Dear readers of the music business research blog,
The take-over of EMI’s recorded music arm by Universal Music Group was still on the agenda in 2013. The EU Commission ordered Universal Music to divest EMI Recording Ltd. (including EMI’s Parlophone label group, with the exception of the Beatles), Chrysalis (but without the Robbie Williams catalogue) and Mute Records, EMI and Virgin Classical as well as the local EMI branches in France, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Poland, Czech Republic/Slovakia and Universal Greece. Thus, the Parlophone Music Group was sold to Warner Music for GBP 487m. The EU Commission eventually cleared the deal in May 2013.
2013 was also the year of booming music streaming services. Led by Spotify, music streaming services reported a growing number of users and increasing revenues. The market entry of Apple with iTunes Radio and Google with All Access raised the expectations of a turnaround in the recorded music market. In the series of six blog entries “Is Streaming the Next Big Thing?”, I tried to assess if these expectations are legitimate from the labels’, artists’, consumers’ and streaming services’ perspective on the basis of an international market analysis.
The booming music streaming market was the perfect starting point for the 4th Vienna Music Business Research Days “The Future of Music Licensing” (June, 20-21, 2013). The role of collecting societies in the digital age was as well discussed as the EU directive on collective rights management and the need for a comprehensive database of music licences. In the course of the VMBR-Days the best paper of the Young Scholars’ Workshop was awarded for the second time. Sisley Maillard of the Université Telecom ParisTech was awarded for her paper “Consumer Information in the Digital Age: Empirical Evidence from the Spillovers in the Music Industry” as well as Francisco Bernardo/Luis Gustavo Martins of the Catholic University of Portugal in Porto for “Disintermediation Effects in the Music Business – A Return to Old Times”. Both papers are considered for publication in the International Journal of Music Business Research (IJMBR).
In 2013, the second volume of the IJMBR was published with two issues in April and October. The special October issue was entirely devoted to the analysis of the Australian music economy:
Volume 2, no 2, October 2013 – special issue on the Australian Music Economy
Editorial by Patrik Wikström and Peter Tschmuck
Guy Morrow: Regulating Artist Managers: An Insider’s Perspective, pp. 8-35
Editorial by Dennis Collopy and Peter Tschmuck
In the next section you can find a list of all theses & papers which were added to the blog in 2013, but also recently published studies and books related to music business/industry research are listed:
Auer, Manuel, 2013, Musikverwertung im Internet. Master thesis, Karl-Franzens-University Graz.
Moyon, Emilien, 2011, Le changement du business model de l’entreprise: Une étude des majors de l’industrie phonographique (1998-2008). Dissertation, Université Lille I. (60 page summary in English)
The following studies, reports and working papers with a music business/industry focus were published in 2013:
BPI, Digital Music Nation 2013.
Eisenach, Jeffrey A., Understanding Webcaster Royalties, Navigant Economics LLC.
Forsa, Webmonitor: Online Musikquellen 2013 im Auftrag der BITKOM.
Mulligan, Marc, Making Freemium Add Up. An Assessment of Content Monetization. MIDiA Consulting.
Ofcom, The digital radio report 2013 for the United Kingdom.
Music business/industry books published in 2013:
Davis, Clive, The Soundtrack of My Life. New York: Simon & Schuster.
Jachim, Alexandra, Erfolgreiches Chormanagement. Ein Leitfaden. Wien: facultas.
Rogers Jim, The Death & Life of the Music Industry in the Digital Age. New York: Bloomsbury.
Seliger Berthold, Das Geschäft mit der Musik: Ein Insiderbericht. Berlin: Verlag Klaus Bittermann.
Finally, I would like to thank all the readers of the blog for 61,490 visits in 2013 – 168 visits per day. Most of the visitors came from the US, UK, Germany, Australia, Austria and Canada, but also from France, the Netherlands, India, Finland, Italy, Portugal, Spain, the Philippines, Ireland, Norway, Brazil, Sweden, Republic of Korea, Hong Kong and from 132 further countries among them e.g. Myanmar, Namibia, Nigeria, Bhutan, Nepal, Belize, Mongolia and China.
The top-10 most visited blog entries in 2013 were:
1. The recession in the music industry – a cause analysis with 6,213 visits
2. Is Streaming the Next Big Thing? – An International Market Analysis with 3,722 visits
3. Money from Music – a study on musicians’ revenue in the U.S. with 2,824 visits
4. Is Streaming the Next Big Thing? – The Business Models of Music Streaming Services with 2,039 visits
5. Is Streaming the Next Big Thing? – What Consumers Want with 1,160 visits
6. Music Business Research 2012 – in retrospective with 994 visits
7. A Brief History of China’s Music Industry – Part 1: Introduction with 979 visits
8. Australian Music Business – an analysis of the recorded music sales 2000-2011 with 690 visits
9. Is Streaming the Next Big Thing? – The Labels’ Perspective with 669 visits
10. Book Review: The Death & Life of the Music Industry in the Digital Age by Jim Rogers with 660 visits
To sum up, all articles and sites on the blog has been visited 134,670 times since March 2010 when it started the blog. I hope the 200,000 mark can be hit in 2014 with your support. For a number of reasons it is worth visiting the Music Business Research Blog in 2014: The 5th Vienna Music Business Research Days on “Monetizing Music in the Digital Age” (conference call and call-for-papers for the Young Scholars’ Workshop) will be held at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna from October 1-3, 2014 for the first time in cooperation with Waves Festival Vienna & Bratislava. The third volume of the International Journal of Music Business Research will be published issues in spring and autumn 2014. And you will find new blog entries on music business/industry topics, book reviews, conference announcements and updates of the several databases.
See you again on the blog again in 2014. Best wishes and Happy New Year,
PETER
Music Business Research 
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