My View of the Online Music Landscape

Photo: KUT Studio 1A, courtesy of longtime pal, Matt Reilly

Writing about music is like dancing about architecture. - Laurie Anderson

Music, for me, has always meant entertainment. I love watching and listening to music in all its forms. These days, particularly since Elena has been with us, most of such entertainment happens at home—and online. Streaming through our ceiling-mounted speakers is an evolving world of music that seems to have no end.

Innovations in recent years have expanded our online listening options exponentially. Knowing these options can improve your home entertainment capabilities—whether for dancing with your newborn, simply setting a positive tone in the house or playing new music to check out a different band.

With that, there are numerous ways to begin exploring. Here's a glimpse of today's online music landscape from my viewpoint:

MP3 files. Originally brought to the fore by the likes of Kazaa and Napster and legitimized by Apple, this format caught on like wildfire. Recently, the surviving services have moved into "the cloud" and the field has become highly competitive, with Google and Amazon both heavy-hitting players today.

How does it work? If you don’t know by now, users download an application for a desktop or mobile device, and their music content is managed there. For people on the run, this is the default choice. It requires a negligible amount of maintenance—and collection, a concept I tend to avoid.

Internet radio. Pandora is the most popular name in this Internet-only segment. Internet radio service providers make a clean break from terrestrial radio (i.e., AM/FM). These companies employ a subscription-ad model, which can generate significant revenues. Other players in this space, like Last.fm, Rdio and Spotify, accept a subscription fee, providing users with an ad-free experience, or give “free” service whereby listeners hear an advertisement every few songs.

We paid $36 to Pandora this year, and while I love that there are no commercials at that price, the depth of its song base is weak. Most artists I can name are searchable, but beyond the first few songs played according to my selection, quality seems to decline no matter how interactive I am with the platform. My sense is that quality (i.e., depth and breadth of offerings) will be the ultimate difference maker in this segment.

Streaming video. This includes such sites such as Vevo and YouTube Disco, where users have the ability to create playlists and interact with a connected community of users. This is a fun way to see music online and discover new artists.

Vevo and Disco have deep troves of music. I found Amos Lee, played often in our house, this way. Be ready for limited commercials, both in the videos themselves and on the sites containing them.

Public radio online. This is my favorite segment, and for users who can navigate their way around it, the path to musical discovery can be long and happy.

I'm a longtime fan of public radio, having visited a station or two in my day, most memorably KRTS in Marfa. My top five stations for choice programming are KCRW (Los Angeles), KEXP (Seattle), KUT (Austin), KXT (Dallas-Fort Worth) and WXPN (Philadelphia).

What do I like about listener-supported radio? Local flavor and support of independent artists. In a few minutes, I can tune into any city to get a feel for its music and cultural scene. And I've heard countless interviews with artists I would otherwise know nothing about.

These stations are often on university campuses. They are often commercial-free, the best thing going in radio. Most stations have their own apps. These apps have a variety of features, again free, with on-demand access to station archives. Live sessions and concerts are common across the top-tier public radio stations.

A few noteworthy music shows syndicated on public radio airwaves are: American Routes, UnderCurrents and World Cafe. There are many, many more. NPR Music has become a leader in online music and offers several shows through its portal.

There are a couple of downsides to public radio online—one is control. It is lost to a certain extent, making the listening experience less personal. Two is that these "community stations" raise money a few times a year, and when they do, there are interruptions to routine listening. In the past, I have supported KUH (Houston) and KUT, and most recently, KXT. The choice to do so—or not—is yours.

What are your thoughts on the online music scene? What do you like about it? Which model will survive, or can they all? What is your preferred listening experience?

A Gift of Love

Elena Kay Covey on Day 15

A daughter is a gift of love. - Unknown

Emily gave me an iPhone for my birthday in March, which was a major facelift to my communications repertoire. Further, I just finished Steve Jobs, the biography, so I'm excited about Apple and its sleek products and their capabilities.

Via my new do-everything device, I've found two technologies that I like and am confident will continue to shape the way we create photos and communicate: Instagram and Tumblr. The birth of our beautiful child, Elena, was the driving reason for my initial interest in them.

