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WarnerIs Live Nation's $120 Million Deal with Madonna a Smart Play?Authored by dmw on October 10, 2007 - 5:33pm.
Madonna Leaving Warner to Sign $120 Million Live Nation DealAuthored by Scott Goldberg on October 10, 2007 - 5:26pm.
 What a month for major labels: First Radiohead announces their new album is worth as much as their fans say it is, then Trent Reznor follows suit and leaves his label with Nine Inch Nails in tow, then Jamiroquai and Oasis consider a similar Radiohead move, and now this: Madonna is leaving Warner to accept a $120 million recording and touring offer from Live Nation.
tags: Deals | Music | Live Music | Concerts | Live Nation | Warner | Madonna | Radiohead | Tickermaster |
Warner Music Shares fall on Analyst’s DowngradeAuthored by dmw on August 6, 2007 - 10:18am.
New York - Warner Music Group saw shares fall as much as 7.7 percent in early trading on Monday as a Wall Street analyst lowered for the company's quarterly results, Reuters reported. Warner, the world's fourth largest music company, has seen its shares fall more than 50 percent since the start of the year as further evidence of a wider downturn in the fortunes of the recorded music industry has come to light. Warner Music, Sony BMG Invest in Chinese Mobile Music FirmAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on January 23, 2007 - 10:42am.
New York - Major record labels Warner Music Group and Sony BMG announced on Tuesday that they have made strategic investments in Chinese mobile music distributor Access China Media Solutions. tags: Deals | Mobile | Music | Sony BMG | Warner | Melodeo | Cellphones | Investments | Access China Media |
Warner Music, Sony BMG Invest in Chinese Mobile Music FirmAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on January 23, 2007 - 10:24am.
New York - Major record labels Warner Music Group and Sony BMG announced on Tuesday that they have made strategic investments in Chinese mobile music distributor Access China Media Solutions. tags: Deals | Mobile | Music | Sony BMG | Warner | Cellphones | Investments | Access China Media Solutions |
Warner to Offer Download of "Harry Potter" Movie Day-and-Date with DVDAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on March 30, 2006 - 9:21am.
Burbank, Calif. - Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Group announced on Thursday that it will become the first major studio to offer a downloadable version of a film on the same day as its DVD release, when it offers "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" through partner Free Record Shop in the Netherlands and Dutch-speaking Belgium. Along with "Harry Potter," FreeRecordShop.nl will offer nearly 100 Warner Bros. films as permanent downloads, including "Ocean's Twelve," "The Matrix" trilogy, "Casablanca" and "Doctor Zhivago". The movie download service from Free Record Shop, which operates 185 stores in the Netherlands, will deliver copy-protected films using Microsoft's Windows Media format. "We are excited to be the first studio to deliver secure and legal download-to-own films through the Internet simultaneous with the film's DVD debut," said Warner HEG president Kevin Tsujihara, adding that the service will "combat piracy by providing high quality, affordable and legal downloads."
Warner Licenses Snowblind Studios to Develop "Justice League Heroes"Authored by Mark Hefflinger on March 20, 2006 - 6:47am.
Burbank, Calif. - Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment announced on Monday that it has licensed developer Snowblind Studios to create "Justice League Heroes" for PlayStation 2, Xbox and PSP. Based on the DC Comics franchise, the game will feature an original story from comic book and animation writer Dwayne McDuffie. The title is slated for release in the fall of 2006.
Digital Music Sales Improve Quarterly Profit at Warner Music GroupAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on February 15, 2006 - 9:45am.
New York - Major record label Warner Music Group credited digital music sales for helping to nearly double its quarterly profit to $69 million, up from $36 million a year earlier. The company reported digital music revenue of $69 million for the first quarter of 2006, up 30% from the fourth quarter of 2005. Warner said 70% of its digital music sales were made in the U.S., adding that sales were split evenly between full-track downloads and ringtones.
Warner, Bertelsmann's Arvato Mobile Launch P2P Movie Download ServiceAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on January 30, 2006 - 7:49am.
Burbank, Calif. - Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Group announced on Monday that it has partnered with German media conglomerate Bertelsmann's Arvato Mobile unit to launch a German-language movie and TV show download service. In2Movies will utilize a peer-to-peer network to initially deliver more than 80 offerings, including "Batman Begins," "The O.C.," "Friends" and "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire," as well as programming from local distributors and third-party content providers. Launching in March in Germany, Austria and German-speaking Switzerland, the service will use a centralized peer-to-peer network to ensure copyright protection and rights management, while a decentralized peer-to-peer network will deliver larger files like movies to users. Arvato Mobile has also partnered with major record labels Sony BMG and EMI to offer songs for download on its secure peer-to-peer network.
