The big one is basically spend at least $10,000 on Facebook advertising in order to get an account manager in order to get approval.

"Provides digital distribution for artists, labels and organizations through custom download cards and personalized web platforms."

Downloady music card thingummies. Still haven't found a way of getting them into the shrinkwrap without tremendous expense.

Si Begg's next release out for free. "Don't get me wrong I'm all for me making money out of my music. But as I say, i'm not exactly churning out platinum hit singles here. I'm thinking its more likely I'll make my money a) from possibly licensing the tracks to compilations b) PRS royalties from radio play etc c) maybe getting the tracks used in film and TV d) gig, remix and production work encouraged by generally raising my profile. All of which is more likely to happen the more people that get to hear and hopefully enjoy my music."

"Use our tools to author playable tracks. Upload and submit your tracks for review by the Rock Band Creators community. Approved tracks become available in the Rock Band Store and on the Xbox LIVE Marketplace*, and you get a cut of every purchase."

"To program songs for the game, you or your developer friend first needs a membership to Microsoft's XNA Creators' Club, which was launched a couple years ago to let independent developers create casual games to sell through the Xbox Live Marketplace; a membership costs $49.99 for four months or $99.99 for a year. You'll then be able to get free tools and instructions from the Rock Band Creators Web site to convert your master recordings to the MIDI charts used by the game."

Centered around music.

"It’s refreshing to see such a big brand being so philanthropic, providing the sort of support most artists would be happy to be connected with, which is so often where big brands can get it wrong."

Answer: people who you know who will probably like it who don't work in the biz. Because not only is it effective, it's also a nice thing to do. Thank you, Dubber, for expressing so clearly something I've spent ages trying to explain to label people.

"In the first day of release, Twitter lead the traffic drivers to the Jimmy Eat World site, with more than 22% of all traffic coming straight outta Twitterland. Twitter was third as a driver of revenue, though, driving just over 20% of all sales. Still, with the large number of people reached, and email a smaller percentage of total sales in this campaign than we see on average, it’s very reasonable to conclude that Twitter was a meaningful driver of incremental revenue."

Answer: probably not.

"a social music game that brings fans and artists together and empowers artists and listeners to determine what's hot by creating virtual record labels."

Bandcamp now does download codes. Ace. "Not just any download codes, mind you, but the sort you can email to your fans OR zap over to Moo for print-on-demand, great looking, and dirt cheap physical download cards."

Just about right.

Clever. Evil.

Fairly obvious but useful for reminding people.

Fairly obvious but useful for reminding people.

Some dead handy tips here.

"Promonet was designed to help you quickly find pre-cleared MP3s for use in your blog, podcast or music website."

Some sensible arguments here.

"An international music marketing collective offering sonic strategies for brands and their agencies, along with brand strategies for musicians, managers and labels."

Surprisingly good article.

"According to reports most fans chose to pay nothing to download the album. However, it still generated more money before it was physically released (on December 31) than the total money generated by sales of the band's previous album, 2003's 'Hail To The Thief'."

"Radar was set up in 2006 to inspire, empower and connect people worldwide through music video filmmaking."

"I recently stumbled across Radar Music Videos. It’s a site that connects independent video producers with musicians, with some quite spectacular results. For quite realistic budgets, there are some very impressive music promo clips."

Social media strategy suggestions from Dubber.

"Xfm's unsigned band network. Bands can create a homepage, upload songs, post gig info, build a gallery and receive a unique Xfm Uploaded web address. They might even get played on Xfm itself."

"A freshly launched elective payment music site. Artists upload their music and listeners electively pay the artist what they want to download their albums."

"Just because the songs are available to buy, doesn't mean we can sell them – in the same way that (and excuse the often-used analogy) installing a landline doesn't mean that the phone is going to ring. And we can't blame the distributors any more."

"A free, open-source package that lets you make and host your own mixtapes on the web. Upload songs (via web or FTP), reorder, rename, customize the style, and share what you like on other sites with an embeddable player.

New Minotaur Shock album on 4AD: "Instead of doing a Radiohead and asking you to pay what you think the music is worth, I have decided to try and explain what I feel the music is worth, and explain my reasoning. Of course, in an ideal world I would charge you £20.00 per track, but I’m a realist."

"Imeem is the third-largest social network in the United States after MySpace and Facebook; and it's now the No. 1 streaming music site in the US. That puts it above one of our favorites, CBS-owned last.fm."

"If I'm making an album available on the web, whats the best album art file names and dimensions to include with the download? Is it worth it to include a playlist file?"

Fantastic comment on music industry/illegal downloads/self-promotion on Slashdot.

"Maybe building a street team of trusted individuals who are tapped into powerful networks, and enabling and rewarding them to evangelise in quiet, enthusiastic tones on your behalf is better than gathering as many random MySpace accounts as you can find

"Since the big NY Times Magazine article a lot of just-starting indie musicians have been writing to ask about how I made all of this happen."

"Improve the way you send promos and get your pre-release music heard by the right people faster. Create, manage and deliver low-cost, high response, email marketing for each of your releases."

"A creator, such as an artist, musician, photographer, craftsperson, performer, animator, designer, videomaker, or author - in other words, anyone producing works of art - needs to acquire only 1,000 True Fans to make a living."

"It’s a clever way of using the available technology to get this music into the hands of people who might not otherwise have found it - and to promote it more strongly."

"BitTorrent and the like are simply new distribution models and the number of our viewers choosing to view our content this way is as relevant as those still choosing to watch on broadcast television. What’s missing is the definitive business model for

"'One of the big criticisms of Neighbours' fans is that the BBC never promoted the show,' said Murphy. 'Five might make a bit more of a fanfare about it, so it might even be for the benefit of the show in the end.'"

"His fans do not want merely to buy his music. They want to be his friend. And that means they want to interact with him all day long online."

"The Canadian folk-pop singer Jane Siberry has a clever system: she has a “pay what you can” policy with her downloadable songs, so fans can download them free — but her site also shows the average price her customers have paid for each track."

"The music industry is evolving, and major labels are starting to develop new strategies to help adapt to the current DIY climate."

"The future of record labels and why online battle of the band competitions produce “an endless reservoir of shit”."

"Releasing music is a real responsibility as you’re dealing with people’s creativity and in some cases the starts of their careers – the last thing an act needs is a false start or early over-exposure before they’ve developed into being something

"Last.fm [...] is launching a PR campaign in the guise of an initiative to get unsigned and independent bands using online tools to build their careers."