On the day Elena was born, I loaded Instagram onto the phone, and my use of the app has kindled a new-found liking for photography. I've been using it to capture what I can of the precious moments in her first two-plus weeks. I'm on a streak to date, having snapped at least one photo of her per day.

Since Instagram is an app only and provides no webpage to store and view portfolios (an interesting aside in terms of where mobile technology is headed), I created a shortform blog with Tumblr to post photos of Elena online. (Note: Instagram does allow for sharing pictures with a multitude of sites, Tumblr included, and robust sharing within the app itself.)

Give the tumblelog a look here. While the pictures online now are of Elena only, my intention is to diversify what's there, probably moving the majority of those taken of her onto a private page.

Enjoy my pictures of the greatest gift... that of love, that of a daughter, that of little Elena.

Even Time Flies on Emirates

Upon reflection of the week that was, I write from my modest yet comfortable hotel room in Bangalore, a 25-hour journey from Cherryhurst, door-to-door.

I arrived to the city in the wee hours of Thursday morning, after an uncertain few days of travel planning. I was meant to be here last Sunday, but Eyjafjallajökull, the Icelandic volcano which has inflicted total chaos on European airspace, delayed my departure by four days.

It also forced me to alter my route. I was originally supposed to fly with Lufthansa Airlines from Houston to Frankfurt, followed by another haul of a similar length to Bangalore, but after excessive days of delay and cancelled flights that reached into the thousands, the executive decision was made: I would fly with Emirates Airlines, on a non-stop flight from Houston to Dubai, around the mess in Europe, and then onto Bangalore.

Fly Emirates I did, and it turned out to be the highlight of my week.

Due to volcano-related tangles, our departure from Houston was behind schedule by 45 minutes. I could have cared less, though, as I had dealt with bigger issues in getting myself to that point.

Happy to finally step aboard, I was met by a welcoming fleet of flight attendants, who offered glasses of champagne, water, and fresh-squeezed orange juice, as well as hot towels. I accepted their offerings.

One of them then showed me to seat 10B, my personal space for the next 15 hours on the luxurious aircraft that is Boeing’s 777-200. Once settled, I was pleasantly surprised to see that nobody would be sitting next to me.

This was my first time in business class, on any airline. My level of comfort had already evolved beyond anything I had experienced on a commercial flight, and we had not yet left the tarmac.

I flew coach with Emirates a few years ago, round-tripping from Dubai to Istanbul—a primetime ride, yes, but business class—I can now state—is on another level: to me, it might as well have been first class.

At takeoff, I noticed fellow passengers, who behaved as if they had been in this situation before, fiddling with their armrests and looking determinately at the personalized screens on the chairs in front of them.

As it turns out, they were familiarizing themselves with ICE, or Information, Communications and Entertainment, Emirates' on-demand multimedia center. Loaded with movies, podcasts, audio books—whatever one could possibly need to combat in-flight boredom—ICE has it all, including SMS messaging capability and access to cameras outside of the airplane for bottom and front views.

Dinner was excellent. I had a glass of French wine along with it. I watched By The People: The Election of Barack Obama, a documentary about the president's campaign to win the White House. Once finished with that, I leisurely reviewed the music selection, deciding on Steely Dan. Surely the sound of Aja would put me in the mood to catch much needed rest.

It did, and a flat-lying seat with a thin-spreading mattress only added to sleep inducement. Facing the artificial stars on the ceiling above, I was soon out like a light, with Emirates-furnished noise cancellation headphones wrapped around my head, and did not wake up for eight hours.

When I did awake, the friendly attendants were nearby, ready to serve, and to my knowledge, had not gotten a wink of sleep themselves. I stood up to stretch my legs, walking in a pair of Emirates-provided socks, with the intention to use a fancy dopp kit also provisioned by the airline.

Waiting for the bathroom, I struck up a conversation with the attendants and seized an opportunity to remember the experience with a photo, even if I had slept through much of it.

From Turkey, Serbia, and India, all three ladies led me to believe that they enjoy working for the airline. If Emirates treats its employees remotely close to how it treats its customers, it is well they should. There is something to be said for cheery attendants. They can make or break a flight.

Following yet another tasty meal, we arrived to Dubai International Airport (DXB). Upon arrival, I noticed, since we had left Houston late, that I was on a compressed timeline to catch my flight to Bangalore, so I needed to scoot.

