Imeem — another music streaming story ends in tears?
If I were Spotify, I’d be paying close attention right now.
Imeem, which was one of the first music startups to work out streaming deals with all four major record labels, is going to MySpace for a bargain basement price of $1 million in cash, according to TechCrunch. (Update: Sources tell us the acquisition valuation is closer to a range of $7 to 9 million. That’s $1 million in cash plus earnouts to retain key employees.)
Neither… Continue Reading
5 O’Clock Roundup: Moving into a networked era, Tumblr envy, Open Web
Watch out Lexis-Nexis and WestLaw! Google’s coming: You can now read full text legal opinions from U.S. federal and state district, appellate and supreme courts with Google Scholar. Expect an oligopoly (as in the legal research industry) to feel some pressure as Google rolls out another free and disruptive service. You can search by cases, topics or specific phrases. You can also explore how different rulings are cited by other judges and later opinions.
Google also experiments… Continue Reading
Imeem reboots without Sequoia in new $6M round
It’s been a year since Sequoia Capital’s “R.I.P. Good Times” presentation to the firm’s portfolio companies. One of Sequoia’s more high-profile startups at the time was Imeem, a site that claimed to be the first to allow free, legal music sharing and listening.
The rumor on TechCrunch this morning is true, I’ve confirmed: Imeem burned through its cash — royalties on the music were expensive — and has borrowed another $6 million to recapitalize the company,… Continue Reading
Live music: Imeem gets better licensing deal from Warner
Music startups have had trouble making money, partly because of high licensing fees they pay to record labels. But Imeem, a popular streaming music service had so many fees to pay that it was having trouble staying in business. Now, though, past investor Warner Music Group has worked out a new licensing deal with the startup, according to MediaMemo.
A source close to Imeem has confirmed the story, and adds that its advertising sales team is “crushing… Continue Reading
Roundup: 18 Android phones coming this year, MySpace hoping for innovation, and more
Here’s the latest action:
Google: Expect 18 Android phones by the end of the year — That number could be as high as 20, says Andy Rubin, senior director for mobile platforms.
News Corp. and MySpace execs say MySpace needs to innovate — During an interview at the All Things Digital conference (owned by News Corp., incidentally), MySpace chief executive Owen Van Natta also discussed concerns that the site might lose its lucrative search deal with Google, saying the… Continue Reading
Warner Music writes off $33M in music startups Imeem, Lala
When it comes to music startups of my generation, they have yet to bring in serious revenue. And to make matters worse, the ones that stream music have to pay record labels a hefty licensing fee. Major record label Warner Music Group may be one of the record labels driving up costs for these startups, but it has had enough of investing in them. It has written off $33 million in equity and debt from… Continue Reading
Music startup imeem making money, not dying unless the labels kill it
Sure, the music industry — including music startups — are having trouble coming up with significant online music business models, but recent rumors circulating about imeem’s money problems appear to be exaggerated. The San Francisco company, which lets users create and share streaming song playlists, has been reportedly running out of money, especially because of how much it has to pay for music licensing deals it has with record labels.
Imeem isn’t commenting on finances. It… Continue Reading
Roundup: Brin backs Parkinson’s study, iPhone gets shakable ads, and more
Google co-founder backs major Parkinson’s study – Sergey Brin says he plans to contribute money and DNA to a study run by his wife Anne Wojcicki’s startup 23andMe.
Dockers introduces shakable iPhone ad — Users can shake their iPhones to make urban street dancer Dufon perform his moves. The ad was created by mobile ad company Medialets.
Twofish launches analytics platform for social games — The company’s Elements platform will help social game and virtual world developers understand and make… Continue Reading
My music to my ears: Imeem’s Android app accesses your music in the cloud
Love it or hate it, all of your digital information is moving to the cloud. And your music is no different. While music social network Imeem has let you upload your own music to its servers for a while, today it’s offering a powerful new feature: access to that music from a mobile device, thanks to its Android application.
The feature, called MyMusic, will let you stream your music over the Internet to your phone from… Continue Reading
Roundup: Another record for cleantech, economy contracting, music news and more
Here’s the latest action:
Cleantech has another record quarter — A total of $1.6 billion went into cleantech during the most recent quarter. However, much of the money came in a few massive later-stage rounds, so the sector shouldn’t breathe easy in the face of recession.
US economy contracts most in seven years — Analysts expect a massive 2.5 percent drop in GDP growth next year. More detail at Reuters.
