 RAIN 7/6: Nearing U.S. launch, Spotify offers invitations to American users ·Jul 6, 11:05 AM POPULAR EUROPEAN STREAMING MUSIC SERVICE POSTS U.S. LANDING PAGEIt’s official. After months and months of rumors, reports and hazy launch dates, on-demand music service Spotify is finally coming to the U.S.
The service has posted a U.S. landing page (here), where you can request an invitation to join the Stateside launch. Spotify is a free, ad-supported streaming music service that offers on-demand access to a catalog of over 13 million tracks. It also offers subscription plans that remove ads and include other benefits. As of September 2010, the service had 10 million users, of which 1 million were paying subscribers. It has, up until now, only been available in Europe. “We should note, however,” writes Engadget, “that there’s still no definite time table to report, but it’s fairly obvious that those final record deals are close enough to done to call this thing a victory.” Read more here. In May it was reported that Spotify reached more young people in Sweden than broadcast radio (RAIN coverage here). The Wall Street Journal wrote then, “Spotify’s ability to attract audiences from commercial radio should also be seen as a threat to commercial radio providers in the U.S. market.” ESPN RADIO LAUNCHES PERSONALIZABLE WEB PLAYERLast Friday ESPN Radio debuted a new Internet radio player featuring personalization and recommendation options.
The new player, dubbed ESPN Audio NOW, apparently learns from users’ preferences and listening history to recommend new content. ESPN Audio NOW streams 30 live ESPN Radio stations and offers access to the archives of more than 100 podcast programs. It also includes the ability to build playlists out of on-demand content. You can find out more from ESPN Radio’s press release here. TRITON PROMOTE MILANO TO COO OF STREAMING DIVISION Triton Digital has promoted Dominick Milano (pictured) to COO of the company’s Streaming Division.
Milano previously served as EVP/Publisher Sales at Triton Digital. He’s been with the company since 2006. His experience includes work at Katz Media Group, Clear Channel and Interep National Radio Sales. Read more from Triton Digital’s press release here. 60% OF U.S. MOBILE WEB TRAFFIC ON APPLE DEVICES, 25% ON iPAD ALONE While a still small but quickly-growing 8% of U.S. web traffic comes from mobile and tablet platforms, over 25% of that traffic is on the Apple iPad.
This means, added to the iPhone’s 35% share, “at 60.7% of U.S. mobile web browsing, iOS nearly doubles Android at 31.6%.” That’s from analytics firm NetApplications’ latest NetMarketShare report, covered in Fierce Mobile Content. Apple has sold more than 25 million iPads since introducing them in April 2010. Read more here. share: del.icio.us.  Reddit  Digg  Yahoo  Wink  Windows  Google  Newsvine 
CommentCommenting is closed for this article.  Other stories RAIN has upgraded (and moved)! RAIN 9/13: RAIN Summit Chicago takes place today! RAIN 9/12: First Summit in RAIN's hometown takes place tomorrow RAIN 9/9: Summer holidays, "doldrums" impact July Webcast Metrics, but audience up over last year RAIN 9/8: Clear Channel launches new customizable iHeartRadio beta; RAIN goes hands-on RAIN 9/7: Meet more speakers you'll hear at RAIN Summit Chicago in less than a week RAIN 9/6: Clear Channel taps The Echo Nest to take on Pandora RAIN 9/2: RAIN reviews Spotify's radio-like product Artist Radio RAIN 9/1: UK online radio aggregator Radioplayer campaigns b'dcasters to create "all radio" ratings RAIN 8/31: Execs from Merlin, Triton Digital, jacAPPS and more to appear at RAIN Summit Chicago |
