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(Metue Celebrity Endorsement Lists are now live on the site. Read the article below or follow the links at the bottom of this article  for more information)

You can’t legally download a Beatles song online yet but you can hear “All You Need is Love” play on TV in support of Luvs diaper sales.   Put off by that? Change the channel but beware, across the channels, TV and radio, famed songs, and new releases from Janis Joplin (Mercedes) to Queen (Bohemian Rhapsody) to John Mellencamp (Our Country) all play in marketing campaigns.   The song Our Country even debuted in advertising months before it was available as a single.

We live in Billboard Nation; a consumer culture.  Celebrities looking to stay in the public eye can do it by selling products. They can market themselves and get paid to do it at the same time. Popular songs can be soundtracks to a sale.   Turn on the TV and that voice selling cars may be one you know (Kevin Spacey, Gary Sinese). Similarly open a magazine and chances are you’ll see a recognizable face on the pages promoting a product.  The guitar riff in a commercial? Not necessarily a jingle.

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The music industry is not a vision of health.  Global CD sales have fallen for seven straight years and debates about how to transition to a digital download world are raging; especially regarding Digital Rights Management technologies.

One of the few success stories among labels has been the Disney Music Group.  As previously reported by the LA Times, under the leadership of Disney Music Group Chairman Bob Cavallo, the one-time joke of the music industry has been on an upswing while the rest of the industry has been spiraling downward.

Disney’s Hollywood Records has found success by staying true to its roots: family entertainment and cross promotion with their other entertainment products.  Among their successes, the soundtracks for Disney Channel’s High School Musical sold 3.7m copies.  The Lizzie McGuire TV Soundtrack has sold more than 10.8m CDs since 2002. Soundtracks from the Hannah Montana series are on track to do just as well.

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Microsoft rounded out the first big week of earnings season with an announcement on Thursday.  Unlike Google, which also reported, Microsoft safely met analyst expectations with sales of its Vista operating system solid enough to offset charges associated with the Xbox manufacturing troubles.

Microsoft earned 31cent/share after subtracting 8cents/share for one time charges for the Xbox 360.     Revenue for the quarter was up 13% to $13.37b.  Analyst expectations were for revenue of $13.27b.

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In ancient mythology, Icarus built wings of wax to fly.  As he soared, getting closer and closer to the sun, his wings began to melt.  Eventually, in most things, what goes up eventually comes down.  It’s gravity, laws of nature.   In business the same rules can apply too.  The higher expectations get, the more likely the odds of trouble.  The bigger you get, the harder it is to fly (e.g. grow at an outrageous rate).

After the close of markets today, Google reported its earnings for the second quarter. The numbers were good, 28% growth in revenue, but expectations were high up in the atmosphere. Analysts expected lower costs, and Google failed to meet profit expectations.  It was only the second miss since Google went public in 2004.  (Google does not give sales or earnings guidance and is tight lipped about expenses.   Without sharing such information, it’s especially difficult for analysts to make accurate projections. Given the history of growth, it was only a matter of time before analyst expectations exceeded reality).

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In May, private equity firm Terra Firma put forward a bid to buyout and privatize "Big Four" music label EMI.  That bid was supported by EMI’s board but has been slow to gain shareholder approval amidst anticipation of rival bids from either Warner Music or a partnership assembled by former EMI CEO Jim Fifield.  (As of Tuesday Terra Firma said it had secured only 3.82% of shareholder approval for its $4.88b (GBP2.4b) bid for EMI Group, according to published reports)

The UK Takeover Panel, which oversees and regulates these transactions, set today as the put up, or walkaway, deadline for counteroffers.  It was extended from July 12.

With the deadline looming, and a bidding war not materializing, it’s looking like the deal with Terra Firma will go through after all.

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Ebay, and newspaper publisher Gannett were the latest entries in this weeks parade of earnings announcements.  Both companies reported earnings after close of market on Wednesday. The news was good for eBay, not so good for Gannett.

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In 1999, going against the days trends, two Stanford undergraduate engineering students took aim at cell phone technology instead of focusing on the Internet.   With money from family, and a lot of persistence, they started a company called Aliph. 

Over the next five years, Alex Asseily and Hosain Rahman hired sound engineering experts and engineers and toiled in an effort to build a better mobile headset. The original plan was to license the technology they developed but along the way plans shifted.   In 2004 Aliph released their Jawbone headsets to critical acclaim.

The headset, which has been optimized by DARPA to improve communication clarity in hostile conditions, brings together a combination of sensors that recognize speech from ambient noise.  Using highly directional microphones and a bevy of signal processing technology, along with a chipset from Cambridge Silicon Radio, the earpieces aim to improve the inconsistent sound quality common to mobile headsets; and by most tests, they achieve their goal.    The Jawbone also has a novel feature: not only does it tune out background noise; it also adjusts the speaker volume relative to the environment. So next time a Harley rumbles past you on the highway, you may not miss an important part of your call.

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