business
Robinhood rolls out wallets to 2M waitlisted users, plans to integrate Lightning
Cryptocurrency and stock trading app Robinhood will roll out its digital wallet feature for 2 million additional users. In a Thursday announcement at the Bitcoin 2022 Conference in Miami, Robinhood chief product officer Aparna Chennapragada said eligible customers who had been on the waitlist for the digital wallet — more than two million people — can now send and receive cryptocurrencies. In addition, the platform is planning to integrate the Bitcoin Lightning Network to reduce the time and cost of transactions as well as their carbon footprint. Super pumped to announce on the #Bitcoin2022 stage that @RobinhoodApp has rolled out wallets access to the nearly 2 million people on the WenWallets waitlist. — Aparna Chennapragada (@aparnacd) April 7, 2022 According to Robinhood, the crypto wall...
Parcast Union Reaches Tentative Deal With Spotify, Management on First Contract
Seemingly averting a threatened strike, a union at Parcast has reached a tentative agreement with Spotify and Parcast management on a first contract covering the podcast studio’s content writers, fact-checkers, producers, researchers and other workers. The Parcast Union — which is affiliated with the Writers Guild of America, East — announced the deal on Wednesday night, their final day of bargaining with the music streaming giant and the Spotify-owned podcast studio, and are not yet disclosing terms of the tentative agreement. “After months of regular meetings, late-night emails, private calls, & full unit efforts, we’re proud to announce we have a deal,” the union tweeted on Wednesday night. “We couldn’t have done it without the consistent support of our colleagues. It’s been a worth...
Record Label Market Share Q1 2022: Interscope Leads, Indies Gain, Disney Surges Into Top 10
We don’t talk about Bruno, but Disney is giving the music business something else to talk about: its impressive new share of the market. As 2022 got underway, the soundtrack to Encanto, the Disney film that was released over the holiday season, saw its Lin-Manuel Miranda-penned collection of songs become the biggest album of the year so far in the first quarter stemming from Dec. 31, 2021 through March 31, 2022. The success of the soundtrack — the first album of 2022 to pass 1 million equivalent album units, according to Luminate, formerly MRC Data — has had a tangible effect on the market share rankings for Q1, as the Disney Music Group surged into the top 10 of overall market share, the most significant of several moves atop the rankings compared to Q1 last year. Interscope/Geffen/A&...
Twitter Is Testing an ‘Edit’ Button
Twitter tweeted Tuesday that it is indeed working on a way for users to edit their 280-character messages, although it says the project has nothing to do with the fact that edit-function fan Elon Musk was just revealed as the company’s largest shareholder and now sits on its board. Twitter said it will test the feature in its paid service, Twitter Blue, in the coming months. It said the test would help it “learn what works, what doesn’t, and what’s possible.” So it may be a while before most Twitter users get to use it, if they ever do. Twitter spokesperson Catherine Hill declined to say whether an edit feature might be rolled out for all users. Explore See latest videos, charts and news See latest videos, charts and news Many Twitter users — among them, Kim Kardashian, Ice-T, Katy Perry a...
WMG Canada Offices Relocating to Downtown Toronto in 2023
Warner Music Group is relocating its Canadian businesses to The Well, a newly-constructed building in downtown Toronto. Beginning in March 2023, WMG employees from Warner Music Canada, Warner Chappell Music Canada and Sodatone (a predictive A&R and marketing intelligence platform) will move into the new office, which will include a recording studio, performance space, songwriting rooms and content creation workrooms. The relocation comes as part of WMG’s Future of Work project, which aims to improve the company’s office spaces globally and better align with hybrid working models. Located at 410 Front Street West in downtown Toronto, The Well “offers a curated collection of premium and new concept retail, commercial, dining, and wellness businesses, as well as office and residential spa...
Spotify’s Discovery Mode Under Scrutiny by Congress (Again)
Members of Congress are once again taking aim at Spotify’s controversial Discovery Mode feature, which allows artists and labels to receive a lower royalty rate on select tracks in exchange for higher priority in the platform’s algorithms. In a letter obtained by Billboard, dated March 29, 2022 and addressed to Spotify founder, CEO and chairman Daniel Ek, Reps. Yvette D. Clarke (D-NY), Judy Chu (D-CA) and Tony Cardenas (D-CA) – co-chairs of the Congressional Caucus on Multicultural Media – express concerns that Discovery Mode “lacks transparency” for both artists and consumers and ask the company to publish “on a monthly basis the name of every track enrolled in the program” and the agreed-upon discounted royalty rate for each. Variety first reported on the letter. “Choosing to accept...
