SONG CONTEST BLOG

POPcuts, a Y Combinator company, is an indie MP3 boutique with an interesting twist.  Similar in nature to Amie Street, the online store provides music fans with an incentive to discover and purchase new music.  Each time a track you purchased sells, you get a cut of the proceeds.  Previous buyers get a larger cut, so it pays to be a “trendspotter”.  The element of A&R role-play is one that I am discovering more and more of in various forms across the web.  See yesterday’s post on Slicethepie & Bebo.

I’ve been following Bandcamp for a little while now (see earlier post) and I noticed today that the company made some revisions to its home page.  Most notably, Bandcamp created a “features” page which lists the entire suite of tools and services.  I was also delighted to learn that Bandcamp now provides Creative Commons licensing designations:

Under the Creative Commons licensing designations, artists who make their music public, in this case via Bandcamp, are providing limited rights to other artists and music fans who wish to remix, share, or use the music in a variety of ways without having to formally ask permission.

Not yet familiar with Creative Commons?  Overview:

DiscRevolt provides an esthetically pleasing physical solution for the digital delivery of music media. Like DropCards, DiscRevolt is music-centric and caters to the artist’s need to promote on the field (street, venue, what have you…) with a product that’s a cross between a flyer and a CD (or perhaps an alternative to a branded USB Wristband?).  The company prints the artist’s artwork on a double-sided plastic card and includes a custom code for the receiver to redeem digital music media from the DiscRevolt storefront.  At $90 per 100 prints, it’s a little cheaper than manufacturing CDs and its wallet sized for convenience.  It looks smart and can be sold or given away.  Downloads are tracked and available through DiscRevolt’s social network applications on MySpace and Facebook.  See MusicPin also, a competing solution which showcased at Midem 2009.