Neil Young says streaming services have the ‘worst audio in history’, promptly pulls his song catalogue

The classic rocker, Neil Young, voiced his opinion on music streaming services earlier today on his Facebook page, saying that “Streaming sucks. Streaming is the worst audio in history”. He went on to say that his music is in the process of being removed from said streaming services. It’s always great seeing creative artists stand up for their principles, especially when it’s done for the fans. But is everything quite as clear-cut as he would like it to appear in his Facebook post?

“I was there.
AM radio kicked streaming’s ass.
Analog Cassettes and 8 tracks also kicked streaming’s ass,
and absolutely rocked compared to streaming.

Streaming sucks. Streaming is the worst audio in history.
If you want it, you got it. It’s here to stay.
Your choice.

Copy my songs if you want to. That’s free.
Your choice.

All my music, my life’s work, is what I am preserving the way I want it to be.

It’s already started. My music is being removed from all streaming services. It’s not good enough to sell or rent.

Make streaming sound good and I will be back.

Neil Young” (Facebook)

If you’re the cynical type, you may remember that Neil Young was involved with the Pono Music Player that raised over $6 million on KickStarter  and became available to purchase for $399 back in January. The Pono’s main claim to fame is that it ‘plays high-resolution music files better than any portable device‘. You can buy uncompressed music files from the PonoMusic store, including, you guessed it, Neil Young’s catalogue of songs. What I’m getting at here is, is this just a publicity stunt to force his fans to buy his songs from the Pono music store?

The truth is, who knows? It would be nice to be to take him at face value when he says that he just want’s to preserve his life’s work. But, stating that AM radio, 8-tracks and analog cassettes kicked streaming’s ass, that’s going to be a subjective view that is probably rose-tinted in nature.

At the end of the day, without trying to figure out his motives, he has a point. Music streaming services don’t offer a superior listening experience when compared to listening to a lossless FLAC music file on high quality speakers in the livingroom, but it may just be that the average streaming experience is good enough for most of us when we are out and about streaming music from our mobile devices.

If you’re a fan, are you disappointed by his decision to remove his songs from the various streaming services? Will you buy his albums for the PonoMusic Store? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

Source: Neil Young (Facebook & Twitter)
Image Credit: Neil Young (Facebook)

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Facebook is working on bringing online shopping within store pages

Facebook product marketing manager Emma Rodgers told BuzzFeed News that the company is working on building online shops within Facebook pages. This will let users to purchase products within Facebook’s ecosystem without having to jump between websites.

You will soon have a “buy” button in Facebook store pages for you to shop and checkout without leaving Facebook.

“With the shop section on the page, we’re now providing businesses with the ability to showcase their products directly on the page“

There are already a few shops that are in a testing phase and more will be available in the coming few weeks. Facebook does not profit from online sales at the moment and might not need to. The more customers are tempted to shop on Facebook the more store will be attracted to advertise on Facebook with the hope of selling their products.

The project is still at early stages and names of participating companies could not be named.

Source: BuzzFeed News
Via: Engadget

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Facebook wants you to shop inside its store pages

Here’s a mystery: if Facebook is bending over backwards to give stores more power, why can’t you shop those stores? Facebook doesn’t think that makes sense, either. Accordingly, the social network tells Buzzfeed News that it’s testing an option to buy goods directly from stores’ Facebook pages, rather than kicking you over to another website. The effort is still early enough that only a few dozen brands are participating (Facebook won’t name names), but it could expand to include groups, sports teams and even celebrities.

Facebook doesn’t take a cut from sales at the moment, but it might not need to. The more you’re tempted to shop on Facebook, the more alluring it is for advertisers — they’d not only be more likely to clinch a sale, but learn more about what you’re likely to buy. And while you might not be thrilled with the prospect of marketers trying even harder to get your dollar, it’s only logical that you should do more with store pages than give them likes and click on the occasional link. Even if you’re unlikely to see a store bring its full catalog to Facebook, the feature could make it much easier to leap on sales that show up in your timeline.

Filed under: Internet, Facebook

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Source: Buzzfeed News

‘Moneypenny’ is Facebook’s new digital assistant

Facebook is looking to get in the digital assistant game. You may have heard of Google Now, Siri and Cortana. Those are all digital assistants developed for their respective operating systems. Facebook, too, is reportedly working on integrating a new voice assistant, “Moneypenny”, into its messenger application.

Moneypenny will help users purchase goods as opposed to revealing the weather and setting calendar appointments. According to The Information, Facebook’s assistant would allow Messenger users to ask real people for aid in the research and purchasing of products and services. Although they left one detail out and that is to who these people would be.

Lots of questions remain about how this will all work, but Facebook’s budding interest in the category will draw attention from some of its rivals. Its still early to know all the details, and no release date has been mentioned.

Source: The Information
Via: Android Central

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Facebook security lead wants Adobe to say when it’s killing Flash

To put it mildly, Adobe’s Flash plugin has fallen from grace in recent years. BlackBerry, Google and other companies once thought it was crucial to the web, but you’ll now find many of these outfits going out of their way to avoid and contain Flash in the names of both security and promoting true standards. Need further proof that it’s a pariah? Just ask Facebook’s new security chief, Alex Stamos. He’s calling on Adobe to not only choose an “end-of-life date” for Flash, but to enable web browser “killbits” that shut it off for everyone at once. That’s the only way to “disentangle the dependencies” and get everyone to move on to more secure technology like HTML5, he argues.

It’s doubtful that Adobe will be quick to heed Stamos’ request any time soon given how many sites still depend on Flash. He certainly has some evidence in his favor, though. Numerous security exploits (such as those used by Hacking Team) revolve around Flash, and it’s no secret that the sandboxing features in some modern browsers are designed primarily to minimize the damage from Flash-related attacks and crashes. For Facebook, getting rid of Flash would eliminate many of the security threats against both you and the social network itself.

Filed under: Internet, Facebook

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Via: Business Insider, The Verge

Source: Alex Stamos (Twitter 1), (2)