By Julie Blaustein

Brian and Shoshanna Zisk

The 7th. SF MusicTech Summit came back to town on Monday, December 6th. at the Kabuki Hotel. It was another great gathering of the various players in the music industry who drive its innovation, creativity and growth in this constantly evolving space. Topics discussed and debated included entertainment, product development, wireless and hand held, start ups, legal issues and, so much more. The very first SF MusicTech had maybe 300 people whereas now, there are over 800 attendees and over 27 sponsors! There was barely enough room for all the sponsoring logos to fit on the Sponsor plaque. The team responsible for securing all these sponsorships include the “music gods” Brian Zisk and his lovely wife Shoshana along with their partner-in-crime Todd Tate. They all have a deep history of performing and working in the music industry and are now seeking to keep the music alive through the collaboration of those that are seeking to make music and those that are seeking to make money. I also gained  better understanding of what made the SF MusicTech Summit a “must” attend by talking to a few of the sponsors and vendors.

Michael Hobson of HRT

High Resolution Technologies (HRT) would normally have exhibited at the Consumer Electronic Show (CES) in Las Vegas which is way larger than the Summit, but due to their employer Michael Mercer’s recommendation they chose the SF Music Tech Summit. Not only was HRT the largest sponsor of the show but they spoke on a panel and took the opportunity to announce their new product’s launch, The iStreamer which allows you to deliver high performance digital audio playback directly from an iPad, iPhone or an iPod.

Sonic.net provides Internet connectivity to the technology start ups in the community. This is their 2nd. year being a vendor and a sponsor with the summit. Tiffany Lawson, an Account Manager with Sonic.net was eager to be a part of the Summit in part due to how easy it was to work with Brian Zisk, the Executive Producer. “Zisk was great to communicate with, he is always on the same page and he genuinely cares about making the conference a success for you.”

Gianluca delli Carri of MusiXmatch hails from Italy with corporate offices in London. MusiXmatch provides a way to distribute lyrics. Usually they would attend evnts such as Music Hack Day where they would engage with developers. Based on a partner and a past, colorful attendee Robert Kaye of MuicBrainz, they chose to commit to the event.

Peter Jung of Vocoo

Not to be outdone in terms of going the distance to attend SF MusicTech Summit, Peter Jung, Manager of Vocoo.com that provides your voice over background of the hottest songs for iPhone, Android, PC, YouTube, FB and more, came from Seol, Korea! Based on the recommendation of their PR firm, ICR, they came in the hopes of meeting other companies. In fact, it appears that MusiXmatch is now in talks with Voocoo about providing their expertise in lyrics. That, my friends, is worth the airfare and certainly  justifies the ROI of the event to any manager questioning its worthiness to attend.

If you are involved in the music scene in any way, do your self a favor and attend the next SF MusicTech Summit in the spring of 2011 to learn, meet new and old friends and do business. You can’t go wrong.

Go here for more pictures and for Past SF MusicTech Summit Events and check them out on Twitter at #SFMusicTech.

Social Media Prom is coming to San Francisco on November 11.

What does this mean?

Social Media Prom sponsored by @FunnyOrDie is for anyone and everyone who didn’t have a chance to go to prom.

Maybe you didn’t make it out of your house, the backseat of the car, or behind the bleachers. Perhaps you were the wallflower or someone poured punch down your dress and gave you a wedgy and hung you from a locker.

Of course, those who did make it to their prom are also invited!

This is your chance to shine, and redeem those moments lost, and do what you may not have been able to experience from your home or behind the bleachers.

Featured Guests Include:

Hosts: Events For Nerds very own Krystyl Baldwin (@krystyl) and Ben Parr (@benparr)
Live music: LIVE105′s Miles The DJ and The Frail
Special Appearance: Revision3′s Scam School
Special Guests: @MissDestructo and @Jonathan360

Vote for San Francisco’s Social Media Prom King, Queen and Most Likely to Succeed at http://www.socialmediaprom.com Winners will be announced at 8 p.m. on November 11 and will receive special gifts from @Moxsie and @Cirque

• Cocktail / Formal attire is required for entry
• Tickets $15 Singles, $20 Couples, $25 at door.
• Event starts at 6 p.m. and ends at 10 p.m.
• Chance to win many cool prizes.
• Portion of the proceeds go to Market Street Railway – restoring San Francisco’s cable cars.
• First 200 through the door receive a special gift bag.
• Live photo / video uploads from Pixorial, Eye-Fi and others.
• Follow the event with the hashtag #SMProm
• Snacks from Doughey’s Cookies, RedVines, PopChips and more!

Thanks to our sponsors:
Funny Or Die
OMGRaj Productions
Pixorial

LiveShare by CoolIris
Yelp
Skyy Vodka and more!

For more information, visit http://www.socialmediaprom.com
Tickets can be purchased at http://smp.mogotix.com
*Get 15% off your ticket if you’re a Bub reader by using code “Bub”

My iPod speaker recently broke and I’ve been on the hunt for a new one since then. Today, I came across a ‘someday’ must have, the iVictrola.

