So MUCH has changed in the last 10 years

Good stats from the Harvard Business Review on what the last 10, even the last few, years have brought.

Have you seen the new Micheal Jordan commercial?

Wow, so compelling. We'll pay attention when something is done this well:

The Nintendo Channel launches on the Wii

Poof! Out of nowhere it's the Nintendo Channel. I downloaded it this morning. The menus are slick and the videos load fast.

GTA 4 scores $ Half-BILLION (!) first week sales

Just flat-out HUGE numbers. Even Captain Jack's 3rd movie got whacked by Niko Bellic:

"Grand Theft Auto IV" has surged past "Halo 3" and "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End" to set the record for the biggest opening week of any entertainment product. - Variety

But Mario Kart Wii rules at our house, waiting for Nintendo's big numbers to shine too.

More is not better when it comes to text on a web page

Web usability guru Jakob Nielsen says you better not have much text on a web page if you want to communicate with your readers.

"On the average Web page, users have time to read at most 28% of the words during an average visit; 20% is more likely."

Video Game Sales again up BIG, Nintendo upping Wii production

"Nintendo announced late last week that it would increase its monthly production of Wii video game consoles to 2.4 million, from 1.8 million."

Lots of strong video game industry numbers on the eve of GTA IV:

Software sales were up 63 percent in March compared with March 2007, according to NPD Group, which tracks sales. Equipment sales were up 46 percent over the same period.

Digital Sales now 23% of US Music Sales

So it's good news on the digital side, more tough numbers on the CD-sales side.

Charlie Rose tries to connect with...

Ha - well done, funny, and a bit haunting... You get that Charlie really wants to connect with...Charlie

How People Are Getting Their Music

The slice of dark blue (CDs) in the chart is shrinking fast. A good overview of what's up in the fast-changing music market. In this survey paid downloads are growing, but here's the tough nugget for record companies:

"... the biggest source of music for people is their friends — either burning CDs or ripping files ..."

Online Video Viewing Way Up

No surprise - online video viewing is way up, 66% more videos watched in February than a year ago. YouTube had almost a third of the traffic. No one else was even close.

No doubt demonstrations of mad skills on the mike from folks like Chris from the Valory Music Company (below) have been driving traffic... :o

US Video Game Software Sales over a $$ BILLION $$ in March

Recession? What recession?

YouTube videos now playing on Google Maps

Here's a neat bit of news for small business owners from Google Maps.

Change a single note in a recorded CHORD (!) - and much more

Wow, the creative musical possibilities shown here in Melodyne's new software are limitless. Maybe even a little scary.

Note: I first thought the narrator in the video was saying "meaty," but it's how he pronounces "Midi."

And much like how digital image editing has challenged us in how we look at any kind of visual, this shows that going forward you'll never really be able to know what the original source of an audio recording was.

All Disney Animation will also open in 3D

And perhaps the best news in the statement about 3D and Disney's upcoming slate of animated movies is that Tom Hanks and Tim Allen are confirmed for Toy Story 3. All is right with the world.

Microsoft coming with its own Wii-mote?

Seems Xbox might get a motion controller by year's end. Will that be a threat to Nintendo, or a sign that the Wii has knocked Xbox off its game?

iTunes claims to be the #1 US Music Seller

It only took about 4 years for Apple to become the biggest music seller in the US.

The news came on the same day as the announcement of 3 of the 4 big music companies making a deal with MySpace.

Jay-Z goes with Live Nation for Mega $$

Will Live Nation's signing of Jay-Z give the "partner with the promoter, not the label" idea a whole lot more traction? Besides the big up-front money (about $80 Mill!), it takes the pressure off of Jay-Z for a radio hit:

“In a way I want to operate like an indie band,” he said. “Play the music on tour instead of relying on radio. Hopefully we’ll get some hits out of there and radio will pick it up, but we won’t make it with that in mind.”

The path to small success with 1,000 "True Fans"

What if you could find and bond with 1,000 "true fans" who would spend $100 a year on your works? Interesting look at how an artist or content creator might not have to become a mass-appeal star to make a living. From Kevin Kelly's blog (thanks to the9513.com for bringing it to my attention).

Taylor Swift - online and clued in

Nice piece in Billboard with Taylor Swift.

How's this for an artist being in touch with fans:

"I spend so much time on MySpace. It's the best way to figure out what your fans and what your friends and these people that helped you get where you are, what they're going through and what they want to hear from you, what they're liking, what they're not. My MySpace is something that I made. The background that you see on there, I went to a Web site and copied the code and copy-and-pasted my "about me" section. I upload all the pictures, I check the comments, I am in charge of everything on that page."

Taylor knows who she is and LOVES her fans. They feel it, and big things continue to happen for her.

Are you experienced? If so, does that mean you're good?

This story from Time magazine is as inspirational as anything I've seen on why we can never coast. The piece talks about how experience alone doesn't make someone good at something:

"...rather than mere experience or even raw talent, it is dedicated, slogging, generally solitary exertion — repeatedly practicing the most difficult physical tasks for an athlete, repeatedly performing new and highly intricate computations for a mathematician — that leads to first-rate performance. And it should never get easier; if it does, you are coasting, not improving."

Guess that means I should fire up Brain Age on the DS again (the activity in the the first edition of the game where you quickly count people running in and out of a house makes my head hurt just thinking about it).

So there it is - the "secret" to success. Work on the hard stuff.