6.3.11 Adam News & Info

My rant:
Now Amazon is killing the stores I love!
6.3.11 by Q3

Over the past 10 years, I have watched my two favorite kinds of stores vanish rapidly – bookstores and “record” stores. First, the big chains knocked out most of the independents. Along came mass merchants who cherry-picked the top selling items and offered them at discounts. Then online retailers started to steal share from traditional retailers. At the same time, internet streaming media, online radio and peer-to-peer music started to divert listeners from broadcast radio.

With easy access to free digital music, usually illegal, recorded music sales started to decline around 2005. Over time, as sales continued to shrink, music stores vanished and music departments in mass merchandise chain continued to shrink. Some Walmart locations now only have a 20 foot run of CDs and one endcap display.

And this week we witnessed what may be the final blow, Amazon offered the biggest new album release of the year for $0.99 – losing $7.00 to $8.00 per unit sold. It was a good promotion for Amazon’s new cloud service but it stole critical sales from traditional and online retail stores – and it appears to be a lot of sales that shifted.


Strange Bedfellows

Now, in an odd twist of fate, three struggling industries are now all intertwined – the book industry, the music industry and broadcast radio. A couple of example:

1. The Gores Group, the parent company of Westwood One, which has offered to buy over 200 of the 405 Borders stores in a deal that could be valued at $200 million. Last month, Westwood sold its Metro Networks traffic and information arm to Clear Channel in a deal valued at $119 million. Westwood One is the US’ largest radio network, providing over 150 programs and other services to more than 5000 radio stations around the world. The Gores Group also owns Alliance Entertainment, the largest wholesale distributor of CD, DVD and videogame titles in the United States, which provides distribution, fulfillment and other services to such retailers as Barnes & Noble, Amazon.com, Target.com and BestBuy.com. Alliance manages a physical inventory of 400,000 CD, DVD and videogame titles in its state-of-the-art distribution center in Shepherdsville, KY. The company has 2,900 unique customers and ships to 14,500 locations throughout the United States. More about The Gores Group holdings: www.gores.com/portfolio/index.shtml

2. Another broadcasting-related suitor also emerged with a bid to buy into books, with Sirius XM minority-stake holder Liberty Media making an offer to buy the Barnes & Noble chain. Liberty Media also owns QVC, Provide Commerce, Backcountry.com, Celebrate Interactive, Bodybuilding.com, Evite, and Expedia, Atlanta National League Baseball Club, Inc., and TruePosition, Inc., Liberty Media's interest in SiriusXM Radio,Inc., and minority equity investments in Time Warner Inc. and Live Nation.


No Way to Win

I spent a chunk of my career working on retail turn-arounds, repositioning and reorganizing retailers who were financially challenged by market changes or structural issues within their sector. I learned that you cannot win when there are structural changes in the marketplace and we are at a point when there is a structural change in the marketplace happening. If books, music, movies, computer games and other entertainment materials can be distributed digitally and stored in clouds (remote virtual storage), the revenue and profit model will shift. If People are willing to store their music and other digital assets in clouds, and are willing to pay a subscription fee for that storage, then maybe the storage fee collector can give away a premium like $0.99 albums.

Most retailers cannot afford to spend $3 million on a promotion like this. They need to make money by selling the merchandise stocked in their store or by actually selling digital tracks. And no retailer operates in a vacuum. One retailer estimated that the Amazon offer reduced their sales by 50%. From the New York Times:



Of the total 1.1 million units of Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way” that were sold in the first week, 40% were digital albums sold for $0.99 by Amazon, a retailer who has a 12% recorded music market share and who primarily sells CD albums not digital albums.


The Amazon $0.99 Album Sale is bad for the music business

When a consumer buys something for little or nothing, it does not matter to them if the seller paid 8 times the sale price for the item. The buyer just knows they got a great deal and got an entire album for less than the cost of one digital track. This devalues the music. Why should I pay $16 for an Arcade Fire album if I only paid $0.99 for my Lady Gaga album? And since it only cost – well close to nothing – why shouldn’t I just send my friends copies of it? It is only worth $0.99.

One special like this will not kill the music business but it is just a matter of time. The model will shift. But how will the artists, the record labels, the retailers, and the broadcasters make money in 2 years, and 5 years?

Sometime in the future we will only have a handful of bookstores and music stores, and those will mostly be nostalgic tourist spots like the Victorian General Store in Ferndale, California. But I hope that someone figures out a music industry business model that provides revenue to replace the revenue from album sales.

In 1900, the music industry was run by the publishers of sheet music. By 1950 records passed sheet music as the largest revenue source in the music business, and the recording industry because dominant. The clock is ticking again and it is not clear who will end up running the show.




Did Adam Lambert record a duet with Xtina?
6.3.11 by Q3

Yesterday, 93.3 FM FLZ the Top 40 station from Tampa, FL tweeted out a rumor that they heard from a source, not at RCA, in NY. According to their source, Adam recorded a song with Christina Aguilera. Here are the tweets:

Source:
933FLZ: @933flz Tampa, FL
Tampa Bay's Hit Music Channel. Listen live: tiny.cc/flzlisten
www.933flz.com

33flz 933FLZ: Uhhh not sure if this is out yet but a little birdie just told us that @adamlambert has recorded a song with Christina Aguilera.
933flz: @omgelvis no idea. maybe we spilled the beans earlier than they wanted. Nobody told us "not" to say anything... We'll see...

seanfullsail10: @933flz how positive are you about the christina aguilera/adam lambert rumored collaboration?
replies ↓
933flz 933FLZ by whimsicalspirit
@seanfullsail10 pretty good intel

Within about an hour – look what was trending worldwide:



Until someone confirms this, I would classify it as a cool rumor but I am convinced it must be based on something. Did someone confuse Adam Lambert and Adam Levine who is on “The Voice” with Xtina? Or is Adam Lambert going to be on one of “The Voice” results shows? Or is it true? I guess we will find out when Adam or Xtina or RCA decides to respond to the millions of questions.

