music files from any version of iTunes and any platform.

More music mash-up services: who gets paid for discovery?

Via 17 dots I discovered the eMusic mashup page, which currently features a splicing of eMusic's profiles and downloads with Pandora's interactive streaming service (pictured below, with Pandora on top). The page also lists forthcoming attractions that include a mash-up with Last.fm and a couple of US radio stations.

If you're listening to Pandora and eMusic has the now-playing track in its catalogue, the bottom part of the screen shows you the album details on eMusic and also gives you a single-click option to download the track (this is shown in the picture above — click it for a larger version). If eMusic's catalogue includes the artist but not the track, you just see the albums by that artist that eMusic does carry. And if you're listening to major label artists like U2 or Madonna, which eMusic doesn't carry, I guess you see the eMusic home page.

Why we need, but cannot trust, charts

Cartoon featured in Daily Star 13 Feb 2007
© Scott Clissold

David Hepworth (director of Word magazine) asks "why should anyone care about the chart?" The reason I give in the book is that the chart helps us know what other people like. Not all of us are pioneers in our musical taste; not all of us want to listen to hours and hours of music to make up our own minds about the new releases. The very idea may make music snobs' blood boil, but many people think the reason Coldplay have lots of hits must be that they're better than other bands. So they buy Coldplay albums.

It's because of this role of charts as a filter and pointer to what's new and interesting that I've been referring to them a few times recently (1, 2, 3). In particular the new UK Charts that include all download sales, and which seem to be open to all sorts of gaming, 'shilling' and general jiggery pokery. Here are three examples.

Book update

Yesterday was what is termed the "final delivery date" in my contract with the publisher, and I met the deadline! Many thanks to everyone who helped with this. I've updated the book announcement page with the new chapter outline.

The publisher tells me that publication of the book is pencilled in for September. In the meantime, I'm going to be catching up with my mail…

Apple, Beatles, Charts

Now that it seems The Beatles' music may soon be available to download, here's a little thought experiment as a kind of postscript to my comments on download charts.

Imagine John Lennon hadn't been shot in 1980, but had gone on to record reputation-enhancing music for another 25 years. Imagine he then died unexpectedly later this year, when The Beatles' and his music was available on iTunes. How many weeks do you think it would be before any song not credited to Lennon in some way made it into the Top 20?