contributed articles

Doi: 10.1145/1562164.1562185

Mining the wisdom of the online crowds generates music business intelligence, identifying what’s hot and what’s not.

BY VaRuN BhaGWaN, TYRoNe GRaNDiSoN, aND DaNieL GRuhL

Sound index:
charts for
the People,
By the People

How MUsiC CHarts are created has remained relatively the same for the past 50 years despite dramatic shifts in the industry’s underlying business, technological, market, and cultural assumptions. The charts, which are generated and published periodically, are based largely on retail sales and radio-listener statistics. However, one of the most significant demographics for the industry—the teen market—has notably altered its new-music-consumption behavior due to the recent availability of online content and digital downloads. This phenomenon is recognized by chart creators eager to incorporate these observations into corporate marketing strategies in order to stay relevant to the younger generation and generate sales.

The Sound Index system demonstrates a new way to measure popularity in the world of music by

incorporating the Web, online communities, and social networks. It enables the capture of what’s hot and what’s not on the Web while tracking the popularity of emerging records and artists in real time. It allows the music industry to keep tabs on the demographic it considers most important and for the public to quickly learn about new music.

Music charts are useful decision-support tools that influence the visibility and success of artists, as well as help calculate their financial rewards. Popularity drives radio and television programming decisions concerning the music to be covered, the resources to be allocated, and the premiums ultimately paid to artists and their representatives. These charts are critical to the continued success of musicians, as well as music-industry professionals.

Since the late 1990s, the Web has emerged as the most popular medium for young people worldwide. Hundreds of millions of users have moved to the Web to listen to music, explore new music, and purchase individual songs, ringtones, records, and albums. In fact, 48% of teens in the U.S. did not buy a single CD in 2007, up from 38% in 2006.12 Thus, traditional music charts are losing their relevance and appeal to their key demographics. 15, 16 Recognizing this long-term business and cultural trend, music-chart-generating organizations have begun to incorporate digital streams, but these streams still make up only a small proportion of the data reflected in the charts. In summer 2009, Apple’s iTunes, which sells digital singles downloads, was the largest music retailer in the U.S. in terms of revenue.

In the U.S., Billboard (http://www. billboard.com) has published the Billboard Hot 100 music charts every week since 1958 ( http://www.billboard.com/ bbcom/charts/chart_display.jsp?g =Singles&f=The+Billboard+Hot+ 100). In the U.K, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) has published its Top of the Pops ( http://www.bbc.co.uk/ totp/) music charts since 1964. Simi-