MTV exec may head MySpace Music — MTV vice president Courtney… Continue Reading
Imeem makes cuts, may be looking to sell
Streaming music company imeem has hired boutique investment bank Montgomery and Co. to help it sell, and it has laid off 25 percent of its 80 person staff, PaidContent is reporting. San Francisco-based imeem has confirmed that it has cut 20 positions but isn’t commenting on any potential sale plans.
The company says it has 25 million monthly active users on its home site, imeem.com, and around 85 million more on its widgets that run on… Continue Reading
Imeem launches music application for Android and the G1 phone
The imeem music-sharing service is launching its first mobile application today — for the new Android-powered G1 phone that is itself launching on the T-Mobile network this Wednesday. So there are all sorts of interesting “firsts” here. But first, about the app itself.
Imeem is taking your user profile — information such as what songs you listen to and what artists you’re a fan of on the site — and using it to recommend “stations” comprised… Continue Reading
Mufin music recommendations: Half-baked or just right?
Online music recommendation engines are nothing new. Pandora is one of the most high profile, but services that do other things such as Last.fm, Imeem and now even iTunes, all offer this functionality in some capacity. Mufin hopes to stand out by doing things a bit differently: Analyzing only the music.
Most other recommendation engines using social aspects to determine what music should be recommended, Mufin head of marketing Petar Djekic explained. For example, if you… Continue Reading
Imeem revamps its site for a more cohesive online music experience
Before MySpace Music even existed, online social music service imeem had a deal with all the major labels and many of the smaller ones to stream their music for free over the Internet. The problem, is that the music was scattered all over the place, making a cohesive music experience harder to achieve than through services like iTunes (where you pay for all your music) or Pandora (where you cannot select which songs you will… Continue Reading
Could a digital music royalty price hike force iTunes into subscriptions?
There’s some talk today that if the National Music Publishers’ Association manages to increase the royalty rates for music bought from online music stores, Apple iTunes could shut its doors. That won’t happen. But it could force iTunes to change its business model.
The Copyright Royalty Board is meeting Thursday in Washington to set a new price for royalties. While the National Music Publishers’ Association wants the rate raised from its current 9 cents a track… Continue Reading
TrueAnthem raises $2 million to pollute music with pre-song ads
The concept of ad-supported music ranges from relatively sensible to outright dumb.
Last.fm’s recently announced “smart ads,” which respond dynamically to the beat of the music being played, are relatively sensible. In-music ads, which consist of sponsored announcements that play before the song, are outright dumb. This has not, however, stopped trueAnthem, a purveyor of the latter, from raising a $2 million round of seed capital and getting the sneaker manufacturer Adidas to sign up for… Continue Reading
ComScore’s June US numbers: Facebook still gaining on MySpace while blog platforms, news aggregators, niche social networks also grow
Facebook gained nearly two million new US users from May to June of this year, while MySpace lost about a million, according to the latest data from comScore. MySpace is still nearly twice the size, though, at 72.8 million national users versus Facebook’s 37.4 million. Facebook has, meanwhile, grown 34 percent since June 2007, while MySpace has grown only two percent. A range of smaller, niche social networks — and related social web sites —… Continue Reading
Roundup: YouTube making money now? Managers leaving Bebo, and more
As YouTube grows, some estimate it’s making up to $200 million this year — The revenue number comes from a couple estimates reviewed by Erick Schonfeld at Techcrunch, where he looks at how the site’s increasing dominance (see comScore graphs, below) may translate to money. Schonfeld calculates that YouTube is making at least $80 million revenue (not profit) based on some of its more prominent pieces ad inventory; the $200 million number comes from Forbes. I… Continue Reading
Roundup: Tidbits on Jangl’s demise, Virgin considers Helio hookup, VCs looking overseas, and more
updated
The back-story on Jangl’s slow death — Yesterday, we reported on Jangl’s asset sale process. A tipster tells us that Seattle-based WhitePages had offered to buy Internet phone company Jangl for $20 million, but then kept the company in diligence for more than a month and walked away at the last minute — giving Jangl no choice to but throw in the towel when it ran out of time and options. Whitepages flew down from Seattle… Continue Reading
Roundup: AMD falls, Sequoia expands, and more
Here’s the latest action:
Advanced Micro Devices is in a world of hurt — The Sunnyvale, Calif. chip company lost $358 million on revenues of $1.5 billion in the quarter. It cited a tough outlook for the computer market, but it is clearly hurting from Intel’s newfound competitiveness. AMD’s core business is microprocessors and graphics chips for personal computers. It has other businesses related to getting those chips into other devices, from consumer electronics to mobile… Continue Reading