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Heads Down, Eyes Up December 5, 2009

Posted by Matt Churchill in Music.
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The rather musically inclined Jed Hallam tagged me in a challenge to create two tracklists.

As Jed puts it:

Definitions;

Heads down: (verb) To put your head in a downward position and dance manically. Until your eyes bleed a bit. Or your mouth falls off.

Eyes up: (verb) The lifting of one’s eyes after a night of ‘heads down’. The state of mind that yearns for the sun rise. Or more tequila.

So, here you go… Incidentally, I wonder if all of these will go into one epic playlist?

Heads Down
True Faith – New Order
Love Will Tear Us Apart – Joy Division
Disappointed – Electronic
Black And White Town – Doves
Waterfall – Stone Roses
Slip Inside This House – Primal Scream
Love Like A Fountain – Ian Brown
Five Man Army – Massive Attack
Heavyweight Champion Of The World – Reverend And The Makers
Takuya – Battle
Vertigo – The Libertines
Crazy Beat – Blur
Spread Your Love – BRMC
One To Another – The Charlatans
I Ain’t Saying My Goodbyes – Tom Vek
Wolf Like Me – TV On The Radio
Talons – Blog Party
Test Transmission – Kasabian

Eyes Up
Atmosphere – Joy Division
All You Do Is Talk – BRMC
Blue Light – Bloc Party
Alone, Jealous And Stoned – Secret Machines
Stealing Tomorrow – Great Lake Swimmers
Hoppipolla- Sigur Ros
Hawaii – Mew
Life In Sound- Trespassers William
Prospekt’s March – Coldplay
4.35 am – Gemma Hayes
Great Expectations – Elbow
Ragged Wood – Fleet Foxes
In Our Talons – Bowerbirds
Johnny Mathis’ Feet – American Music Club
Don’t Let It Bring You Down – Neil Young
Caught By The River – Doves
Burning Benches – Morning Runner
Smokers Outside The Hospital Doors – Editors

So, in the spirit of passing this on, i’m tagging Lolly, Mauricio Samayoa, Dan Lazarides, Elliot Pearson, Ian Bach, Ross Churchill and Anna Stuart.

7digital Expands December 3, 2009

Posted by Matt Churchill in Music.
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Record of the Day reports that MP3 download specialists 7digital are expanding with the launch of two new MP3 stores in Finland and Norway.

This means that a catalogue of 8 million odd tracks will be available to a total of 16 countries, and this will be music to the ears of their partners, of whom Spotify is one.

The expansion means that 7digital will have the largest reach of any vendor in Europe, and are looking to be in a solid place financially following HMV’s recent acquisition of half the company for £7.7 million.

Ben Drury, CEO of 7digital, said “This gives us the largest international reach of any MP3 retailer. Our partners and potential clients now have the option to operate digital music promotions across the a vast number of markets, through a single partnership with us”.

According to the press release:

At launch both stores will provide best selling albums at sale prices. The finish store will discount top albums to €5.99, while Norway’s will be priced at 56NOK.

Regular tracks and album pricing on the Finish store are €0.99 and €9.99 respectively. In Norway tracks are 8NOK while albums start at 80NOK. Both stores will sell content from all four major labels plus key independents including Bonnier Amigo, Phonophile and Artspages.

Sounds like a bargain to my ears.

MySpace Music officially launches in the UK December 2, 2009

Posted by Matt Churchill in Music, Myspace.
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Myspace Music has officially launched in the UK. Stuart Dredge pointed out that, despite an embargo preventing him from writing about the service’s launch, a Myspace designer tweeted about it’s launch 17 minutes before the media were (in theory) allowed to publish anything.

Stuart has acknowledged this on Music Ally.

UPDATE: Now the embargo has passed, you can read Stuart’s thoughts here

What this has demonstrated is that in the world of social media, the embargo is a threatened beast, and what better way to annoy a blogger than to give them an embargo and then break it. I’m sure the Myspace designer didn’t mean to break an embargo and was harmlessly sharing his excitement of the service going live.

It’ll be interesting to see if this inadvertent slip has any affect on how the service is received or how the social media sphere discusses it. It will also be interesting to see how sustainable the service is as users, used to spam and becoming widely regarded as behind the curve as Myspace itself falters, sign up (or don’t).

Euroblogosphere Development December 1, 2009

Posted by Matt Churchill in Blogging.
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I stumbled across a group of bloggers who are at the very cusp of developing their community as I was travelling around the Internet on Saturday, and it got me thinking about how blogging communities start, grow and where do they end?

I was intrigued by Joe Litobarski’s post, a response to the proposal that a Euroblogosphere and community isn’t emerging.

In it, Joe argues that there is no Euroblogosphere as such, but sets himself the challenge of building one (wow, tough cookie!) from the embryonic communities that already exist.

He says that:

This might mean pulling even further back from hardcore European politics – and focusing more on European life. It might mean translating bits and pieces from national blogospheres for the English-speaking Euroblogosphere. What I definitely think it means is sharing skills learned and best-practices between bloggers. I’m going to try to work harder with other European bloggers to improve their own blogging, and ask for their help in improving mine.