I skipped through the Emirates Business Class Lounge, freshening up for a few minutes there, and before I knew it, was back in familiar territory: in a business class seat with Emirates.

Not long into the second flight, I was served another fine meal and a glass of wine, this time Californian. I knew what to do after that. Looking to the arm of my chair, I reached for ICE, delving into its deep music for a selection fit to accommodate a leftover tinge of sleepiness, leaned back and closed my eyes... into dreamland I went again.

Two hours later, I awoke to the sound of a pilot saying something in Arabic about our descent, and stumbled to the kitchen and bathroom areas for another pre-landing stretch.  Meantime, I struck up a conversation with a congenial Indian attendant, a man of about my age (34).

Looking at my watch, I realized that we were on track to land early, but inquired to confirm that I was tracking in the appropriate time zone: "Are we arriving to Bangalore early?"

"Yes," he replied, "by about thirty minutes or so."

I smiled contentedly; this news of an early arrival had just completed my dreamy experience.

As I turned to head back to my seat, he said, "Even time flies on Emirates."

Indeed it does.

Lead Your (Social) Network

Your personal and professional networks can provide you with the unique opportunity to lead people. If you have not done so, take stock of these networks, understanding their composition (i.e., who is in them) as well as where the connections you have can contribute to your success as a leader.

I was recently directed to a website replete with inspiration: TED Ideas worth spreading. On TED, one can explore a vast trove of speeches by figures who head industries and all else. I came across a speech by Seth Godin that grabbed my attention. (If you have marketing experience, you might recognize Godin for coining the term, "permission marketing.")

I recommend watching all 17:23 minutes of his speech, loosely titled, The Tribes We Lead. Godin struck a chord with me, alluding to networks (a.k.a., tribes), and how leading them can translate into the spread of ideas. Rested on this concept, he argues to his audience, is their chance to boldly assume a position of leadership.

None of us is immune to the powerful phenomenon that is social networking. As surely as you are reading this sentence now, you have participated in some form of networking online. Even if social networking is not your bag, you have at least browsed Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.

The explosion in social networking allows you to accelerate the number of people with whom you regularly connect. Social networking allows you to organize individuals around a single interest. In a recently published article in Fast Company, How Chris Hughes Helped Launch Facebook and the Barack Obama Campaign, there is a lesson in how such organization can develop on the broadest of levels.

The best part about it is that you can actually choose the network you want to lead. To try it out, visit Ning or Twibes. At either site, you can instantly whip up a group of like-minded individuals to follow you, provided the content and direction you contribute has meaning and relevance. Whenever before could you so quickly assemble and sustain your own networks?

In his latest WSJ.com blog entry, Empowering Natural Leaders in ‘Facebook Generation’ Ways, Gary Hamel notes “Natural leaders today have the means to challenge ossified and change-resistant power structures. Thanks to the reach of the Web, a lowly but brilliantly effective leader can mobilize followers across a global organization and beyond—by writing an influential blog, by using that notoriety to get a platform at industry events, by hosting a Web-based discussion on a hot topic, by building an online coalition of similarly-minded individuals, by disseminating a provocative position paper to hundreds or thousands of fellow employees, and by using email to ensure that supporters show up at key meetings.”

So the digital age might have created more opportunities to lead, but will it create better leaders? Our leaders will look different, perhaps younger (see Chris Hughes and his Facebook-founding brethren). There will be people who are perceived as effective leaders because they start a “movement,” to use Godin’s term, but I contend that starting a movement does not necessarily mean you are an effective leader.

While on a relative basis our networks have increased, some of us have become lazy, relying less on interpersonal skills to connect with our "offline" networks. While we know more people, and much about them, we are, in many cases, less intimately connected than ever before.

Your "offline" connections instill and sustain the trust between you and your networks, and ultimately, your leadership is best tried among those who you know personally.

New opportunities to lead will come to you in the form of your social networks. If appropriately capitalized upon, these opportunities will lead to movements, which will then be carried on as sustainable ideas into the offline world, and it is there where the mettle of a true leader gets tested.

An Industry's Reverse Shakeout: Phase 2.0 of Digital Media

In my March 1 entry, Death of a Pastime, I touched on the current demise of print media.

