Ad: Manage updates with the Download App
ie8 fix

soundscan

Universal Music toasts BigChampagne

Count BigChampagne among the companies trying to cut into Nielsen's media-measuring empire.

Universal Music Group, the largest of the four major recording companies, has agreed to a multi-year deal that calls for BigChampagne to help track the popularity of the label's music online. Traditionally, Universal has relied on Nielsen's SoundScan for such chores.

BigChampagne tracks online music and video consumption. Headquartered in Beverly Hills, Calif., BigChampagne is perhaps best known for being the first of the business-intelligence companies to measure activity at file-sharing networks, such as the original Napster.

"With the addition of BigChampagne, we provide … Read more

Mellencamp mourns the death of the record biz

Don't take my word for it that the major labels and the system that propped them up for so many years are dead. John Mellencamp, who sang a string of rock hits back in the 1980s and '90s, thinks the business is dead as well. In an articulate and passionate essay on the Huffington Post, he argues that the long slide started well before the rise of file sharing, back to when the business started relying on SoundScan and Broadcast Data Systems (BDS).

With SoundScan, instead of relying on surveys from record stores, the labels could see exactly how … Read more