The New York Post is reporting that Sony BMG and Warner Music Group are gearing up to sign an agreement with MySpace to launch its upcoming digital-music joint venture: MySpace Music.

The agreements could be signed as soon as this week. The service is expected to launch later this year. The labels don't want any upfront money either, they're instead trading content rights in exchange for minority equity stakes in MySpace Music and a revenue-share that News Corp. hopes to generate from the service.

"Everybody's operating with a sense of urgency to try to close it out," said one industry insider to The Post.

The business model? Ad-supported audio mixed with good ol' fashion pay-per-download music.

Silicon Alley Insider points out that the creation of MySpace Music would give the labels their own competitor to iTunes that they so desire. That, no doubt, adds to the "sense of urgency" as the music labels would prefer to control their own digital destiny, rather than have Apple dictate it to them.

"The concept of the joint venture is to bring in all forms of [making money from digital music] and much more tightly integrate them," said another person familiar with the negotiations.

[New York Post via Silicon Alley Insider]
Photo: MySpace CEO Chris DeWolfe and News Corp Chairman Rupert Murdoch speak at the Web 2.0 summit... caption contest anyone?

Remember when I said internet in your car may come sooner than you think? Well guess what, Chrysler is saying it will be the first car company to provide in-car Internet access - availability will come later this year.

The third-largest U.S. automaker will have the capability added to existing vehicles by dealers beginning this year, and later will be factory-installed on the assembly line.

The Washington Post is reporting that Chrysler will use a cellular signal and a mobile phone account to give passengers access to the web.

"We want to make the radio itself a WiFi port," said Frank Klegon, Chrysler's product development chief.

And this is just the beginning of Chrysler's connectivity plans. Hey DOJ, are you watching this?

[Washington Post via Autoblog, Engadget]

It looks like Americans are moving beyond using their cellphones just to talk, with non-voice functions gaining more and more usage, according to recent research released by eMarketer.

But what struck me as the most interesting was that "play music" came in at an incredible 17% total - that's nearly the same amount of mobile usage as using email, accessing the internet or recording a video.

Obviously the daily activity drops significantly from the total, but even then, mobile music has the same amount of daily usage as internet access.

Check out how this breaks down by age after the jump...

REM will be debuting their latest album Accelerate on the social music discovery site and popular Facebook application iLike. Accelerate will launch on iLike starting on March 24th, but Warner Music Group won't start selling the album until April 1st.

Why is this significant?

Because while plenty of artists have previewed their upcoming albums on various broadcast media (Sirius and XM have debuted their fair share), those outlets were passed up for a social network in this case.

This could signal a significant shift in how music companies and artists are looking at promotions. A shift that radio (both satellite and terrestrial) need to keep a serious eye on, and figure out how to remain a part of.

iLike allows users to share and download music with the goal of music/artist discovery. It's also one of the most popular Facebook applications. According to Wikipedia, as of last November iLike had more than 15 million users.

[via Silicon Alley Insider]


UPDATE: Ah, looks like the debut isn't exclusive to iLike. Regular radio beats them to 6 new songs this week.

It's becoming a reality. BMW is the first car company to offer Web browsing as a factory-installed option.

And this is using currently available wireless data technology, it's not a WiMax pipe dream or using spotty WiFi. Currently, it's only available in Europe, but it's only a matter of time before it's available here.

Mark Ramsey at Hear 2.0 carries the thought even farther. Rather than simply streaming in the generic "internet radio" from various sources, this type of connectivity allows the automakers themselves to brand their music offerings. So rather than 13,000 internet radio channels, you'd have "Jazz on BMW" or "BMW Rocks" etc. Distribution is no longer an obstacle.

[Watch the Video via Hear 2.0]

Apple just released the software development kit (SDK) for the iPhone, opening up a world of glorious options for the coding crowd.

And maybe... hopefully... we can finally get some satellite radio related applications in the device.

Now, if you want to be an iPhone developer, the SDK is available right now - for free. If you want to be included in the iTunes Application Store (which is exclusive to Apple of course) to distribute your lovely work, it'll cost you a mere $99.

Developers get to pick the price for their wares, and even get to keep 70% of the revenue. Not bad. Free software is supported as well.

Are there any coders out there that would want to develop some XM/Sirius apps for this slightly popular device? (Related: the iPhone consists of 71% of US mobile browser usage.)

[via Gizmodo]

Facebook has approached the major music labels about launching its own music service, according to a Financial Times report yesterday, citing those famous "people familiar with the matter."

This news comes on the heals of a similar effort by social networking rival MySpace, which reportedly has approached The Big Four music labels to launch a "MySpace Music" service.

Both MySpace, and more recently Facebook, have served as excellent promotional platforms for artists (wait... isn't that what radio is supposed to be doing?). Facebook, in November, introduced a way for artists to create their own home pages similar to MySpace. The service also links to iTunes and offers applications from online music services such as iLike, Last.FM and Pandora.

The move to transform social networking sites from promotional platforms to revenue generators, some would say, is most definitely at the forefront of thought for record label executives.

Social networking sites let users share playlists and recommend artists to their circle of friends. And as marketing/sales goes, nothing beats recommendations. Satellite radio (and most broadcast media) is still only serve as a one-way communication, lacking the interactivity and personalization that a new generation of music listeners have become accustomed to.

This level of engagement is something that satellite radio desperately needs. The question is, how?

[Financial Times, chart courtesy of WSJ]

Side note: If you want to link up on Facebook and actually (gasp) see what I look like, go ahead and check out my page here.