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Warner Music reporting more stable sales, propped up by iTunes and streaming services
There's finally some good news in the music business, but don't get too excited, it's not that good. Warner Music reports (before we hear about the full industry sales from 2011) that its sales were steady last year, at $780 million. In this case, steady is better than a drop, which is what most of the music industry has seen lately. Warner says that digital revenue makes up 28% of the company's sales, a number that's jumped up 17% in the last year. iTunes and other downloadable services accounted for $205 million in Warner's revenue in the last quarter. Streaming services are becoming more lucrative as well. While Spotify and other streaming services have only brought in $15 million so far, that share of the market is growing by 36%, much higher than downloadable music's 15% growth. In other words, streaming revenue isn't a huge deal yet -- but it might be very soon if trends continue. Plus, analysts are saying that streaming revenue (which comes from customers who pay a monthly fee for an all-you-can-listen-to music service) often comes from those Napster users who didn't pay at all before, which means that it's brand new revenue for the music companies. Not as much revenue, obviously, as if those customers actually bought every CD they listened to, but a music industry that's been flagging for the better part of a decade will probably take what it can get.
PS Vita game downloads cheaper than boxed copies in US
Sony is offering a discount for game-starved shut-ins with PlayStation Vitas, Shacknews has confirmed. It shouldn't come as a surprise, since Sony has been talking about doing such a thing for months now, and has followed a similar pricing scheme -- favoring downloads -- in Japan.There's no exact indication of how much you'll save downloading through PSN compared to purchasing boxed copies, but a NeoGAF thread of supposed Best Buy SKUs suggests it'll be a ten percent discount.
6.5 million downloads for Angry Birds on Christmas Day
Rovio says that it saw a whopping 6.5 million downloads of Angry Birds this past Christmas Day, which is just phenomenal, even for this overwhelmingly popular game. That number is very close to the number of iOS and Android devices activated overall, which means that most people who got an iPhone or other mobile device that runs Angry Birds over the holiday ran to download the game as quickly as they could. I've heard this before. One of the creators of Doodle Jump told me a while ago that whenever Apple released a new device, that app saw jumps of approximately the same numbers in downloads. Angry Birds is obviously quite a phenomenon, and it's so synonymous with the mobile experience that apparently the only limit on it out there is simply how many mobile devices manufacturers can sell. Rovio also says there's more coming in 2012. We'd hope for Rovio to get back to actually making mobile games not about Angry Birds (the company made more than 30 before Angry Birds hit), but given its popularity, we'll probably still see these frustrated avians even more in the future. [via Joystiq]
App downloads top 1 billion during the holiday week
During the holiday week (by which we mean the seven days between the secularized celebration of a Christian holy day timed to replace a pagan winter festival and the beginning of a new year in the Gregorian calendar) the iTunes App Store and the Android Market combined to reach a record-breaking 1.2 billion downloads according to analytics firm Flurry. The sudden surge in downloads is no shock considering the impressive number of activations on Christmas day, but a 60 percent jump over the week of December 4th through December 17th is still quite a feat. Check out the source for a few more details.
Reports suggest Apple retail had a great Christmas
We've already heard that the iPhone and iOS had a record day this Christmas weekend, and here's even more stats proving that's the case. First up, the latest data from Flurry Analytics points out that both iOS and Android saw not only record activations over the holiday weekend, with as many as 6.8 million new devices connecting up to their respective app stores for the first time. And of course with new devices comes new app downloads: Flurry says there were around 242 million app downloads on Christmas Day alone, a rise of more than 125% compared to the previous month's average (which itself has been high, I believe, ever since Thanksgiving). GigaOm also cites some other usage figures, including the fact that over 7% of new purchases made on a mobile device this past Sunday were on an iPad. That means people wasted no time at all in breaking open their new Apple tablets and using them to buy more stuff. All in all, it sounds like quite the phenomenal weekend for Apple, and all of the various developers and services that rely on the App Store for their livelihoods. I'm sure we haven't seen the last of these kinds of statistics. Stay tuned for more in the coming days and weeks to hear just how great a Christmas it was for the iOS ecosystem.
Apple Mac Store breaks the 100 million download barrier
At just under a year old, Apple's Mac App Store is celebrating a fairly significant milestone, hitting the 100 million download mark, a fact the company celebrated with a customarily self-congratulatory press release. The desktop store hit the scene in January of this year, just ahead of CES -- at present, it's home to "thousands" of apps, according to Apple. Granted, these numbers pale in comparison to the some 18 billion app downloads for Apple's other App Store, but still, not bad for a year's work. Press release after the break.
