Liner notes are the writings found on the sleeves of LP record albums and in booklets that come inserted into the compact disc jewel case or cassette j-cards.
Pandora is a subscription-based music streaming service owned by the broadcasting corporation Sirius XM that is presently based in Oakland, California inside of the United States. The service carries a focus on recommendations based on the "Music Genome Project", which is a means of classifying individual songs by musical traits such as genres and shared instrumentation. The service originally launched in the consumer market as an internet radio service that would generate personalized channels based on these traits as well as specific tracks liked by the user; this service is available in an advertising-supported tier and additionally a subscription-based version. In 2017, the service launched Pandora Premium, which is an on-demand version of the service more in line with contemporary competitors.
TuneCore is a Brooklyn, New York–based digital music distribution, publishing and licensing service founded in 2006.
Youku Tudou Inc., doing business as Youku, is a video hosting service based in Beijing, China. It operates as a subsidiary of Alibaba Group Holding Limited.
AC4 was a Swedish hardcore punk band from Umeå, Sweden. Refused members Dennis Lyxzén and David Sandström had been talking about starting a new band for a long time. In the spring of 2008 Karl Backman had written songs for the new band and they started to rehearse. Jens Nordén had played with Lyxzén in pre-Refused straight edge hardcore band Step Forward (1987-1991) and since 1990 with Backman in punk band The Vectors. The "AC" in the name is the regional code for the Västerbotten province where Umeå is located.
Spotify is a Swedish audio streaming and media service provider founded on 23 April 2006 by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon. As of September 2024, it is one of the largest providers of music streaming services, with over 640 million monthly active users comprising 252 million paying subscribers. Spotify is listed on the New York Stock Exchange in the form of American depositary receipts.
DigiListan is a Swedish radio programme in SR P3 airing the top singles sold electronically to computers, mobile phones and other kinds of media players in Sweden. The statistics are created using Nielsen SoundScan.
A music streaming service is a type of online streaming media service that focuses primarily on music, and sometimes other forms of digital audio content such as podcasts. These services are usually subscription-based services allowing users to stream digital copyright restricted songs on-demand from a centralized library provided by the service. Some services may offer free tiers with limitations, such as advertising and limits on use. They typically incorporate a recommender system to help users discover other songs they may enjoy based on their listening history and other factors, as well as the ability to create and share public playlists with other users. It may also include customized radio or social media platforms.
SoundCloud is a German audio streaming service owned and operated by SoundCloud Global Limited & Co. KG. The service enables its users to upload, promote, and share audio. Founded in 2007 by Alexander Ljung and Eric Wahlforss, SoundCloud is one of the largest music streaming services in the world and is available in 190 countries and territories. The service has more than 76 million active monthly users and over 200 million audio tracks as of November 2021. SoundCloud offers both free and paid memberships on the platform, available for mobile, desktop and Xbox devices. SoundCloud has evolved from a traditional online streaming platform to an entertainment company.
8tracks.com is an internet radio and social networking website revolving around the concept of streaming user-curated playlists consisting of at least 8 tracks. Users create free accounts and can browse the site and listen to other user-created mixes, as well as create their mixes. The site also has a subscription-based service, 8tracks Plus, although this is currently only available to listeners based in the United States and Canada.
Mixcloud is a popular British online music streaming service that allows for the listening and distribution of radio shows, DJ mixes and podcasts, which are crowdsourced by its registered users.
Pond5 is a New York–based online marketplace for royalty-free media. The company licenses stock footage, stock music, stock photography, sound effects, Adobe After Effects templates, and 3D models. Pond5 claims to have the world's largest collection of stock footage, and that they host more than 38 million clips as of September 2023.
GoDigital Media Group (GDMG) is a diversified multi-national conglomerate founded in 2006 by Jason Peterson and headquartered in Los Angeles. GDMG focuses on intellectual property rights management through divisions in music, video networks, and brands (commerce).
Tidal is a Norwegian-American music streaming service, launched in 2014 by the Norwegian-Swedish public company Aspiro. Tidal is now majority-owned by Block, Inc., the owner of the point-of-sale system Square.
Apple Music is an audio and video streaming service developed by Apple Inc. Users can select music to stream to their device on-demand, or listen to existing playlists. The service also includes the sister internet radio stations Apple Music 1, Apple Music Hits, Apple Music Country, Apple Música Uno, Apple Music Club, and Apple Music Chill which are broadcast live to over 200 countries 24 hours a day. The service was announced on June 8, 2015, and launched on June 30, 2015. New subscribers get a one-month free or six months free trial with the purchase of select products before the service requires a monthly subscription.
Spotify, a music streaming company, has attracted significant criticism since its 2008 launch, mainly over artist compensation. Unlike physical sales or downloads, which pay artists a fixed price per song or album sold, Spotify pays royalties based on the artist's "market share"—the number of streams for their songs as a proportion of total songs streamed on the service. Spotify distributes approximately 70% of its total revenue to rights holders, who then pay artists based on their individual agreements. Multiple artists have criticised the policy, including Taylor Swift and Thom Yorke, who temporarily withdrew their music from the service.
Amuse is a global music company offering digital music distribution, funding and artist services to independent artists and managements, who retain 100% of their master rights. The company was founded as a modern alternative to major record labels in 2015 in Stockholm, Sweden by entrepreneurs Diego Farias, Andreas Ahlenius, Christian Wilsson, Guy Parry, and Jimmy Brodd. Amuse is based in Stockholm, Sweden, with offices in London, UK and New York, US. In 2024, Giorgio D'Ambrosio was appointed CEO of the company.
Music Business Worldwide (MBW) is a global music industry news and analysis website launched in 2015 by former Music Week editor Tim Ingham. As of December 2020, it ranked 22,845 in the list of most visited global websites according to Alexa Internet.
Spoken Giants is the first global rights administration company for the owners and creators of spoken word copyrights. Spoken Giants represents comedians, podcast authors, speech writers, and other spoken word creators.
As of 2016, Spotify has faced accusations from numerous publications, such as Music Business Worldwide and Vulture Magazine, regarding their practice of commissioning tracks and listing them under fake names on their music platform. Some allege that the practice exists in order to reduce the amount of royalty payments distributed to real recording artists. In December of 2024, the specific initiative of Perfect Fit Content (PFC) was revealed in a report by Liz Pelly, a music writer and critic whose internal investigation regarding the matter, titled "The Ghosts in the Machine", was published in Harper's Magazine. Other publications have also since raised concerns about the growing amount of generative artificial intelligence in Spotify's playlists and on the service writ large.
