Canada Day 2012
It’s Canada day so I thought I’d bump some Independent Canadian Artists.
Lately I’ve been partial to electronic pop band Austra but I’ve also been keeping an eye on rock instrumentalists The David Barrett Trio and new wave rockers Metric.
I’ve also recently discovered Young Galaxy, whose catalogue I haven’t yet had the time to listen to thoroughly. But I like what I’ve heard so far on Youtube and their latest single is excellent.
I’ve been meaning to get back into francophone music after hearing Marie-Mai and Cœur de pirate recently. But I’ve unfortunately been quite busy over the past year and a half so I haven’t been keeping track of the music scene in Quebec for some time.
Anglophones may know Cœur de pirate for her Everyday cover on Danone Activia commercials and Ensemble, the song behind this cute viral video.
I’m hoping to find more time to get back to my previous music listening schedule in the next few months. I have quite allot of catching up to do.
BTW, don’t forget to listen to CBC Radio today, which will feature Canadian music all day.
Bill C-11 Update
Bill C-11, the Copyright Modernization Act, will be up for its third reading vote by June 18th in the House Of Commons.
Cisco Predicts Online Video Explosion
Cisco has released their Visual Networking Index Mobile Forecast for 2011-2016 and it predicts that mobile data traffic will explode because of online video.
The report predicts that in Canada “mobile data traffic will reach 219,897 Terabytes (0.22 Exabytes) per month in 2016” because more Canadians are using their mobile devices to watch movies, television programs, music videos and other content from sites like Youtube.
In 2011, Canada’s mobile data traffic was clocked by Cisco at 10,773 Terabytes (11 Petabytes) per month, “the equivalent of 3 million DVDs each month or 30 million text messages each second.” And their 2016 prediction would equal “55 million DVDs each month or 606 million text messages each second”.
Cisco reported that in 2011 only 57% of that year’s mobile data traffic was video. But predicts that 75% of this traffic will be video by 2016, at 162,179 Terabytes per month.
A Vinyl Comeback ?
It appears that more and more consumers are choosing vinyl over compact disc when if comes to purchasing physical copies of their music.
According to Soundscan, Americans had purchased just over 330 million vinyl albums last year and over 76 thousand new record albums were released in the United States that year.
Apparently many audiophiles are purchasing mp3s for their portable players and purchasing vinyl for their home stereos instead of compact discs because they believe vinyl has a richer sound. And although many bloggers have claimed that this opinion was subjective, the sales of vinyl records continue to rise.
Regardless of the technological debate, consumers have not dropped vinyl as a physical format like the magnetic tape formats (8 track/cassette tape). And compact disc sales are dropping so dramatically in the United States that many major retailers have either reduced or eliminated the retail space they had dedicated to the format.
On the other hand, many online retailers have created vinyl stores to fulfill the demand, including Amazon.ca
in Canada, and Amazon.com
, CD Universe
, DeepDiscounts.com & JR.com
in the United States.
Yes, compact disc sales were still substantial at $225.5 Million dollars in the United States in 2011. But sales have slipped by 5.7% from 2010 whilst sales of LPs, digital singles and digital albums have grown.
LPs will not likely not surpass compact discs in sales anytime soon. But it obviously remains a niche product that is fashionable in certain circles, who also prefer the artwork found on LPs and 45s.
Compact disc inserts may be adequate to some but I personally prefer framing a LP for display if I am unable to find a poster of an album cover’s artwork. And I doubt that I am alone in finding the LP album cover more aesthetically appealing.
Many home audio systems and compact stereo units still include turntables but record players are available as separate components in Canada from Amazon.ca, and Sony.ca
.
Canada – The Dial-Up Dungeon ?
It appears that even with the progresses we’ve had in Canada when it comes to the internet that some are still behind.
A quarter million of Canadian internet users still use dial-up according to the Convergence Consulting Group, a large percentage of which are in rural areas according to the CRTC. And of those who subscribe to high speed, only 52% have the necessary speed to download standard definition films.
Though 77% of Canadians are able to access services that are fast enough to stream high definition video content according to the Broadband Report, only 2% use these services. And it is obvious that it is because these services are prohibitively expensive that more Canadians are not subscribed.
Usage based billing has kept most Canadians from using these services to rent and purchase films online. And though the taxpayer is responsible for most of the infrastructure, we are still being told to pay more.
Perhaps the rates might go down once the spectrum management issues are resolved at the CRTC, which could result in the introduction “Super Wifi” into Canada’s major urban centers.
Unfortunately this wireless service could have issues in communities where analog television broadcasts still exist and digital television broadcasts are only mandatory in the major city centers.
The technology is also in its infancy, having only just been introduced in the United States in Wilmington, North Carolina.
Added More Listings
Updated my Music/Film/TV Memorabilia, Free Shipping Offers and Musical Instruments & Recording Equipment listings. Will add more Canadian entries to the latter as soon as possible.