Filemaker offers free holiday kits for Bento users
Filemaker has released free holiday-themed goodies for Bento users. The Bento Holiday Kit has templates for cards and labels, a party planner and a gift list. To take advantage of this, you need to have Bento 4 for Mac installed. A free trial is available for those who want to see the program in action. U.S. users can download the holiday kit here, and a version for UK users can download the kit here.
Court holds European ISPs can't be forced to filter traffic, users free to fly the jolly roger
It's been a sliver under a month since UK ISP British Telecom was ordered to cut all ties to filesharing site Newzbin 2. Now, a European court decision deals a counter blow to media owners by denying their demands to hustle ISPs into tracking freeloading downloaders. Specifically, the court held that it was illegal to force an ISP to install and maintain a system filtering all of its traffic as it could infringe customer privacy rights. While the decision will prove unpopular in big-wig boardrooms, joe public will no doubt be pleased with the court's upholding of both net neutrality, and of course not having to shred quite as many strongly worded letters from his or her ISP.
Free games and big updates this weekend on the App Store
Another day of the holiday season brings a whole lot of great downloads from the App Store. What we saw yesterday was mostly new releases, but here's a list of free games (and free updates) you might want to check out. A whole bunch of great games have gone free for the weekend, including Baby Monkey, Redlynx's 1000 Heroz, Battle Slugs, Burn the Rope Worlds, Crystal Soul, Gem King, and Ragdoll Blaster 2. Every single one of those is worth a download if you don't have them yet. More free apps: Legends of Alekham, Sarge, Rise of Atlantis, Doomsday 2: Legions of Hell, and AtlantiSub. There are also some really great new freemium titles to play; Cosmonauts is one, and I've really been enjoying Battle Nations (you can friend me in that one -- I'm "toucansamurai"). Freemium title Tiny Tower has gotten a big update that adds missions, the ability to share stock with friends, and new floors and costumes to play with. Bungie's Crimson Steam Pirates is free on the iPad right now to celebrate the new 99 cent iPhone version, and there's a new Chapter 3 update with more content to play with. Zombie Gunship has added a new unlockable scenario, as well as full AirPlay support. Freemium title Rocket Chimp recently got an update for iCloud and iOS 5. Once again, there's more there to play than you'll need all weekend. Things are picking up as this holiday season gets into swing. Stay tuned, because I'm sure we'll see lots more of this over the next few weeks.
Valve's Steam forum security compromised
Valve is the latest gaming company to suffer a security breach during the hackathon that is the year 2011. What's that got to do with MMOs, you say? Well, the company's Steam digital download service offers access to a ton of our favorite virtual worlds, and it has thus far seemed relatively secure. Kotaku reports that the Steam forums were hacked last night, with the paper trail leading to a cracker website known as Fknowned.com. The gentlemen in question are of course denying all responsibility for the mischief, and thus far Valve has offered no comment on the situation. It's worth noting that the Steam forum account info is separate from the actual Steam service account info, but it's also likely that some users employ identical sets of credentials. We'll keep you posted as we learn more.
Apple: 250 million iOS devices sold, 18 billion apps downloaded
Among the glut of numbers coming out of the Apple keynote today, delaying the reveal of your next iPhone, was a particularly impressive one: 250 million. That's the number of iOS devices sold. That's 250 million iPhones and iPads in the wild worldwide, running a grand total of 18 billion apps between them, which have netted developers a whopping $3 billion. That ladies and gentlemen, is nothing to sniff at.
Apple: 16 billion iTunes songs downloaded, 300 million iPods sold
Tim Cook's dishing out plenty of numbers today, and there's some big ones when it comes to the iPod and iTunes. He confirmed that there's now been a whopping 16 billion songs downloaded from iTunes, and 300 million iPods sold. To put that in a bit of perspective, he also noted that it took Sony 30 years to sell a mere 220,000 Walkman cassette players.
Apple: Six million copies of OS X Lion downloaded since launch
Before we get to the real meat of things, Tim Cook's just trotted out some Lion numbers -- six million copies downloaded since launch, to be exact. According to the big Apple's new CEO, that's a growth of 80 percent over Snow Leopard. Of course, those numbers would mean nothing without a little comparison. Cook says it took Windows 7 20 weeks to meet 10 percent of Windows' install base, compared to the two weeks it took Lion to reach the same portion of OS X users.
