Distributor TuneCore Sings Digital Music’s Praises

“Unit sales are up, not down — that means people are buying more music, not less,” says Jeff Page, chief executive of digital music distributor TuneCore, in an interview with the Los Angeles Times. TuneCore’s business model is accordingly looking up: the company charges a flat fee to send song and album files to digital retail, as opposed to the conventional practice of taking a percentage of sales. Since the company’s 2005 founding, TuneCore has grown to distribute as many as 30,000 songs each week, from both aspiring and established artists, to the likes of iTunes, Amazon.com’s MP3 store and Microsoft’s Zune service.

Microsoft Revamps MP3 Store In Tandem With Bing Upgrade

Those who use Microsoft’s Bing search engine to look for digital music can now stream song results for free and purchase track downloads with a credit card, in an expansion of the company’s Zune brand. Previously, consumers had to use Microsoft’s “point” currency to purchase music via Zune. paidContent has the details.

Movie Download Revenues Totaled $291 Million In ’09: Report

Total revenues from download services such as iTunes and Amazon Video on Demand amounted to $291 million in 2009, falling short of research firm Screen Digest’s expectations for the year by some $69 million. paidContent cites a forthcoming report from the Screen Digest that blames the underperformance on a lack of effective marketing from studios.

As it stands, four movie download services — iTunes, the Zune (Xbox) Video Marketplace, Sony’s PlayStation Network, and Amazon VOD — account for 97 percent of the market. iTunes alone has an 80 percent share, Screen Digest says. But the download figures do not take into account streaming movie services from the likes of Netflix, which are increasingly taking root with consumers. By paidContent

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