In any case, I think the appropriate response was posted by Gelly14:





Sia tweets she is not involved in any Xtina-Adam duet
6.3.11 source: Twitter

Scratch Sia off the list of people who were involved in the collaboration.

@ala4adam: @siamusic I have a feeling we are gonna hear that song u wrote for Adam and Xtina real soon......crossing fingers.

@siamusic: adam and xtina are not working together. i am working with both of them separately. i haven't even started with xtina yet. kay?




The Maxidrom concert – the great videos keep coming!!

Nostrovia!





Adam Lambert: Interview with Cosmopolitan, Russia

Source: www.cosmo.ru/in_focus/cosmostars/1015330/
www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_h79Y0Ih98




Don’t miss: Cassie on the Radio with Angelina

Cassie's interview on Sound Bath on the evolution of communication. Here is the program in four segments.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EAEdTR0Pek&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpwUwXu6wiQ&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

www.youtube.com/watch?v=wOSpHQ_cni0&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQUzd1AvpzU&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL





Upcoming Events

Check the Adamtopia calendar for more events and links to more info.

July or so: Behind the scenes video of Adam #2 recording sessions to be released.

7.29.11 Adam performs at the St. Agathe en Feux Festival in Sainte-Agathe-des-Monts, QC, festival concert.

ATop Quebec concert thread: www.adamtopia.com/index.cgi?board=adam2performances&action=display&thread=321


Late Summer 2011 New single released

October-November 2011 Adam's second album released

Every Saturday from New Zealand -- Adam Lambert Hour -- Live 7:00PM EDT US.
Link: www.adamlamberthour.co.nr/

Check out the ALH page for podcast of previous shows.
This is the only weekly Adam Lambert show in the world.




Voting Opportunities

I have changed my recommendation on VH1 Do Something Awards to DO NOT VOTE
5.27.11 by Q3

On 5.25.11 I recommended voting in this competition. Since then I have done some additional research and testing.

1. Voting for the celebrity online awards is just a way to build awareness for the real awards show.

2, Adam is not nominated for any award. The only way to vote for Adam is as a write-in. It takes much longer to cast a write-in vs. voting for a nominee. There is no limit on voting. So 10 minutes of Adam fan voting time can be wiped out in about 1 minute by someone voting for a nominee.

Poll rating (0=lowest rating, 10=highest rating)

Adam benefit: 3 – a win could raise awareness of The Trevor Project.
Fairness: 3 - there is an attempt to limit voting for just one category but it is very easy to work around.
Potential to win: 9 – The voting structure makes a write-in vote very timeconsuming.
Fan value: 2
RECOMMENDATION – vote only if you are willing to work really hard.


About the awards: DoSomething.org and VH1 have partnered to present The Do Something Awards to honor young people's commitment to social change. VH1 is doing a series of online contests to promote this event – they have nominees but also accept write-ins. One of the celebrity categories could help Adam but, more importantly make a difference.

The category: Charity Song

The write-in: @adamlambert for "Aftermath Remix" and mention the Trevor Project.

You need to sign in on Twitter or Facebook to vote.

Below the SUBMIT button, it says:

“Did we miss your favorite?
NOMINATE YOUR OWN!”

Clink on “NOMINATE YOUR OWN!” and you will get a voting pop-up window.

Link to cast a write-in: www.vh1.com/shows/events/do_something_awards/2011/
Note: If you send a really clever tweet, VH1 may retweet it.

More information about The Do Something Awards

Broadcast: Thursday, August 18, 2011 @ 9/8c Location: Los Angeles, California

Link: www.vh1.com/shows/events/do_something_awards/2011/about.jhtml





The Much Music Awards - Most Watched Video of the Year[/color]

Award is issued on June 19, 2011.

Adam is up for a Much Music Award in the muchmusic.com most watched video of the year category. Just click on the category and click on Adam's pic. Adam won last your for WWFM and we can win him an award for IIHY this year.

Poll rating (0=lowest rating, 10=highest rating)

Adam benefit: 5 – could result in a TV mention and video clip being played during show.
Fairness: 6 – spamable but bot/automated voting prevention.
Potential to win: 2 – There are 25 videos up for this awards -- it will take a lot fan effort.
Fan value: 5 – yes, this one results in a mention of Adam on an important Canadian award show.
RECOMMENDATION – This is worth some effort. Play when you get a chance.

Link to vote: mmva.muchmusic.com/nominees/



Q102 "TakeOver Hour"[/color]

Vote for both WWFM and IIHY and get Adam radio play between 8:00PM and 10:00PM in Philadelphia media market. Just click on the green arrow and WWFM will keep moving up the playlist.

Poll rating (0=lowest rating, 10=highest rating)

Adam benefit: 6 – results in airplay on Q102FM.
Fairness: 6 – spamable but bot/automated voting prevention.
Potential to win: 5 – Both WWFM and IIHY has gotten airplay from this.
Fan value: 7 – yes, this one results in airplay of Adam's hit songs.
RECOMMENDATION – This is worth some effort. Send in a few entries every night.

Link to request or write in song: www.q102.com/pages/takeover.html




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