Music Industry Terminology

Convergence of Technology - By converting from analogue to digital opens opportunities
Convergence of Industrial Activity -
Synergy - The coming together of two seperate media texts in such away to benefit bot eg. Marks and      Spencers and the X-factor, Morrisons and Take That music, Tony Hawks Pro Skater 4 & ACDC this example benefits the company Neversoft and ACDC's record company EMI.
Conglomerate - A company of companies eg Sony hardware - electronics - films
Globalisation - Record company that sells it's products across the world
Analogue Music - An audio signal is an electrical representation of, i.e., is analogous to, a sound waveform
Digitalisation - 1984 introduced conversion of analogue (vinyl/tape) to digital (CD/MP3) - conversion from waves to binary numbers
Vertical Intergration - The merger or takeover of companies operating at different stages of the production/distribution process eg EMI - CD pressing plant - HMV
Horizontal Integration - The merger of competing companies from the same line of business and involved at the same level of activity.
Major Record Label - Owns smaller recording company and is one of three: Universal, Sony and Warner
Subsidiary Label - is a company that is completely or partly owned and wholly controlled by another company that owns more than half eg Sony music is the major label and owns Epic, Arista, Columbia etc.
Independant Label - a small recording lable run independently without the financial aid of major recording organisations
Niche Audience - The targeting of a small but significant group of consumers with a media product directed specifically at their interests
Mainstream Audience - The common current thought of the majority (follows the crowd)
Fans - People who are interested in a certain type of music or a certain artist
Active audiences - Activly promote their faveourite band/artist etc. without getting paid via blogs (self-promote)
Audiophiles - Early adaopters of the newest technology
Early Adopters - People who are early responders of technology
Consumption - The using up of a resource
Web 2.0 - An interactive use of the web eg. facebook or youtube
Meta-tags/Personalisiation - Genre/album/artist/rating
Download - Copy (data) from one computer system to another or to a disk.
Streaming -  Technology (computer) is used to transfer data over the Internet in a continues stream
Peer to Peer - A website that distributes music eg. itunes or sportify
Piracy - The unauthorized use or reproduction of copyrighted or patented material ie, music,CD's
Portability/miniaturisation - the quality of being light enough to be carried ie, Ipod
Multi-track - Relating to or made by mixing of several separately recorded tracks of sound
Sampling - A portion, piece, or segment that is representative of a whole ie used on itunes to sample a small part of the song
Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) - Audio inputs and outputs - Computer - Audio software
A&R -Artists and Repertoire - is the division of a record label that is responsible for talent scouting and overseeing the artistic development of recording artists. It also acts as a liaison between artists and the record label
Record Deal - contract - royalties - is a legal agreement between a record label and a recording artist (or group), where the artist makes a record (or series of records) for the label to sell and promote which makes them money
Distribution - The action of sharing something out among a number of recipients ie sending CD's to stores in which they can sell them
Plugging/marketing - The action or business of promoting and selling products or services