Amazon today announced a new service that will soon be available called the ‘Cloud Player’. The idea is that users can upload their music tracks to their own space on the internet and access it from any computer or Android phone. This beats Apple and Google who are apparently developing similar systems themselves. The idea of a large amount of online storage space for general public use isn’t exactly a new idea (i.e. Dropbox), but the fact that the major players see this as the way forward means the demise of the CD and the hard drive. Read more

A year or two ago I joined Last.fm for the sole purpose of getting my band’s music on there. I used it for personal use for a short time having downloaded the scrobbler for iTunes but to be honest, I didn’t really get it. Especially as Spotify was becoming increasingly popular and having it as a standalone program seemed much more appealing. Before long, I forgot about using it, letting my account gathering dust. Read more

A few months ago, you will have seen me blog about the Amazon Kindle. I ended up getting one and it’s fantastic. Just letting you all know you can now subscribe to this blog with your Kindle. Click one of the links below to find out more!

Amazon.co.uk (£1.99)

Amazon.com ($1.99)

It goes without saying that all bands should have some sort of online presence such as an online profile on MySpace or a Facebook fan page. Bands or artists looking to have a more personalised and controlled online presence opt for their own website. The success of these websites depend largely on the content and amount of interactivity available. If you have the same content, pictures and information as your online profiles, users don’t exactly have an incentive to make those few extra clicks to your own place on the web.

Having a media rich website with interactive content is vital in today’s web 2.0 world, which can be a tricky thing for unsigned bands or artists trying to create their own web presence. There are many content management websites available such as Drupal, but the WordPress blogging platform has worldwide popularity and rightly so. You can get your website up and running with minimal programming/designing experience, however the more you delve into customising your website, the more likely you are to get bogged down in CSS, HTML or PHP code. Read more

Another day and another new social network. I’m beginning to lose count to be honest. Still, a day after Steve Jobs’ annoucement of ‘Ping’ the new social network incorporated into iTunes 10 it went live and I’ve gone straight in and had a look.

When I first heard about it, I was a bit skeptical. Spotify had introduced their own social networking features recently and to be honest it works because it’s well incorporated into Facebook – there’s no need to set up additional profiles or add friends, you just have to link accounts. It was clear that this wouldn’t be the case with ‘Ping’ and quite how the public will react to having a new place to ‘like’ artists and albums will be interesting indeed. To join ‘Ping’ you have to upgrade to iTunes 10. Once you have done this, you’ll see the link for ‘Ping’ just below ‘iTunes Store’ in the left hand column. Read more