Boba Network to prioritise Ethereum’s computational constraints with a $45M funding
The $45 million Series A round was completed in the fourth quarter of last year via a token sale The hybrid computing platform aims to resolve the ignored scalability aspect of Ethereum – its computational limitations Ethereum overlay solution Boba Network has announced that it completed a $45 million Series A raise during Q4 of 2021. With a valuation of $1.5 billion, Boba has joined the ranks of unicorns within this nascent space. Without a lead investor, the hybrid computing platform enjoyed broad participation, with investors ranging from industry-native venture funds to celebrity figures. Infinite Capital, Crypto.com, Kinetic Capital, Huobi, Hack VC, BitMart, Will Smith, Keisuke Honda, and Paris Hilton were all involved. The network said that funding for the Series was secured via a to...
Ed Sheeran Wins UK Copyright Case Over ‘Shape Of You’
Ed Sheeran has won a copyright battle in UK court over his chart-topping 2017 hit “Shape of You,” after a judge ruled Wednesday (April 6) that the star did not copy the song from a little-known track. The judge ruled that Sheeran’s mega hit, which spent 12 weeks atop the Hot 100, did not infringe a 2015 song called “Oh Why” released by an artist named Sami Chokri, who performs as Sami Switch, and music producer Ross O’Donoghue. Explore Explore See latest videos, charts and news See latest videos, charts and news Sheeran quickly celebrated the ruling in a video posted to social media – and blasted what he called “baseless” lawsuits and the harm they’re doing to the music industry. “While we’re obviously happy with the result, I feel like claims like this are way too common now and have beco...
Lightning Labs secures $70M from Valor Equity-led Series B raise
The Bitcoin-focused firm intends to use the funds to continue advancing its Lightning solutions Lightning Labs also proposed a new protocol, Taro, that will facilitate low-cost stablecoin transactions Lightning Labs yesterday shared news of a $70 million Series B raise, adding that the funds will go into projects set to introduce stablecoin and other asset transfers on Bitcoin. The funding round saw participation from several names, including asset management firm Baillie Gifford and Valor Equity Partners – the latter leading it. Other entities and individuals that took part are NYDIG, Goldcrest Capital, Kingsway, Stillmark, Brevan Howard, Moore Strategic Ventures, Silvergate CEO Alan Lane, and Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev. The California-based, which focuses on the development of software tha...
Lightning Labs secures $70M from Valor Equity-led Series B raise
The Bitcoin-focused firm intends to use the funds to continue advancing its Lightning solutions Lightning Labs also proposed a new protocol, Taro, that will facilitate low-cost stablecoin transactions Lightning Labs yesterday shared news of a $70 million Series B raise, adding that the funds will go into projects set to introduce stablecoin and other asset transfers on Bitcoin. The funding round saw participation from several names, including asset management firm Baillie Gifford and Valor Equity Partners – the latter leading it. Other entities and individuals that took part are NYDIG, Goldcrest Capital, Kingsway, Stillmark, Brevan Howard, Moore Strategic Ventures, Silvergate CEO Alan Lane, and Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev. The California-based, which focuses on the development of software tha...
Lauren Alaina Parts Ways With Longtime Record Label
Singer-songwriter Lauren Alaina has parted ways with her longtime record label home, Billboard has confirmed. Alaina first shared the news on social media, with a lengthy statement thanking UMG Nashville and Mercury Records for being her label home from the beginning of her career, after she came in second place on the 10th season of American Idol in 2011 (fellow country entertainer Scotty McCreery was the winner that season). “I want to thank the staff at Mercury Records and UMG Nashville for everything they have done for me over the last 11 years,” Alaina said. “They have been my label home since the day I walked off the American Idol stage as a really young, wide-eyed, eager 16-year-old kid. Now, at 27 years old I look back and see just how much I have changed and grown in to the woman ...
Los Angeles’ Forum Arena Is Now the Kia Forum
The 55-year-old Forum in Los Angeles has landed a new naming partner. Going forward, the Southern California arena will be known as the Kia Forum. Automotive company Kia has become the naming rights and official automotive partner for the arena, which used to serve as the home of the NBA’s Los Angeles Lakers. “Kia America is proud of our history in Southern California going back to the establishment of our US Headquarters here in 1992, and so we all celebrate now being part of one of the most historic, and emotionally-connected live entertainment and sports venues in California – if not the world,” said Kia America vp of marketing Russell Wager in a release. “We are thrilled to be a part of the entertainment and excitement of live music and events at the Kia Forum moving forward.” The Foru...
