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Outrage! Michael Arrington has branded Britons as ‘..having all the crazy-stupid ideas about how to screw up the music industry’. Surely not sir? You are a cad of the first order sir and I challenge you to a duel. Pistols at dawn. Outside right now, the honor of the British nation is at stake.

So what has caused this great champion of capitalism to insult the very soul of Britishness? Apparently Billy Bragg (you remember him, the socialist musician with a face like a bloodhound at a funeral whose extensive back catalogue includes such musical classics as ‘Tank Park Salute’, ‘Sulk’ and ‘There Is Power In A Union’) has said that Bebo should share some of its buy-out windfall with the musicians who have posted their music to the site.

“The musicians who posted their work on Bebo.com are no different from investors in a start-up enterprise…Now that the business has reaped huge benefits, surely they deserve a dividend.”

photo credit: p_c_w

He also argues that the social networking sites are adding to the declining sales in the music industry by encouraging free streaming and downloading.

Predictably, MA has come down on the side of the capitalists, leveling that Billy is talking a load of old bollocks (I paraphrased a little here). MA’s counters Social networks have absolutely nothing to do with the decline in music sales. The fact that recorded music can be reproduced at a zero marginal cost is why music sales are declining.

He goes on to say that Recorded music is nothing but marketing material to drive awareness of an artist.

Gentlemen, sometimes it is better to keep ones’ mouth shut and have everyone suspect that you are a fool rather than open it and show everyone you are. Certainly damning the entire British nation on the strength of the words from a single demi-musician seems a tad harsh.
Until dawn then Michael.

Reuters are reporting that AOL is taking a serious look at New York-based widget-maker KickApps for $90 million.

KickApps is a hosted platform that allows webmasters to quickly and easily deploy user-generated content and social networking functionality directly on their websites. Our company provides a “white label” solution, with all elements precisely matching a website’s existing look and feel. The KickApps platform is highly customizable, scalable and enterprise-quality.

By providing webmasters with a set of sophisticated media management, reporting and administrative tools, KickApps protects websites from pornography, copyrighted material and inappropriate user content that may hurt their brands or offend advertisers. The KickApps platform is a complete content management system and a viral syndication engine for your community (and premium) content.

Investors Softbank Capital, Prism VentureWorks and Spark Capital and others have dropped $17 million into KickApps.

ITV has joined the Open Media platform, giving free and open access to premium ITV content to the Bebo community of 40 million users worldwide. According to a release on the Bebo site, ITV will have a member profile on Bebo, and the ITV profile will host numerous media channels, each promoting individual programmes. Bebo users will be given the opportunity to become Fans of programmes meaning they will be notified when new content is uploaded to the profiles.

The broadcasters first channel launch will be US acquisition Gossip Girl, ITV2, available at http://www.bebo.com/gossipgirl from today, with other channels planned for rollout later to include, amongst others, ITV2 Comedy shows.

Each channel will be branded with programme-specific skins designed by itv.com. Users may adopt or use the programme skins from ITVs Bebo profiles on their own - potentially creating thousands of mini show posters in the online space. Users will also be able to integrate skins and video content into their own profiles potentially creating thousands of brand champions for ITVs programmes and channels.

The programme channels will draw on the itv.comsBrightcove video player with video content to include teaser clips and interviews. Blogs, galleries, a wall for fans to post comments, polls, forums and links back to the official channel home (itv.com) may also accompany the profiles. Users are able to select clips and embed the ITV Brightcove video player into their profiles, helping to promote clips among their peer groups.

Full Release

Zivity, a company creating a new category of subscription-based social networking for the 18 and over market, has raised $7 million in Series B financing from venture capital firms BlueRun Ventures and Founders Fund.

John Malloy, partner and a founder of BlueRun Ventures, and Luke Nosek, managing partner at Founders Fund, will join Zivity co-founders Scott Banister, Cyan Banister and Jeffrey Wescott on the companys board of directors.

BlueRun Ventures, which led the round of financing, has previously collaborated with Scott Banister at Slide, the personal media network best known for its embedded social networking applications, and PayPal, the online payment company now owned by eBay.

Zivity, much like Slide and PayPal before it, has a driven and talented team focused on challenging the status quo and creating a large new market opportunity, said Malloy of BlueRun. Zivity is introducing an innovative business model that reflects a major shift in the maturation of the Web. We look forward to helping build Zivity into a global media platform.

Zivity.com is a community-powered showcase promoting female beauty and expression through professional-quality photography. Subscribers to Zivity pay $10 per month and distribute 40 percent of their subscription fee to the participating models and photographers via Zivitys innovative dollar-backed voting system. Each vote cast delivers cash to the content creators.

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About time! LinkedIn, the world’s largest professional network, has announced over 19 million members can now access a LinkedIn web application via mobile devices with Internet browsers like iPhone and iPod touch, Blackberry, and other web-enabled wireless phones.

“Let’s face it, every professional today is carrying a wireless device,” said Dan Nye, LinkedIn CEO. “Many of these professionals are on the move, attending conferences, sales meetings and client events. Making LinkedIn available on mobile devices responds to both these business realities and will be great for our users.”

There were more than 405 million mobile Internet users worldwide in 2007, with that number projected to grow to 489 million this year, according to eMarketer.com, a market research resource for Internet and emerging technologies. And industry analysts including Standard and Poor’s conclude that the phenomenon of online social networking has gone mobile and is one of the key applications driving mobile Internet usage.

LinkedIn members can utilize the LinkedIn network on their mobile devices by logging into the web app at m.linkedin.com. This release is a beta product with the final version expected later this spring. The beta is available immediately in English, French, German, Spanish, Japanese and Chinese with additional languages to follow

LinkedIn members will be able to immediately take advantage of the following LinkedIn features on their mobile devices

• Search LinkedIn profiles including photos and bio information to help recall and connect with business acquaintances at events and conferences
• Research the mutual contacts they have with other professionals to help make real world introductions easier
• Invitation capability to connect on LinkedIn anywhere
• Network update capabilities to receive important updates about your connections while on the go