While my sentimental side would love to witness the wholesale survival of newspapers, my entrepreneurial side looks ahead with amazement to the opportunities that are taking shape across today’s media landscape: "Phase 2.0 of Digital Media" is what I am deciding to call it.

Phase 2.0 is a media world so upside-down, turned-around and inside-out. Anybody's game. It is one that changes so fast you can't keep up, not on Facebook and not on Google.

No longer is it a world, where TV, Radio and Print work together to support the Net. That was Phase 1.0, at the commercial inception of the World Wide Web, when then-new companies, like AOL, acquired customers with reckless abandon, creating value by providing Internet access and displaying advertisements.

Phase 2.0 is the now, when the Internet has rapidly seeped into traditional media, strangling it, and taking a hold of its content, often making it free. This has been financially disastrous for traditional media and has destroyed the comfortable lock it once had on our eyes and ears.

The companies that survive in Phase 2.0 of Digital Media are anybody's guess, but mine is that a proliferation of opportunities will fall on several. Surviving media companies will be small, efficient and nimble. The ones that can quickly group people--en masse--around specific content, which they can influence somehow for profit, will earn first place in Phase 2.0.

Will it be Amazon's Kindle or Twitter that defines Phase 2.0? With plenty of funding and thoroughbred-like momentum, each organizes and channels content. Neither produces it. Still, how will they profit from amassing users?

Another question in media fragmentation is that content quality often suffers. Blogs, like FMOC, have surfaced one after the other, with no professional quality standards.

In 6 Reasons Why Twitter is the Future of Search - Google Beware, Gyutae Park notes that today's media landscape can be a trustful place due to the familiarity of a user’s network. Phase 2.0 is rife with opportunity to influence people without having to answer to any standard.

Yesterday, in his article, SXSW panel: Don’t worry, kids, the news business isn’t going to die, Nicholas Deleon writes how author Steven Johnson spent his time on SXSW panel trying to "allay the fears of every kid in journalism school." As noted in Death of a Pastime, my hope is that the rigorous standards of quality in traditional media will find their way into Phase 2.0.

The toughest questions facing the pioneers in Phase 2.0 of Digital Media: How do you make money? How do you maintain quality? Neither seems to be connected.

Death of a Pastime

In the bookstore, in the convenience store, in your local barber shop, or more likely, online, you might have seen one of Time magazine's latest cover stories: "How to Save Your Newspaper."

If only we could.

I remember in 1995, when Houston's two major dailies came together as one. The Post, acquired by the Chronicle, fell into the abyss, never heard from again outside of an occasional reference to the Hobby family, the prominent Houston family that owned it.

The Houston Chronicle is owned by the Hearst Corporation, which also owns the San Francisco Chronicle. In the summer of 1998, I interned at the San Francisco Chronicle and Examiner, which then functioned under a Joint Operating Agreement. A few years later those two papers became one. And just this week, it was reported that Hearst is threatening to close the San Francisco Chronicle's doors.

While these papers have struggled for some time, the deathknell has come faster than expected. What happened?

The proliferration of online media, from free news content to uber-specific blogging and social networking, is one contribution. Newsworthy or not, we can find nearly anything on the Web.

Habits, although slower to change than media itself, are another contributing factor. As devices, like Amazon's Kindle 2, enter our lives, how we obtain the news and information evolves.

Finally, newspapers, like any business, rely on revenue to keep the printers running. Sure, in some cases, they might operate like professional baseball teams, where big-money families can keep them alive. However, newspapers are being replaced by more profitable endeavors. At least in baseball, spending occasionally produces a world champion.

Admittedly, I'm caught in the middle here. I am a truist, in the sense that I am sentimental to the communal effect a newspaper can have on a large city. But as a technophile, I have an appreciation for the ability to express one's self in the same space as the biggest names in media.

In the end, my hope is that solid and steady journalism remains the backbone of news reporting and that the rigor that the big papers brought to the making of the news finds a lasting way into the digital world.

Balancing Content

Over the last few weeks, I have been consumed with work and our move to Cherryhurst. But between my consulting j-o-b at Accenture and getting settled into the new digs, I have found time on every Sunday of this year to post my thoughts. I am enjoying the drill.