Warner to Sell Ringtones to Users of Skype Internet Telephone ServiceAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on January 30, 2006 - 7:46am.
New York - Major record label Warner Music Group announced on Monday that it has signed an agreement with Skype, a provider of Internet phone service, to offer master recording ringtones for purchase by Skype's 74 million registered users. Madonna will be the first featured artist on the Skype online retail store, which will also offer ringtones compatible with the Skype service from Warner artists including Green Day, T.I. and Paul Wall. Warner said the Skype retail store will also eventually offer ringback tones and other music-based personalization content.
Warner Launches Digital-Only Label Imprint, Cordless RecordsAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on November 10, 2005 - 8:23am.
New York - Major record label Warner Music Group announced on Thursday the launch of Cordless Recordings, a new digital-only label imprint headed by Jac Holzman, the founder and former CEO of Elektra and Nonesuch Records. In an unorthodox move for a major label venture, Cordless will allow bands to retain rights to their master recordings, which will be distributed in "clusters" of three or more songs on digital services, rather than as full albums. Cordless will initially sell clusters from signed artists Jihad Jerry & The Evildoers, Breakup Breakdown, Dangerous Muse, Nozzle, Koishii & Hush and Humanwine, on iTunes, Rhapsody, Napster and new, legal peer-to-peer services like iMesh and the forthcoming Mashboxx. "When we started to think about Cordless, certain lessons from the past kept returning to me," said Holzman. "The close, creative relationship with artists and their fan base by frequent release of records, keeping costs low and having a methodology that would let us use our medium to introduce our material to more fans. Cordless is a community intended to give new artists their chance, and a process that connects an audience to our artists' creativity. This is who we are and that is what we have pledged to do."
Warner Home Video Announces Releases on UMD for Sony PSPAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on November 1, 2005 - 4:44am.
Los Angeles - Warner Home Video has announced that it plans to begin offering titles on the Universal Media Disc (UMD) format for Sony's PSP handheld video game device. The company plans to release 8 movies and episodes of Cartoon Network's "Aqua Teen Hunger Force" animated TV series, pricing new releases at $30 and library titles at $20. Movies released on UMD will include "The Dukes of Hazzard," "Batman Begins," "The Matrix" and "House of Wax." Citing DVD Release Report data, the Hollywood Reporter said Sony Pictures so far has offered 51 titles on UMD, compared with Disney's Buena Vista (30 titles), Fox (23), Universal (22) and Paramount (21); the only major studio still eschewing the format is DreamWorks.
Warner Becomes Second Studio to Back Both Blu-ray and HD DVD FormatsAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on October 21, 2005 - 8:27am.
Los Angeles - Warner Bros. Entertainment has announced that it will also support Sony's Blu-ray Disc format in the next-generation DVD format war, after previously saying it would support Toshiba's rival HD DVD format. With the announcement, Warner becomes the second studio, after Paramount Pictures, to pledge to release movies and other content on both Blu-ray and HD DVD. So far, none of the studios to originally back Blu-ray have announced plans to also support HD DVD. Responding to Warner's announcement, Toshiba said in a statement that it understood the studio's "commitment to listen to a broad array of opinions and to continue to make technical evaluations of each format," but Toshiba still "strongly believes the HD DVD format will eventually win broad support as the more superior format, and in cooperation with our partners, we are committed to bringing HD DVD products first to market early next year in the U.S." Earlier this week, analyst firm Forrester Research predicted that Sony's Blu-ray would emerge as the standard next-generation DVD format.
Warner Adding Bonus "Pop-Up" Content to VOD MoviesAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on October 12, 2005 - 5:08am.
Burbank, Calif. - Warner Home Video announced on Wednesday that it will begin adding exclusive extra content to movies it distributes to the video-on-demand services offered by cable and satellite TV firms. The "Movies That Pop" content will include information about the actors, behind-the-scenes production details, and movie trivia, which will appear in "pop-up" windows on the screen. Up to 15 minutes of footage from between three and five scenes will be added at the end of each feature. The first Warner video-on-demand titles to feature the pop-up bonus content will be "Batman Begins" (Dec. 3) and "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" (Dec. 23).
Warner "E-Label" to Eschew CDs, Offer Frequent 3-Song ReleasesAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on August 22, 2005 - 8:02am.
