Subscription services will become more popular but may not be profitable as many users opt for free ad-supported versions. More artists will embrace social media to promote their music at no cost. Music videos will continue to thrive online, driving traffic to sites like Vevo. Music piracy will remain an issue despite efforts to curb it, as many do not feel artists deserve payment for songs. The cloud will become increasingly integral to how people access and store digital music files and content.

1. Future of The Music Industry
Beccy, Emily, Nicky and Phoebe

2. Subscription Services Will Be Popular, But Not Profitable
 We7 launched in the UK in 2008 and has 3m unique monthly visitors and then
relaunched in 2011 hoping to gain more subscriptions with their new look and
'freemium' service with adverts, but ended up with the same amount of
subscribers but preferring the new look and service.
 Vevo currently has 1,254,445 subscribers and within Vevo there are separate
channels for individual artists which have there own subscribers with the
highest being Justin Bieber with 1,406,928.
 But as companies are having to introduce versions of their services for free with
ads this prediction was proved correct as many users will just have the free
version.

3. More Artists Will Finally Get Social
 In In It For The Money all of their artists are online on blogs and
YouTube, so they can post their music and updates to reach a wider
audience.
 SME’s ‘big’ artists will all have the newest social network accounts as
this is a great way to advertise their music and it’s free.

4. Music Videos Will Continue Their Renaissance Online
Vevo has shown massive growth. The site launched only at the end of 2009 and within six
short months is already competing with the biggest names in web video.
SME create music videos for most of their ‘big’ artists
Without a music video SME would not be able to get artists onto music channels as every
song that is played has a video.

5. Music Piracy Will Not Die
• Despite a possible 46% drop in the number of music pirates compared
to a year ago thanks to the shut down of LimeWire, three months after
the closure of LimeWire, there were 12 million less music pirates in the
US alone, down from 28 million. However the digital music revenue
actually rose 8% in 2011.
• While there still are options and ways to download music illegally
people will, most people do not care about the artist getting the money
for their songs and will just download music instead of having to pay
for it.

6. Analysing Future Predictions
1. Google+ continues to grow.
2. Vinyl continues to grow as well.
3. Facebook feels pluses heat.
4. Twitter grows up.
5. The major labels wind down.
6. Indie labels make some headway.
7. Concert attendance takes a leap.
8. Music publishers feel the pain.
9. Artist royalties take a beating.
10. Subscription is the new download.
11. The cloud is in the air.
12. Micropayments hit their stride.

7. Google+ continues to grow
 The prediction; Google+ came out of the gates swinging. 2012 is likely to find Google+ making some changes and
additions that could cause it to be a legitimate contender for Twitter and Facebook
 Google+ is adding new users at a very rapid pace.
 How many users they have got so far:
July 13 - 10 million
August 1 - 20.5 million
September 1 - 24.7 million
October 1 - 38 million (Larry Page announced "more than 40m users" on Oct 13th)
November 1 - 43 million
December 1 - 50 million
December 27 - 62 million
January 1 - 65.8 million (forecast)
February 1 - 85.2 million (forecast)
Expect the growth to continue to accelerate however. Google can continue to integrate Google+ into its other products
and word of mouth will continue to build. Most importantly, 700,000 Android devices are activated daily and this will
become a very significant source of new users for Google+. That number will also grow next year.
 Adding 625,000 new users per day. Prediction: 400 million users by end of 2012.

8. 2. Vinyl continues to grow as well.
The prediction;
You can say that vinyl is a fad except for the fact that every music store owner who sells it says their sales are way up over
last year. Add to that the fact that they can't keep record players and turntables in stock tells you that although the vinyl
business may never be huge, sales will continue to increase in 2012.
 Music On Vinyl, in cooperation with Sony Music Entertainment, will release the next
wave of classic albums mid-November.
 This second wave includes a very special item which has never been released on vinyl
before: The 5-disc set 'The Grace EP's by the late Jeff Buckley. This is an example of vinyl
growing in 2009 so by now the sales will have risen due to the popularity of outdated
products.
 In It For The Money have been effected by the rise in popularity for vinyl as it is a
cheaper way of recording music onto. Here is an example of IIFTM selling vinyl.
 Sale on IIFTM’S MySpace page – ‘12'' gatefold vinyl (limited number) Available Now!’

9. 4. Twitter grows up.
The prediction;
While dismissed by many, Twitter is still a force to be reckoned with and will be more so in 2012 as the
next versions of Twitter and Tweetdeck come online and provide new features such as brand pages and
embedding. Look for user numbers and social influence to increase in 2012.
 SME is on twitter, it has a profile that you can follow to get the
latest news and updates about the music industry, whereas
IIFTM are on MySpace, so people can listen to the music that
their artists blog. This shows that Twitter has become sufficient
big, SME are a large cooperation. By them using the site, it is a
clear indication of how big Twitter has become. However, it
smaller record labels such as IIFTM, don’t tend to use, showing
that is does not appeal to the majority in the way that Facebook
does.

10. 11. The Cloud is in the air.
The Prediction;
In 2011 we saw the introduction of cloud services from Amazon, Google and Apple, and while they
haven't been in the forefront of our daily news cycle, they are making an enormous impact upon our daily
lives as people see how useful storing their data in the cloud can be. Expect to see a gradual increase in
cloud computing use in 2012 until we all use it so seamlessly and often that it becomes a huge part of our
lives.
 The revenue sharing splits that will come out of the wheeling and dealing: Apple will "share 70
percent of any revenue from iCloud's music service with record labels, as well as 12 percent with
music publishers holding the songwriting rights. Apple is expected to keep the remaining 18
percent, said people knowledgeable with the terms."
 Apple's clout through iTunes, which commands the music download market, is evident through
the labels that have agreed to work with them on iCloud: Warner Music Group, EMI Music
Group, Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment.
 Many tech competitors have been releasing cloud-based storage services over the past few
months, including Amazon's Cloud Drive, which launched in late March and encountered legal
troubles with record companies, and Google Music, which was released in early May.
 For a while there, many wondered when Apple would join the cloud club. But in late
April, rumors started circulating that Apple bought the domain "iCloud.com" for $4.5
million, and from there, Apple met with record labels and plans to demo the new service this
month.