Mac 101: Reclaiming space by cleaning out the Downloads folder
To new Mac users, the Downloads folder is quite confusing and even "invisible." As a Mac consultant, you wouldn't believe the number of times I've found multiple copies of downloads, updaters, and pictures in the Downloads folder -- all taking up valuable room on your disk. Reader Joe Delk brought this to my attention recently and thought it would make a great Mac 101 post. Joe said "My harddrive has filled up recently and even after deleting most of the movies, iTunes or otherwise, it was still a struggle finding enough space for new movies and new programs. One day last week I had the epiphany of deleting everything in my 'Downloads' folder older than six months (I've had this MBP for around 2 years). It immediately freed up 18 GB. I was astounded. And I haven't missed anything since. Even after going through the recent stuff, I found that I had downloaded some items three, four, ten times, adding much additional space." I'm personally pretty good about cleaning out Downloads on a regular basis, but when I did my cleaning today, I was able to toss 3 GB worth of unneeded files. Many Macs have a Download folder icon in the Dock, usually on the far right side near the Trash. If you don't have that icon, the easiest way to jump into the folder and start tossing things is to click on your Mac desktop, then select Go > Downloads from the menu bar. Fellow TUAW blogger TJ Luoma pointed out one of his favorite ways of saving space on Macs. It's a relatively new app called Spacie (US$1.99) that's available on the Mac App Store. Spacie lists files by size or location along with their sizes, making it easy to see where you may have duplicates or large unwanted files that can be deleted. Cleaning out the Downloads folder can be very helpful whether you have a new Mac with a smaller drive (like a MacBook Air) or an older Mac that's losing space. Be sure to remind yourself to clean it out often.
Digital Chocolate buys Sandlot Games
Mobile game developer Digital Chocolate, one of the biggest developers on the App Store, has acquired Sandlot Games, makers of Cake Mania and a few other popular App Store titles. Sandlot has offices in Seattle and Eastern Europe, and Digital Chocolate says it plans to use the developer to expand operations in both places. Unfortunately, there's no word on how much the deal is worth. Both companies have seen plenty of app downloads, and have big titles on multiple platforms, including Apple's devices and the PC, so this is likely a substantial acquisition for both sides. As Digital Chocolate's Trip Hawkins says, "We expect to be the leading game company in at least 5 of the 7 cities where we now have development studios." That said, I don't think this is the last we'll hear of either company. This space is extremely volatile at the moment, and it's just as likely that we'll see Digital Chocolate pick up more developers as it is that we'll see a larger company buy out the whole company if so inclined. [via Touch Arcade]
Symbian Belle download leaked to N8 community, quickly pulled from site (update: Anna available on NaviFirm)
For a very short period of time there was pure bliss for Nokia N8 users with a knack for tinkering around; Symbian Belle, a coveted update to the still-unreleased Anna, was spotted in a user forum, leaked and available for download. Alas, it was not meant to be, as enough users experienced issues installing the new firmware that the files had to be pulled until it can be resolved. According to DailyMobile, the folks behind the update will try again tomorrow, so anyone interested may want to keep a close eye on it just in case it goes live again. As any other unofficial firmware install, it's not for the faint of heart; you'll want to be confident in what you're doing before you get started. Head below for another eight-minute video. Update: It looks like Symbian Anna is now available for N8 users, with early variants of the firmware showing up on NaviFirm. No word yet on when V22 will be available via Ovi Suite or as an OTA update, but if you've already upgraded, let us know how you're finding it in the comments. [Thanks, Daniel]
GameFly to launch 'Unlimited PC Play' download service, offer less incentive to leave the house
GameFly hasn't wasted any time jumping into the digital download waters after acquiring IGN's Direct2Drive platform a little over two months ago. Set to launch September 8th in beta form, its new "Unlimited PC Play" service will offer subscribers access to 100-plus downloadable PC and Mac titles, with hundreds more expected in time for the official end of year launch. Fans of the video game rental outfit's snail mail subscription service don't have to worry about a shift to digital only, as the company has no plans to abandon its "unique combination of console and digital PC game offerings." Interested in getting an early peek at the new platform? If you live in the Los Angeles area, you can look forward to a planned beta launch party next month, where access codes for the new, invite-only service will be distributed. The rest of you PC gaming warriors will just have to settle for a sign-up page at the source.
