Record Exec Says Music’s Future Is in the Clouds – WSJ.com – Mr. McBride is CEO of Vancouver-based Nettwerk Music Group, which manages Avril Lavigne, Barenaked Ladies and Sarah MacLachlan, among other artists. He said he anticipates that many music lovers will start to access smart-phone apps like Slacker.com’s subscription-radio service.If they can create their own playlist, he says, they are likely to stop buying downloads, since they know they will always be able to retrieve music they want to hear from the cloud, the computer industry term for content and applications stored remotely and accessed over the Internet. “There’s no need to own product,” he said.For $3.99 a month, Slacker subscribers pick favorite artists or songs that will then be played more frequently on a customized radio station. Mr. McBride predicted the smart phone will replace the PC as the control center for media. He said that artists need to “monetize their brands” by selling merchandise and concert tickets through the smart phones.

US Airways Reinstates Free Beverages – WSJ.com – This article points out that sometimes additional "a la carte" charges are just not worth it. In this case, charging passengers for water overshadowed US Airways advances in their on-time, going from last in on-time rankings among major carriers in 2007 to a close second last year. From the article….

Last August, US Airways began charging fliers $2 for bottled water and sodas and $1 for teas and coffees. The move came as airlines confronted sharp increases in fuel costs. Those costs prompted an industrywide shift toward so-called "a la carte" pricing models. But charging for water may have proved to be a step too far. Even as airlines assessed new fees and matched one another on increases last summer, no major carriers followed US Airways’ decision to charge for complimentary beverages.

Japanese Service Prices Point to Deflation – WSJ.com -  A gauge of prices that Japanese firms pay for services dropped to its lowest level in nearly 21 years in January, resurrecting fears that the nation has slipped back into deflation as energy prices fall and demand wanes. Data released Tuesday showed the Bank of Japan’s corporate service price index slid 2.2% from January last year to 92.0, a level unseen since March 1988. The fall came a month after the index fell 2.5% in December.

Can Free Content Boost Your Sales? Yes, It Can – Mashable.com – Interesting post about Monty Python putting up free, high quality content from their archives onto YouTube, and then seeing a 23,000 percent increase in sales of their DVDs and merchandise. When you have a huge body of work, this is a great way to "prime the pump." Unfortunately, it’s a tough way for new artists/producers/musicians to make a living.