DOWNLOADS DWINDLE:  In another sign of the apocalypse for the digital download industry, Billboard is reporting the lowest number of purchased downloads in a given week for its #1 song than any time since 2006.  This week’s #1 is “Closer” by the Chainsmokers.  The poor guys only sold 84,000 downloads in their week at the top of the charts, which is the fewest since Hinder’s  #1 song “Lips of an Angel” – remember that jam?!?  It’s just another proof point that the age of buying downloads is going the way of the vinyl record, 8-track, cassette, and CD.  But music lovers take heart . . . while the delivery system may change over the years, passion for the artist and the music are still constants!  (link)

DIGITAL REVENUE ROUNDUP:  Yesterday the IAB released stats on US Digital Ad Spending for the first half of 2016.  The results were not surprising – Digital continues to surge at +19% YoY, on the strength of mobile which comprised 47% of the total spend.  Some interesting inside the numbers observations include web advertising actually declining -10% YoY for the first time in forever, and rich media/site sponsorship revenues also declining -20%.  The top 10 Digital Publishers are still ball-hogging 74% of the total rev – which is still a mind-blowing stat to me.  The WSJ has a nice summary of the data in the following link. (link)

PRIORITIZING PERISCOPE?:  Here’s an intriguing question – can Twitter make Periscope the dominant live streaming platform despite the fact that it couldn’t make Vine successful?  That’s the question at hand as the other big players in the Social Video space ramp up their live video offerings.  Periscope was another one of those new tech darlings from 2014 which broke ground as an innovative social platform.  But as sometimes happens, they sold to a bigger fish who didn’t move with enough urgency to maximize their opportunity.  And now Twitter is left with a solid product which has good scale, but has lost their presumed lead to the other guys.  I’m guessing it won’t take more than 6-12 months to know which direction this is headed.  (link)

Have a great Wednesday guys!