Lion: Restoring Safari's download list keyboard shortcut
Oh, those poor Mac OS X Lion developers. They work their tails off to get a new version of OS X out to us, and then people immediately find things that they liked better in the old version. Red Sweater Software founder and über-geek Daniel Jalkut found that the loss of a keyboard shortcut to display or hide the active downloads list in Safari (Command-Option-L) was driving him bonkers -- he wasn't alone, as Erica pointed out the same annoyance. Like a good developer, he figured out a way to bring back the shortcut. The solution was to use his FastScripts application (Free for up to 10 shortcuts, US$14.95 for unlimited shortcuts) and then develop a "simple UI Scripting script." The script, available here, is placed into the [Home] -> Library -> Scripts -> Applications -> Safari folder, and it appears in FastScripts only when Safari is active. Now you can toggle the downloads list as much as you want with Command-Option-L. Be sure to send Daniel a thank-you tweet -- he's @danielpunkass on Twitter.
20th Century Fox to offer digital downloads for Android devices, Blu-ray purchase required
20th Century Fox is dipping its downloading toes into the 21st century's waters, releasing movies on Android in addition to good, old-fashioned Blu-ray. According to the Financial Times, retail discs of X-Men: First Class will direct owners to a website where they can sideload a digital version of the film onto their Android device of choice. Apparently some of the suits over at Fox caught wind of how popular Android tablets are getting, and now see them as complementary, not cannibalistic (remember that industry buzz kill?) Sure, right now you shouldn't expect any Netflix-sized library of titles, but perhaps we can all agree this is a step in the right download-to-own direction. Residents of the US, UK, Germany, and France will get the first crack at downloading the films. The rest of you can just stream and wait. [Image credit via 20th Century Fox]
OS X Lion hits one million downloads on launch day
We were pretty sure OS X Lion would be a success, but this is kind of ridiculous. According to Apple, OS X Lion was downloaded over one million times on launch day. Apple says this is the fastest adoption rate of any OS in its history. How about some other crazy numbers to go along with that stat? If you assume that most of those first-day downloads were paid downloads for the first machine (remember, Lion can be installed on any Mac associated with your iTunes account), that's US$30 million in revenue in one day. The actual number is likely to be a few million lower than that due to users installing Lion on multiple Macs, but it's still a gigantic amount of dollars flowing directly into Apple's coffers (and as Gus Mueller points out, Apple doesn't even have to give up 30 percent of its cut!). Even more incredible than the financial implications is what happened on the data side of things. OS X Lion is a 3.49 GB download from the Mac App Store. With one million downloads, that's over 3400 terabytes of data pushed out in a 24-hour period. I guess that server farm in North Carolina is paying for itself already. Show full PR text Lion Downloads Top One Million in First Day CUPERTINO, California-July 21, 2011-Apple® today announced that in just one day, over one million users bought and downloaded Mac OS® X Lion, the eighth major release of the world's most advanced operating system. Available through the Mac® App Store™ for $29.99 (US), users are buying Lion faster than any other OS release in Apple's history. "Lion is off to a great start, user reviews and industry reaction have been fantastic," said Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. "Lion is a huge step forward, it's not only packed with innovative features but it's incredibly easy for users to update their Macs to the best OS we've ever made." Lion introduces more than 250 new features to the Mac, including Multi-Touch® gestures; system-wide support for full screen apps; Mission Control, an innovative view of everything running on your Mac; the Mac App Store, the best place to find and explore great software; Launchpad, a new home for all your apps; and a completely redesigned Mail app. Available in 123 countries, the Mac App Store brings the revolutionary App Store experience to the Mac so you can find great new apps, buy them using your iTunes® account, download and install them in just one step. The Mac App Store offers apps in Education, Games, Graphics & Design, Lifestyle, Productivity, Utilities and other categories. Users can browse new and noteworthy apps, find out what's hot, see staff favorites, search categories and look up top charts for paid and free apps, as well as user ratings and reviews. The Mac App Store is built right into Lion and available for Snow Leopard® users through Software Update as part of Mac OS X version 10.6.8. Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers in the world, along with OS X, iLife, iWork and professional software. Apple leads the digital music revolution with its iPods and iTunes online store. Apple has reinvented the mobile phone with its revolutionary iPhone and App Store, and has recently introduced iPad 2 which is defining the future of mobile media and computing devices.