By design, it usually takes me 60 minutes, from start to finish. By the time I sit down to write, I may have thought about my post, content-wise, but never have anything organized.

I simply write whatever happens to roll off of my fingertips, and an hour later, Emily will give it a quick edit. She then clicks "Publish Post," and voila, we're live.

That, my vast readership, is the extent of our editorial operation here on Haver Street.

I bring up the routine without reason. Really, I do so to point out that there is not much of any routine.

I have been short on content as well. Coming up with meaningful content can be a difficult balance.

Sometimes there is a lot to write. Sometimes there is not much. Either way, it is a useful exercise for me. Of course, it is no help that I have not read much news lately.

I put myself on a low-news diet to be more productive during this particularly busy stretch at work and to get through our move. I do not recommend a low-news diet for everyone, but it works out well for me. Some people enjoy passing their time watching news, and that's cool.

Although I will state that, if your intent is to immediately increase your focus, eliminate news, particularly from the TV, from your day, and you will get results. I picked up this idea from Tim Ferriss, author of The 4-Hour Workweek.

I was never a fan of the local news to begin with, as my experience with it is typically negative. But whether or not I like the news is not the point. Rather, the point is that if you clip the daily news from your routine, you will have more time to focus on other people, projects and priorities that matter in your life. Increased happiness is a worthwhile byproduct of news elimination.

That stated, I thought about buying the Sunday Times this morning, which, in my view, is an educational way to catch up on the week's events over caffeine and carbohydrates. I resisted, to instead face down an iTunes overhaul, which was successful after two hours of "duplicate song" deletion. What a royal waste of time. (If anyone knows how to control songs from duplicating whenever you update your iTunes library with digital files in storage, suggest your resolution.)

Nevertheless, we are up and going with a pleasant selection of songs currently shuffling on the iPod in the living room. The view is worth the climb. Quality sounds are a must-have.

We currently have a single speaker that is made for the iPod's flush fit and compact enough for our 1,2oo feet of house. Next on my list is to figure out how to activate the speaker system coarsing through it. Once comnected, we will totally be in business on the music front.

On another note, my friend, Brady, asked me to meet him at Memorial Park yesterday. Brady is always brewing up something adventurous, so I didn't hesitate to join him. I went for jog and then met him, his wife and his little boy of five weeks.

With him, he had an apparatus made up of a strip of nylon and two hand cranks on either end of it. I think he called it a slickline, but when I briefly Googled "slickline," I found only several web pages that featured slicklining equipment of the oil field services variety. No thanks. (If I can find a link for the slickline, I will tweat it on Twitter.)

The idea is to strap the slickline between two hefty trees about twenty or so feet apart. Then you pull the line taut between them, using the two cranks to tighten it. Ideally, it lays across, horizontally, about three-to-four feet above ground.

Once set up, you step on the strip with one foot, eventually placing the other one on as well, at which point, you try your best to balance for as long as you can. It reminds me of unicycling, an activity I never mastered. A difficult balance takes focus and occupies the mind, which I enjoy. It is fun.

That is it for now, until the next balancing act.

Baby Steps

So, I have been looking forward to my first post all week. I did a bit of research online to learn about the blogging world, hoping to nail "numero uno." What I did I find?

Many experts in the blogosphere claim that the single most important trait of a quality blog is, guess what, specificity. Well, if you read this blog's description, my intention is to offer variety.

Whoops... strike one.

As for the second tip of which I took note: brevity. Okay, long-winded is not how I imagine people describing me, but I do have everyday thoughts that I was planning to let fly.

I hate to change course and disappoint... but enough from the experts.

Here are a few thoughts for FMOC, quality notwithstanding.

First, I want the content to be interesting.

My reason for writing is partly selfish. I am looking for a way to unload a few thoughts and really find and understand my passions in life. A bit of a search if you will. Naturally, the content should be interesting to me.

I do, however, want to attract and keep an audience. While I am on journey for passion, I do not want to bore you as the reader to tears. This journey is not only mine.

Second, I want this experience to be productive. I do not plan to spend all day on these posts. This blog is in effect a drill to improve my writing and be productive while doing so. I invite you to critique my style.

Two groundrules ought to be sufficient. Let the blogging begin, step by step.

See you next week.