To do this, Joe has organised a Euroblogger meetup taking place over Twitter using #euroblog, Google Wave and Skype on December 3rd from 20:00 GMT.

I think this is a great idea and i’ll be watching with interest to see how the Eurobloggers unite and start to build the foundations of a community as strong as those like the Mummy or Tech Bloggers.

There are many individuals writing about their views on European policies and culture, but these tend to be very localised as far as I can see – there are very few writing about Europe as a whole and I’ll be interested to see how the work of a few individuals will affect this.

This sprt of meetup is of course a regular occurrence in London, and Andy Bargery has provided the focal point for this – I wonder if Joe will fill the same role, only on a European scale?

Nope, It’s Still Wrong For PRs To Pay Bloggers November 30, 2009

Posted by Matt Churchill in Social Media.
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Triggered by Lolly’s blog post about getting approached by an agency looking to pay her to write about their product, and the resulting debate that took place because of this, PR Week commissioned a poll.

It asked if PRs should pay bloggers, and astoundingly, 43% said it was acceptable to do so.

Now, granted this won’t have seen every registered PR take part, but to say that just under half the people in our industry think that it is totally fine to pay a blogger to write a blog post about their product, is a sad indictment of the state of the PR industry at the moment.

Robin Grant, the MD of We Are Social, hits the nail on the head when he says: “Bloggers are their own people and should write what they want. The results of the PRWeek poll only show the naivety towards social media in the PR industry; they haven’t got their heads round it and aren’t set up for it.”

And, pertinently, Lolly makes this point in the PRWeek comment section:

“As a blogger and a PR I am on both sides of the fence. Yes it is hard to get coverage these days, and it is tempting to throw a few pounds at someone in exchange for a few kind words. Bloggers who get paid to write blog posts might as well hand out their WordPress login details to PR agencies. Would PRs agencies pay bloggers if coverage was negative? Unlikely.”

Of which I agree wholeheartedly. There was another comment in the piece that had quite a reaction on Twitter, but i’ll let you figure that one out for yourself.

So I was dismayed/unsurprised when I saw Douglas Blyde tweeting about Douwe Egberts, who have offered to pay bloggers £50 to post a series of videos. What alarms me is that some of the bloggers have not disclosed that they have been paid to feature these videos, as Jamie Goode explains.

I have no qualms about a blogger being sponsored by a company, or getting them to advertise (I will ignore the post or advert), but a disregard for their readers by not letting them know if their blog post has been sponsored? Outrageous.

As a PR I will never recommend to a client that they should pay a blogger, and I would find it very awkward to continue working for any employer, current or future, who insisted on doing so.

As a blogger I will reject and approach by an agency who are offering to pay me, it damages my integrity, neutrality and relationship with my readers.

The Eight Stages of Listening November 29, 2009

Posted by Matt Churchill in Social Media.
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@hrouda shared a presentation by Jeremiah Owyang on Twitter, about the different stages of listening.

I spend alot of time doing exactly this and thought it worth sharing as it is short, simple, and gets to the point!

A Bunch Of Young UK Social Media People You’ve Probably Not Heard Of, But Probably Should Have Done November 28, 2009

Posted by Matt Churchill in Social Media.
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So I was reading, for the millionth time, a best social media pros list, and it struck me that all of these types of lists always feature the same names. There’s nothing wrong with that, the likes of Drew Benvie, Chris Garrett and Neville Hobson have worked long and hard to get to build up their experience and are rightly considered among the best in the business.

But what struck me was the shortage in youngsters on these lists. Raw talent and an understanding of the space is just as important as experience, and in social media, can make up for not having been a pro for many years.

So, in a controversial move (who’da thought it), here’s a group of people who I think are making waves, without having been in the industry for that long. What’s my criteria? I know they are doing a great job, they understand the space and they are full of a fire that only youthful exuberance can bring!

Anna Carlson
Blog: Anna Carlson
Twitter: @Carlsonator

Dan Lazarides
Blog: digitisedculture.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/DJLazarides

Ben Ayres
Blog: Ben Ayers
Twitter: @benayers

Jed Hallam
Blog: rock-star-pr.com
Twitter: @jedhallam

Ben Cotton
Blog: ben cotton.com
Twitter: @BenCotton

Gerel Orgil
Blog: smelevation
Twitter: @Gerel

Jim Wolff
Blog: jimwolffman.com/
Twitter: @jimwolffman

Jordan Stone
Blog: digitalprescriptions.co.uk/
Twitter: @jordanstone

Mike Phillips
Blog: eatsleepsocial.com
Twitter: @imjustmike

Laura Scott
Blog: popjunkietv.com/
Twitter: @Laura_Scott

Michael Litman
Blog: litmanlive.co.uk
Twitter: @litmanlive

Rachel Steed
Blog: quotesfromthestreet.com
Twitter: @Monsty

James Poulter
Blog: jamespoulter
Twitter: @jamespoulter

Adam Lewis
Blog: Flawless Buzz
Twitter: @FlawlessBuzz

So….who have I missed?