A man in Denmark was sentenced to 18 months in prison today for using fake accounts to trick music streaming services into paying him 2 million Danish kroner ($290,000) in royalties. The unusual case reveals a weak spot in the business model behind the world’s biggest music platforms. The 53-year-old consultant, who had pleaded not … Read more
Apple has a Spotify problem—and it just cost the iPhone maker a $2 billion fine from the European Commission. For years, the two companies have been at war as the streaming service lured users away from Apple’s iTunes and accused the tech giant of exploiting its dominance to stifle innovation. In their long-running conflict, each … Read more
Automattic, the parent company of sites like WordPress and Tumblr, is in talks to sell content from its platforms to AI companies like MidJourney and OpenAI for training purposes, according to a new report from 404 Media Tuesday. And while the details of the deal are still sketchy, Automattic is trying to reassure users they … Read more
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Singing, dancing, roller-skating—Usher is the consummate performer. On Sunday, following months of hype, he took the stage at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas for the Super Bowl 2024 halftime show, cramming three decades of his hits into a 13-minute performance. Performing in a series rhinestone-covered outfits, Usher took the field to “My Way” and performed … Read more
“You wouldn’t steal a car. You wouldn’t steal a handbag,” said that infamous 2000s anti-piracy commercial from the Motion Picture Association. “Piracy is stealing.” Do Not Steal Our Robot Dog! But would you pirate a song? Last year, over 17 billion visits were made to music piracy websites around the world, first reported by Wired. … Read more
Since CES 2024, we have seen this adorable little bright orange (Leuchtorange, to be exact) device everywhere. Despite all the hype, many are still confused about what it is, who it’s for, and why it couldn’t have just been an app. Hey Google, Where Did My Watch’s Battery Life Go? What Exactly is the Rabbit … Read more
Kindle libraries; troves of infinitely streamable songs on Spotify and Apple Music; scores of shows and films on Netflix, Max, and Hulu. Even the Criterion Collection is online now. Cultural archives now live on server farms, so much so that the value of physical media seems ever-shifting. While there’s some benefit to it—the ineffable experience … Read more
Google Stadia finally met its end in January this year, but it was just a drop in the bucket for the number of products and services the company killed in 2023.Image: Colleen Michaels (Shutterstock) Big Tech went on a murder spree in 2023. We saw the end of many once-loved products and services, all swallowed … Read more
Image: nikkimeel (Shutterstock) Apple Music subscribers can no longer sign up for the Voice Plan and existing subscribers’ auto-renew will turn off at the end of the billing period, Apple said in a blog post on Wednesday. Subscribers paid just $4.99 for Apple Music’s Voice Plan which launched in 2021 and allowed users to access … Read more
You normally go to the Marvel Cinematic Universe for lots of issues, however memorable authentic music isn’t actually certainly one of them. However Rogers: The Musical—a corny Hamilton-alike that instructed a really condensed story of Chris Evans’ Captain America—is among the extra profitable makes an attempt at musically spicing issues up for the movies, if solely … Read more