Facebook has been rolling out the ability to buy a variety of goods for months, and since summer they’ve talked about getting in live concert ticketing.  Today, their talk turned into action, and its likely a boon for small artists and venues….

Artists take note, a recent review of the statistics reveals that social video on both Facebook andYouTube has blown up in the past year, and will likely only become even more popular moving forward into 2016….

Instant messaging (IM) has become one of the main methods of communication, first starting out on social media platforms such as Facebook and Google Hangouts and developed further into mobile apps like WhatsApp, WeChat and Viber….

Coldplay is reportedly set to storm the 2016 Super Bowl stage as the annual game’s halftime show performer, according to the Wall Street Journal. …

Creative industries contributed $2.25 trillion to the global economy, but the creators behind the boom are not properly compensated, according to an in-depth report presented by global rights group CISAC at a press conference in Paris this morning….

In commemoration of the venerable Chicago music festival’s 25th anniversary, Lollapalooza is doing 2016 differently. Instead of a three-day fest, Lolla 2016 will be a sprawling four-day affair in Grant Park featuring more than 170 performances….

A year ago, Jody Gerson was preparing for one of the most ­important speeches she would give as ­chairman/CEO of Universal Music Publishing Group (UMPG) — her first. More than 30 years into a successful career in music ­publishing, Gerson had ascended to a rarefied position of power: leadership of the second-largest music publisher and ­songwriting house of Elton…

Canadians will now have access to Google Play Music’s free ad-supported streaming service that has been available in the US since June, and the podcast portal that has been in the U.S. for a month. The two services are now only available in North America, not the 58 other countries where the subscription service is…

The technology of the future is bringing back the quintessential “King of Cool.” Dean Martin will take the stage in 2016 thanks to Hologram USA, the company that produces lifelike hologram performances (ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel was “beamed” to the Country Music Awards in Nashville last year)….

Internet radio company Songza is being put out to pasture. On January 31, over a year and a half after being acquired by Google, Songza will finally retire its website and app, marking an end to a small yet innovative Internet radio service….