Designed by Matt Richmond, this amazing invention combines the classic with the new. A solid wooden dock holds a place for your iPhone or iPod touch in front of a vintage metal magnavox gramophone horn to amplify the tunes throughout the room.

I couldn’t find a place to order them online, but it seems that if you want one for $425, you can contact Matt at info@made-craft.com and see what happens.  Each horn is custom chosen for each order, so cool! Placing on my Christmas wish list now.

Check out this video of it in use:

Ke$ha, a Los Angeles based singer, moved 610,069 downloads of her first single “Tik Tok” in a week placing her at the number 2 spot for one week downloads ever with Flo Rida’s “Right Round” at number one in one week sales (with Ke$ha as an uncredited singer). That number is remarkably similar to the number of times New Moon was illegally downloaded online during it’s first week of release (610,000). That number pales in comparison to the first week illegal downloads for Avatar which came close to one million illegal downloads.

Illegal online downloads during the theater run doesn’t appear to have much of an impact on the box office numbers, the challenge for the movie industry comes when the films are released to DVD/Blu-Ray. With Netflix and other cost effective (or illegal and free) options for watching movies, it’s become harder and harder to sell DVD/Blu-Ray discs. According to the Wall Street Journal, 2009 was the first year since 2002 that ticket sales out did DVD/Blu-Ray sales, challenging the existing business model of the movie industry. The music industry faced a similar challenge with the appearance of digital downloads but they were able to recover from the disaster that Napster could have been after a little resistance. The did lead to the near death of the compact disc.

The movie industry isn’t quite there. With new release digital movie downloads costing up to the monthly membership at Netflix (and I mean the good membership with 3 movies at a time), what is the movie industry to do in 2010 to turn that around? SmartMoney recently released a list of things not to buy in 2010 and along with newspaper subscriptions, new college text books and CDs was DVDs. Perhaps it’s time the industry lower the cost of a digital download and move the home release date closer to the theatrical release date. This will allow for two money making opportunities for the industry and allow for the movie watcher to choose the type of experience they want and trump the massive amount of illegal downloads. Of course, with Avatar passing $1 billion dollars at the box office, the need for change is not as immediate but as the quality and availability of downloads become a bit easier for the non-techie, that may shift quickly.

We did survive the death of the VHS, I think we can make it through the next shift.

Sprite may be looking to join music artists with iPhone users for the creation of the next big hit. A new app called ZoozBeat features tracks from various artists such as Dallas Austin, all of which can be remixed by app users for a unique beat. The ZoozBeat mobile app turns iPhone users into music producers, with the iPhone as your mobile music studio.

What do users get out of it? The fun of making beats based on exclusive content from well-known artists. Users can then upload the music and share it with the world. Artists get the chance to hear their own creations from new perspectives, tapping into the power of the crowd towards this end.

The app itself works by shaking, tapping or tilting their iPhones. The music gets remixed according to your motions, adding a bit of dynamic fun to the ZoozBeat iPhone app. You can download new beats, learn more about the artist that initially created the beat, and edit music to your own personal tastes.

It seems unlikely that the participating artists would want to seek the aid of iPhone users for the purpose of creating new beats. Even if this was the case, the ZoozBeat iPhone app acts as a mini mobile portal for the artist. Creating content for a mobile app like this increases visibility and finds new ways in which to explore the music industry.

The other interesting aspect of the ZoozBeat app is that it utilizes some of the iPhone device’s best aspects, appealing to a wide user base. For the purpose of marketing an artist, combining the iPhone and its capabilities as a device makes for great access to consumers. What the consumers do from there is up to them.

Even as the music industry struggles to find a way to regain its days of glory, the new economies of mobile and web apps introduce new opportunities for it to do so. What remains to be seen is how much the music industry will have to rely on associated branding in order to do so.

Sprite gets to reap the benefits of associated branding by powering the ZoozBeat app, using music as a universal marketing message to reach out to consumers. Artists, on the other hand, rely on brands like Sprite for a certain amount of distribution and access to a wide range of consumers. It’s an interesting play, and it’s one that has been gaining steam in the web and mobile app realms.

Time will tell if such apps have any lasting power, with combined strategies seeking similar ends. The cooperative efforts towards reaching a single goal means that partnerships could continue to be successfully forged, with a necessary focus on the end consumer to help carry the marketing message to their friends. ZoozBeat in particular is an interesting way to promote music, its popular artists, and the engagement of users.

This week (tomorrow) is the San Francisco Music Tech conference which is a must attend event for anyone that loves music and/or technology.  The event brings together entrepreneurs, developers, musicians, investors, and service providers for a full day to talk about how the music industry is evolving and how technology is playing a role in that evolution.

