On the heels of news last week that it has secured EMI‘s recorded music division for nearly $2 billion, Universal Music is again in the news: Google (NSDQ: GOOG) is reportedly very close to signing a deal with the company to use its music as part of an upcoming download…

Four years after the whole label sold to Terra Firma for £4.2 ($6.69) billion, now one half of EMI Group - the record music division, EMI Music - is being sold by Citigroup to Vivendi’s Universal Music Group for £1.2 ($1.91) billion.

French entertainment and telecoms company Vivendi (EPA: VIV) has reported a strong first half, with record sales of its Activision (NSDQ: ATVI) Blizzard games division’s titles Call of Duty and World of Warcraft more than countering a 17% profits plunge at Universal Music Group.

While everyone’s attention was focused on Spotify finally launching services in the U.S., another online music milestone has been reached on the other side of the world. China’s search giant Baidu (NSDQ: BIDU), long accused of aiding and abetting music piracy, has finally inked a deal with major music labels…

UK ISPs may be about to embark on bundled music offerings again, according to industry execs I asked whilst facilitating a panel discussion at Changing Media Summit on Wednesday.

Vivendi (EPA: VIV) has reported a strong performance in 2010 with huge sales of Call of Duty boosting earnings in its games division by more than 40%, more than countering a plunge of almost a quarter at Universal Music Group.

Nokia’s struggle to compete against Apple (NSDQ: AAPL), and drive more sales of its own smartphones, hit a new low today, as the Finnish company said it would be discontinuing its free, bundled music service, Comes With Music, in 27 of the 33 markets where it has operated since 2008,…

With digital becoming a bigger part of Universal Music Group’s revenues in all parts of the world, the company is promoting Rob Wells to president of Global Digital Business, a new position. For Wells, formerly SVP for digital, this is a formal expansion of what he’s essentially been doing: striking…

French media conglomerate Vivendi (EPA: VIV) saw Q1 revenue up six percent to €6.9 billion compared with last year - and it’s easy to see why. Vivendi told analysts last month it’s putting a “growing focus on subscriptions”, which have grown to comprise more than three quarters of the group’s…

It’s been about three years since people first started talking about how bundling music services with internet access could realistically provide hard-pressed labels with vital new income streams. But there are still precious few such services in operation. So Universal, the bravest of the four majors when it comes to…

Video games are shining brighter as the jewel in Vivendi’s crown. The French conglomerate is expecting Activision (NSDQ: ATVI) Blizzard to contribute a boat-load more to this year’s group profit, when two key titles trickle farther down. Its 2009 earnings, out today, show… —Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 shifted…

Universal Music Group’s ever-honest international digital SVP Rob Wells gave a video interview to TheMusicVoid. The highlights…

Music labels’ YouTube-powered music video site Vevo may have had a glitzy launch in New York on Tuesday - but on Wednesday many who hit the site for the first time found it crashing under traffic weight, and everyone outside the U.S. and Canada who hits Vevo.com is getting the…

How much money do artists really make from Spotify? According to Swedish paper Expressen, 2009’s standout breakthrough artist Lady Gaga and her songwriter Redone made just SEK1150 (£100.76; $166.56) in songwriting royalties from one million Spotify plays of her hit Poker Face in Sweden in the first five months after…

Activision’s Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 grossed more than $300 million in sales in its first 24 hours just in the US and the UK, making it not just the biggest video game launch of the year, but the biggest entertainment launch, in any medium, ever. That most hyperbolic…

Fast growing digital music sales and the ongoing popularity of online multiplayer video games helped Vivendi (EPA: VIV) to a recession-beating 15 percent year-on-year revenue growth in the first half of 2009. —*Activision* Blizzard: The games division continued to power on - revenues up 300 percent from last year to…

“Don’t it always seem to go you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone.” ... Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) didn’t pave paradise but it helped kill off albums and now it wants the magic—and the higher profit margins—back. The FT reports via multiple unidentified sources that Apple, EMI, Warner Music…

—Five Cricket VOD: Five’s highlights from this summer’s Ashes Test series will be shown online via its Demand Five VOD platform—and the Publicis-owned Zenith Optimedia agency has bought up all the ad inventory surrounding it and a new cricket mini-site. Each 45-minute highlights show will go online from 10pm each…

Two-year old Total Music has closed up shop, Billboard.biz reports TechCrunch confirmed. The causes? Billboard.biz, citing multiple “directly involved” sources, points to continued dominance of Apple’s iTunes store, the popularity of free ad-supported music streaming services and decreased ad support—plus the increasing pressure of the economic downturn. In the end,…