by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
This morning, Napster (NAPS) mailed a letter to shareholders advising them not to vote for three dissident investors–Perry H. Rod, Thomas Sailors and Kavan P. Singh–who are seeking seats on the company’s board, and to instead back the three incumbents seeking to keep their seats. Not a big surprise; did you think the board was going to say otherwise?
by Peter Kafka, Managing Editor, Silicon Alley Insider
Newsflash, courtesy of PR agency Edelman: Young people don’t feel warmly about the music industry, presumably because they are harshing their mellow and trying to stop them from pirating music. Leave aside the dubiousness of a PR agency telling other people they have a PR problem, and take a gander at these supposedly damning statistics …
Wednesday morning I read with some surprise in USA Today that Amazon is “No. 2 in digital [music] sales since opening nearly six months ago.” Amazon’s entry into this market last year was an important milestone in the continuing irrelevance of DRM and the overly restrictive and anticonsumer policies that the music industry has foolishly wielded in this new, digital age. But let’s get one thing straight: outside of iTunes, no one sells more music digitally than eMusic, and we don’t plan on giving up that title anytime soon. So how is it, we wondered, that USA Today came to name Amazon No. 2?
by Warren Cohen, Contributing Writer, Rolling Stone
Wal-mart wants every CD you buy to cost less than 10 bucks. And the nation’s largest retailer–which moved a quarter of a trillion dollars’ worth of goods last year–usually gets its way. Suppliers who don’t accede to Wal-Mart’s “everyday low price” mantra often find their products bounced from the chain’s stores, excluded from being sold to the 138 million people who shop at a Wal-Mart store every week.
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