The speaker lineup this year is also quite impressive, here are just a few of the folks that are going to be in attendance:

• Stephan Jenkins, Third Eye Blind 3eb!
• Tom Conrad – Chief Technical Officer, Pandora
• Zahavah Levine – Chief Counsel, YouTube
• Tim Quirk – VP of Music Programming, Real Audio / Rhapsody
• Dave Ulmer – Sr. Director, Multimedia, Motorola
• Jeff Yasuda – CEO & Founder, blip.fm
• Jean Cook – Interim Executive Director, Future of Music Coalition
• Michael Masnick – Founder, TechDirt

As you can see it’s going to be quite an eclectic event with a lot of interesting discussions.  I’m really interested in the back story behind a lot of the companies such as Pandora and Blip.fm so hopefully I’ll get time to chat with both Tom and Jeff.  We can see that the music business is greatly evolving.  With the evolution of sites such as Youtube, Blip.fm, Pandora, and Imeem; the indy artists now have a chance at stardom.  We are also seeing a huge difference in how musicians are interacting with their fans, many of them are actively engaging on sites such as twitter interacting and building relationships with people that love their music.  None of these things were possible even a few years ago.  Legal is also a hot topic in the music business as more and more people are starting to download their music for free on the web.  These are just a few of the interesting topics that are sure to be covered.

Here is a full schedule of the event and here is a full speaker lineup.

These are the details on the time and location of the event:

Hotel Kabuki
1625 Post Street
San Francisco, CA
Monday, December, 7 2009
9am – 6pm + cocktail party

Brian has graciously offered a discount of 15% for all the readers of BUB, thanks Brian!

If you want to register for the event visit the registration page and enter in the code “bub” to receive the discount.

Hope to see all of you there!

connect with me on twitter @JacobM

On Saturday, I had the fortune of attending and being back stage at the Bridge School Benefit Concert in Mountain View, CA. Before jumping into the concert, I want to share a bit more about the Bridge School and the impact that this benefit has on the students.

The annual concert, now in it’s 23rd year, is the primary source of funding for the Bridge School. The school was founded in 1986 and opened to students in 1987 and my brother, Peter Schlegel, was a member of the inaugural class. Founded by Pegi Young and Jim Forderer, the school was created to meet the needs of kids with severe speech and physical impairments. A group that is marginalized more often than not, the focus on these kids prepares them to lead fulfilling lives.

The concert itself was an amazing musical experience. This year, the show featured Neil Young, No Doubt, Chris Martin (of Coldplay), Jimmy Buffet, Sheryl Crow, Monsters of Folk, Fleet Foxes, Wolfmother and Gavin Rossdale. Adam Sandler is scheduled to perform in place of Jimmy Buffet during the Sunday show. What’s unique about this benefit is that the artists all perform acoustic sets.

No Doubt was by far my favorite performer of the day. Students from the school are seated on the stage behind the artists, which presents a challenge for the musicians, performing for both the kids and the audience at Shoreline Amphitheater. Gwen Stefani and her band were the most successful with that by singing to both the kids and the audience throughout the set. Chris Martin was also amazing. As a solo performer, singing Coldplay songs, he had the unique challenge of using just his voice and a piano to woo the 20,000 or so people in the audience. He did it beautifully and was joined by a violin-playing friend of his after the first song. He was funny, making jokes about his bad choice in hat (which had a “where’s Waldo?” feel) and sharing an incredible musical performance.

Earlier in the evening, Jimmy Buffet took the stage with his happy island music and all had a good time dancing to songs like “Margaritaville”. Sheryl Crow shared an emotional set featuring a lullaby she composed for her son. Monsters of Folk and Fleet Foxes were new bands to me but both impressed the crowd, making the most of the acoustic sets. I was a little late so I missed Wolfmother and Gavin Rossdale but I heard good reviews from the people around me.

This is the one show I look forward to every year. The tickets seem a little pricey but you always get your money worth and it’s all for a good cause. I realize that this post has absolutely nothing to do with social media but is an event that I want to share with the community, especially bay area based people who may be interested in attending next year.

To learn more about the Bridge School, please visit: http://www.bridgeschool.org/

To check out the videos I recorded at the concert head over to my YouTube page: http://www.youtube.com/schlegelsteph

Ouch! Watching this video of Guitar Hero featuring Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain singing along to Bon Jovi really, really hurts my soul and its got Cobain’s widow Courtney Love in an uproar too. The Guardian has much more on the story including the Twitter rant Love went on after Everett True posted this video on YouTube.

I have some fond memories of the first time I saw Nirvana at Iguana’s in Tijuana in the fall of 1991 back when the band just started to gain traction with the album Nevermind. I personally preferred Nirvana’s debut album Bleach but the album and the band were a big factor in the incredible musical revolution of the late-1980s and early-1990s.

After watching this horrendous video, I’m heading straight over to Pandora and cleanse my battered ears with some great Seattle Sub Pop sounds. Afghan Whigs, Tad or Mudhoney anyone?