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Spotify Runs Up Against Apple in U.S. Expansion Attempts
Setting up a streaming music service in the U.S. isn’t an easy task, and to find out why, you need only look as far as the company holding the music industry’s purse strings. That company is Apple, and according to Spotify‘s head of business development Faisal Galaria, it’s a force that may be impossible to reckon with.

In an interview with StrategyEye, Galaria suggested that one of the main reasons behind the long delay of Spotify’s U.S. launch (originally rumored for 2009, then set for 2010 by the company itself) is that the labels depend too heavily on revenue from iTunes to risk angering Apple:

If you're the digital team [at a label] and 80% of your revenue was coming from one place, how much are you going to p*ss them off until someone else can guarantee all that revenue from a new source?

Put yourself into their shoes for a moment – you're a nice, fat big executive at label X, Y, Z. You're getting half a million dollars a year as long as you hit your bonus. Your bonus means that 80% of your revenues comes from iTunes. Are you going to tell iTunes where to go? Because your half a million dollar bonus has now gone.

Galaria also suggests that the reason Apple is obstructing the arrival of Spotify in the U.S. (where the music market is larger than all of Europe’s combined) is that it’s working on its own cloud music service, and doesn’t want any existing competition in the space when it comes to market.

That Apple carries a lot of weight with record labels is hardly a secret, nor is it news. Ever since the introduction of the iPod and the iTunes music store, Apple’s influence on the music industry has been growing at a pace that rivals like Amazon .mp3 couldn’t possibly match. In many ways, the Nov. 10 announcement that finally brought the The Beatles catalog to the iTunes store is a good symbolic representation of its current dominance.

Though Apple’s influence shouldn’t come as a surprise, Galaria’s comments are important for two reasons. First, they remind us that Apple does nothing by accident, and probably plans much far further out than most other companies can anticipate. Music industry clout gives Apple the freedom to proceed at its own pace (which depends on being able to offer a consistent, quality experience before going to market) with cloud music delivery.

Two, it reinforces Michael Wolf’s assertion that leading the way with a cloud-based music service is basically a card that Apple alone holds right now. Just like with NFC and digital transactions, Apple is the brand most users trust when it comes to handling their music purchases. If labels move to the cloud independent of Apple, there’s no guarantee Apple’s users will follow, and 80 percent of revenue isn’t a figure any major content provider can risk losing.

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Follow the Civil Unrest in Egypt on Your iOS Device
If you’re away from a computer or just having trouble connecting to a live stream source on your desktop browser, you may still be able to find news on the civil unrest in Egypt on your iOS device. In fact, Al-Jazeera streaming source Livestation is recommending people use its app instead of the website to ease bandwidth issues.

Protests in Cairo and other parts of the country continue in Egypt, despite the institution of a 6:00 p.m. EET (8:00 a.m. PST) curfew and the calling in of Egyptian army reinforcements (whose intentions remain unclear). Both app and web-based video options are available for those interested in keeping abreast of the situation on their mobile devices, including:

Al-Jazeera’s free official iPhone and iPod touch app, which is available in both English and Arabic and is providing continuous live coverage from Cairo. The app isn’t universal, but you can watch it on your iPad, too, using compatibility mode.

CNN’s free iPhone and iPad apps, both of which are providing live coverage via official Egyptian Nile TV state television.

Of the two, Al-Jazeera’s coverage is probably the better choice, since CNN’s Nile TV feed is being provided (and selected) by a state-run organization. If you don’t need live streaming access, Al-Jazeera’s English language YouTube channel is providing periodic video updates.

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How to Manage Your Mac's A/V Settings for Voice & Video Chat
A few times every week, I’ll play World of Warcraft with some great friends. Rather than type, we’re much more comfortable using a VOIP solution like Skype. Nothing beats actually hearing the sarcastic abuse your friends heap on you.

VOIP and video chat solutions are becoming much more common and user-friendly. While I’m going to go over multiple programs (Skype, iChat, and FaceTime), my preferred app is Skype because it’s available for most platforms, allowing you to talk to people on almost any kind of hardware.

Managing Your Default Preferences

If you’re using the built-in microphone and iSight camera, you can skip over this part. Please, for the love of Steve Jobs, don’t use the built-in microphone. You will end up producing a sound not unlike yelling into a flushing toilet bowl, albeit one with great acoustics. Headsets with boom microphones are relatively inexpensive at around $30, so do your listeners a favor and buy one.

If you have an external headset, open up your System Preferences and choose Sound, then go to the Input tab. Make sure your microphone is plugged in to your Mac, and that OS X sees your microphone and you’ve set it as the default input device, and set the headset as the default output device.

Now, the dirty secret is, this isn’t really going to change much in many programs, except for iChat. Since it’s unlikely you’ll keep your headset plugged in all the time, when you unplug it, OS X will go back to the default setting of the built-in gear. Even so, it’s the perfect place to make sure OS X can detect and use your hardware.