Aspen, Colo. -- The CEO of Warner Music Group said on Monday the major label plans to create an "e-label," which instead of CD albums will release batches of three songs from artists every few months as digital downloads, CNET News.com reported. The e-label will provide artists with a "supportive, lower-risk environment," commented Warner Music CEO Edgar Bronfman Jr., and not focus on the million-selling hit records sought after by major record labels. In addition, artists on Warner's e-label will retain ownership of the master recordings of their songs and copyrights. "We're trying to experiment with a new business model," said Bronfman. "We're going to try to see where this goes."
Warner Releases Chinese DVD on Same Day as Film's U.S. Theatrical DebutAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on June 9, 2005 - 10:15am.
Los Angeles -- In a bid to stem the rampant piracy of newly-released films in China, Warner Bros. Entertainment this week made the unprecedented move of releasing its film "The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" on DVD in China on the same day it debuted in U.S. theaters, the Los Angeles Times reported. Although the film was not scheduled for release at all in Chinese theaters, the studio said it will consider the practice on more prominent titles in the future, in efforts to battle the large Chinese pirate DVD market. "We will closely monitor the impact of this release on our other businesses to determine whether to follow this same release strategy with more high-profile titles," Warner Home Video president Jim Cardwell told the Times. Fellow Hollywood studio Sony also recently released a deeply-discounted DVD of its "Kung Fu Hustle" in China just over a month after its release in Chinese theaters, and two months before the film's U.S. release -- adding that it sold nearly 2 million of the discounted DVDs.
Warner Music Group IPO Raises $556 Million; Shares Fall 7%Authored by Mark Hefflinger on May 11, 2005 - 9:40am.
New York -- Shares of Warner Music Group fell more than 7% on their first day of trading, debuting at $17 and then falling to $15.75 before stabilizing in an initial public offering that raised about $556 million. The stock had been expected to debut at around $22 a share, but analysts cited an unclear future for the record label in the realm of digital music, as well as a public dispute with top-selling artists Linkin Park as fuel for the downturn. "When the vast majority of your sales are physical CD sales and the market is moving away from physical sales, your revenue model and how you alter your cost structure to adapt to that new revenue model are unknown," Fulcrum Global Partners analyst Richard Greenfield told Reuters. The smallest of the world's four major record labels was taken public by a group of investors led by former Seagram CEO Edgar Bronfman Jr., who acquired the label from Time Warner for $2.6 billion. There is some speculation the company may seek a merger with U.K.-based EMI, which would further narrow the market from four major record labels to only two.
Linkin Park Wants Out of Warner Contract, Mentions Internet DistributionAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on May 2, 2005 - 3:35am.
New York -- Warner Music Group recording artists Linkin Park, in announcing on Monday that they want to split with Warner over the label's failure to share substantial profits from its planned IPO with artists, hinted at the recent leaking of Fiona Apple's unreleased record onto the Internet as a possible outcome for unsuccessful negotiations. "Possible avenues include relying more on touring, merchandising and endorsements, rather than leaving their future in the hands of a weakened WMG. Recently, new Fiona Apple music was released on the Internet for free," the band said, in a statement. Linkin Park has sold more than 35 million records over the past five years -- representing 10% of all Warner sales. "We feel a responsibility to get great music to our fans. Unfortunately, we believe that we can't accomplish that effectively with the current Warner Music," the band said.
Warner to Sell DVD Movies for $2.65 in China to Combat Pirate MarketAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on February 24, 2005 - 4:20am.
New York -- Warner Bros. Entertainment has announced plans to release a slate of DVDs in China for as little as $2.65 each, in a bid to counter the rampant movie piracy in the region, The Wall Street Journal reported. Pirate DVD movies regularly sell in China for just $1. Initially, the roster of 125 discounted DVDs will not include any extras, but Warner plans to offer such features on later releases that will sell for about $3.38 in China. "It's pretty daunting going into that market to release a legitimate product," Warner Bros. chairman and CEO Barry Meyer told The Journal. "But we really think if we can get in there, we can be a part of the solution and not the problem."
Verizon's "V CAST" 3G Multimedia Service Adds Warner Music VideosAuthored by Mark Hefflinger on February 1, 2005 - 3:45am.
Bedminster, N.J. -- Verizon Wireless announced on Tuesday that it partnered with Warner Music Group to launch the nation's first mobile music video download service on its recently launched V CAST 3G mobile multimedia service. The V CAST service, which costs subscribers an extra $15 per month, will also ask consumers to pay $3.99 per music video from artists like Simple Plan and My Chemical Romance. Along with music videos, Verizon's V CAST service offers content from providers including NBC Mobile, ESPN, Fox Sports, Fox Entertainment Group, Walt Disney Internet Group, CNNtoGO, MarketWatch, MTV Networks, CinemaElectric, Gameloft, Airborne Entertainment, Superscape Group and Jamdat Mobile.
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