Blog | Eric Paul Snowden » News

Open Screen Project

Eric Snowden — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 21:52:37 +0000

This may have been up for a while, but it’s new to me. We’ve been working closely with Adobe for a few years on their multi-screen initiatives and are now officially a member of the Open Screen Project. Were listed among some pretty impressive partners and are glad to be part of the project.

In addition to this, we are part of a concept video on the OSP homepage. The first video in the carousel titled “Fun with Friends” includes a conceptual mockup of what our AIR Application Fanbase could look like in the future. It’s just a concept at this point, but is fun to see. The folks at Adobe did an amazing job putting this together.

Check it out.

Fast Company, MTV, WMG and Atlantic

Eric Snowden — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 01:26:01 +0000

This week Atlantic and Warner Music Group were the subject of a great article in Fast Company, as well as a pretty major announcement regarding our new ad partnership with MTV. I constantly feel proud to be part of a music company who is changing and innovating in a troubled industry, surrounded by extremely difficult economy.

Check out the Fast Company Article.

Read about our new partnership with MTV.

Apple to shut down Lala on May 31st

Eric Snowden — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 15:30:57 +0000

Apple purchased Lala.com a few months back and faithful Lala users have been holding their collective breaths waiting for Cupertino to let us know the fate of the popular streaming service. In my inbox this morning was the following automated message from Lala.

Dear Eric,

The Lala service will be shut down on May 31st.

In appreciation of your support over the last five years, you will receive a credit in the amount of your Lala web song purchases for use on Apple’s iTunes Store. If you purchased and downloaded mp3 songs from Lala, those songs will continue to play as part of your local music library.

Remaining wallet balances and unredeemed gift cards will be converted to iTunes Store credit (or can be refunded upon request). Gift cards can be redeemed on Lala until May 31st.

Click here or visit Lala.com/support for more information, or to view Lala’s Terms of Service.

Thank you.

Lala

It’s a sad day for music fans but it’s nice to see Apple is doing the right thing and giving consumers iTunes store credits equal to the amount they spent on web songs. Personally I hope to see another incarnation of Lala’s technology soon, as I have almost entirely given up listening to music in iTunes. It looks like my Rhapsody subscription will have to tide me over until Apple tells us what the future holds.

Talking about the iPad with Alternative Press

Eric Snowden — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 00:17:48 +0000

Check out my thoughts on how the iPad may effect the music industry at AltPress.com. Looks like I made the cut and was quoted a few times talking about the device. The interview was purely conceptual as none of us had seen the actual hardware, but I think everything we said holds up well post-launch.

Check out the full article here.

Adobe Flash Video: One Web. Any Screen.

Eric Snowden — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 14:48:39 +0000

Adobe released a new video today showcasing their upcoming Flash 10.1 and AIR 2 technology running on a multitude of devices. As part of the Open Screen Project you can see one of Atlantic’s new videos for artist B.o.B running in Flash during the piece.

Check out the video on YouTube.

Rules of Productivity

Eric Snowden — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 05:54:16 +0000

An interesting article showing a correlation between prolonged overtime work and a sharp decline in productivity. It’s amazing to see studies done by Ford at the turn of the century, and those done in startups showing almost exactly same loss in productivity with sustained overwork. Good for short bursts of productivity, but a loosing strategy if it becomes the norm. A great read.

http://lostgarden.com/2008/09/rules-of-productivity-presentation.html

The 4G Connected Car Prototype

Eric Snowden — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 04:18:07 +0000

Today Alcatel-Lucent and QNX announced the 4G connected car prototype in New York. As part of the NG Connect program (an ecosystem built around 4G connectivity) Atlantic Records was proud to create a version of our award winning Fanbase platform for the music fan on the road. The car contains 4 internet connected screens allowing for an in car music experience like never before.

Check out a (shaky) video of an early version of Fanbase running in the car.

NG Connect also launched a micro site with detailed information on the program and the prototype.

Check out a video on the connected car staring yours truly.

Details on all the participants.

The press buzz surrounding the launch was great, with some standout coverage from Wired, Mashable and Reuters.

Wired

Mashable

Reuters

A great overview video from CNN.

As well as a great Fanbase mention.

NY Convergence

A full press rundown can be found on the NG Connect site.

The complete list

Check out the video below for an overview of the car and the possibilities that a nationwide 4G network can bring.

Interview in Adobe’s Edge Newsletter

Eric Snowden — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 17:56:31 +0000

I was interviewed a few months ago by Adobe for an article titled “From black box to contextual applications” which ran in this month in Adobe’s Edge newsletter and on the Adobe.com site. The goal of a contextual application is to provide a unified experience across multiple devices, while leveraging the unique capabilities and qualities of each. The article discusses the key tennants of contextual apps, Atlantic Record’s Fanbase applications as well as the Open Screen Project which Atlantic officially joined last week.

Check out the article.

Fanbase Mobile launches at CTIA

Eric Snowden — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 17:44:12 +0000

Today AgencyNet and Atlantic Records launched Fanbase Mobile, a version of Atlantic’s award winning Fanbase application for Flash Lite enabled handsets. As part of the launch Rob Thomas is showcasing the app during the Billboard Music Keynote at CTIA and he was interviewed about the app by CNBC.

“It is really about you and your favorite music, being able to have in the palm of your hand everything that has to do with the artists. Straight access to the music, to wallpaper, to lyrics to different videos. The content in real time can be updated as many times as you want.”

CNBC

Read the article here or check out the video below at 1:30.

From our partners at AgencyNet

Check out the blog post from our partners at AgencyNet or watch the promo video they put together below.

Other press

WE were also lucky enough to get picked up by a few dozen blogs. Here are a few highlights.

WMG one of Fast Company’s top 50 most innovative companies

Eric Snowden — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 01:01:46 +0000

It’s a huge honor to be a part of a company that ends up on this list. I think there are times where the music industry gets a bad rap on the innovation side, but there are a lot of people here who work really hard to change that impression. I’m sure the haters will be yelling about this all over the blogosphere tomorrow, but tonight it feels great see WMG on this list.

Warner Music Group’s profile on Fast Company.