Setting up iChat

Apple provides an A/V communications program on every Mac called iChat. It’s very easy to set up and use, but for video, the protocols it supports are limited. Google Video Chat accounts, for instance, are rumored to not work well with iChat video. MobileMe and AOL Instant Messenger accounts work well, however.

As with most Apple programs, setting up iChat is pretty easy. Open up the iChat Preferences, choose Audio/Video, and choose your camera from the drop down list. I’m using an Xbox 360 Camera as my test, so that’s why I have a “Camera #2″ showing. So long as you have a recent USB webcam (one that’s USB Video Class compliant and uses USB 2.0), it should be recognized under OS X 10.6.6 (the latest version).

Setting up FaceTime

FaceTime for the Mac lets you video chat with a supported iOS device or another Mac user. Currently, FaceTime only supports recent iPod touches, iPhone 4s, and Macs running 10.6.4 or higher, making the number of people you can reach fairly limited. Another limitation is that I couldn’t get FaceTime to detect my external video camera. This could be a major issue if you’re using a MacBook with the lid closed, or a Mac mini.

Setting it up is easy, though, if you’re content with your built-in iSight camera. You download the program from Apple’s site, and log in with your Apple ID. FaceTime will then prompt you for the email address you want to be identified by.

Below is a cropped screenshot of the settings panel, but all it has is an On/Off switch and a display of what email addresses you’re using. FaceTime uses your default audio input and output devices.

Setting up Skype

As I mentioned earlier, Skype is my favorite of the video conferencing apps. It’s easy to set up, and since everyone is using the same network (Skype doesn’t support multiple protocols like iChat), a lot of hassles are eliminated.

If you haven’t already set up a Skype account, the first time you open the app you’ll be prompted to create one. Then go to Preferences, Audio/Video and select your preferred Microphone, Speakers and Camera from the drop-down source lists. Skype lets you specify different devices for in-call audio and the ringer for incoming calls, which can be useful if you have your headset plugged in but you aren’t wearing it.

What I love is since Skype lets you call toll-free numbers free of charge, you can easily take notes or browse the web while on a conference call without having to awkwardly shoulder your phone.

Final Thoughts

If you’re video chatting for work, still make sure you’re in business attire when working from home. Also, if it’s a business call make sure your on-camera surroundings are neat, and your camera isn’t aimed at the pin-up calendar on your back wall. And make sure you’re wearing pants, just in case you need to stand up suddenly.

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Tips and Tricks: iTunes
It’s time to welcome back another installment of Tips and Tricks. These articles aim to teach you some handy things you might not know about your Apple stuff. Let's continue the series by looking at iTunes.

Search the Store From Anywhere

If you want to find something in the iTunes Store, ordinarily you have to open up iTunes, click on the Store link in the sidebar, then enter your search term in the search field on the page that appears. But there’s a simpler way to search the store from anywhere within the iTunes application. All you have to do is type your search query into the search field that always resides at the top right corner of your iTunes window, then instead of just hitting Return, hold down Option and press Return. You’ll be taken automatically to iTunes Store results.

Filter Your Searches

While we’re on the subject of searching, did you know you can apply filters to your searches? For instance, if you’re searching your music library, you can add filters such as Artist, Composer and Album, which can really help narrow down results if you have a huge library.

To use one of these filters, click the magnifying glass inside the search bar. A list of available filters will appear, and you can choose the one you want. Once you do, the default text inside the search bar will change to reflect what you chose, for example changing from “Search Music” to “Search Artists.”

Scroll Along the Progress Bars

There are many ways to scrub through a song, such as holding the Fast Forward button down, or dragging the slider. Another way is to hover your mouse over the slider, but instead of clicking and dragging, scroll up or down using the scroll wheel (or your finger, if you have a trackpad or Magic Mouse). The effect is the same, but it can be a very sensitive depending on your input device settings, so I generally only use it for scrolling straight to the beginning or end of something. This also works with the volume control as well.

Edit the Sidebar

If there are some sources on the sidebar which you never use, there is a way to hide them. Open up iTunes’ preferences screen, either from the menu or using shortcut Command + <. On the General tab, there are a series of checkboxes. You can turn these on and off, and the corresponding items in the sidebar will hide. I use this to hide Ping, which I never use. Below the checkboxes in the General tab, there are some other options as well. Source Text changes the size of the text in the sidebar, and Show Source Icons allows you to decide whether you want the small icons to show next to the source names.

Get Album Artwork From the iTunes Store

A lot of the time, when you import a CD into iTunes, the album’s artwork will get added automatically for you. When it doesn't, there’s a feature in iTunes that will search the iTunes store for artwork and automatically fill in the blanks. To use it, simply go to Advanced > Get Album Artwork in the menu bar.

The caveat with this is that your music has to be named correctly in order for it to work. Even extra words such as “Bonus Edition”, for example, can screw up the search, and iTunes will report back that it couldn't find the artwork you wanted. It’s best to go through your library checking names before you use the Get Album Artwork feature.

I hope you’ve learned something new, and as always, leave your own additional tips in the comments!

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