BigChampagne
Encyclopedia
BigChampagne Media Measurement is a technology-driven media measurement company. The company produces popular music, film and television charts which have been syndicated by Nielsen, Billboard
, Rolling Stone
, and Entertainment Weekly
, among others.
BigChampagne.com is a web site used primarily by entertainment industry professionals, major brands and their advertising agencies, and Wall Street analysts to access information about the popularity of music, film, and television as it is distributed and sold. BigChampagne's sources for data include retail accounts (point of sale), traditional radio and television broadcasters, internet radio broadcasters, internet on-demand streaming services, social networks and blogs, mobile device streaming and downloading services, as well as file sharing networks. BigChampagne's tagline is, "Now you know everything."
BigChampagne provides a number of services related to producing business intelligence
(BI) and competitive intelligence
(CI) for users of the BigChampagne.com site: access to proprietary data, data management (integration and analysis), combined with web applications and other technologies for producing marketing recommendations. BigChampagne also provides consulting services.
BigChampagne was originally founded by co-founders Eric Garland, Adam Toll and Zachary Allison. The company's earliest service tracked the popularity of songs on the original Napster file-sharing service.
Co-founder Adam Toll has said that the company was named for a lyric in the Peter Tosh
song "Downpressor Man": "You drink your big champagne and laugh."
BigChampagne is based in Beverly Hills, CA with offices in Atlanta, GA. The company was funded entirely by the founders, without outside capital. Musician Glen Phillips
was an early adviser and supporter of the company.
BigChampagne has courted some controversy. The company's early focus on Napster and other file sharing networks originally discouraged major music companies from working with BigChampagne. In 2003, founder Eric Garland testified before the California State Senate that online file sharing was "fundamentally unstoppable." The Recording Industry Association of America
publicly criticized his remarks. Beginning in 2002, BigChampagne was involved in a lawsuit with a company called Webspins. Both companies alleged defamation and unfair business practices. The suit was settled out of court in 2003, but the terms of the settlement were not disclosed. Also in 2003, Altnet, a distribution partner of file sharing service Kazaa, sent legal threats to BigChampagne and eight other companies alleging patent infringement. BigChampagne was dropped from the list of targeted companies almost immediately.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation hoped to use the record industry's relationship with BigChampagne to defend file sharing networks like Kazaa
as they believed using the networks for market information constituted a non-infringing use of the networks. This defense proved unsuccessful.
Data provided by BigChampagne is used by major music companies to make decisions about signing artists and promoting music online and to radio stations and MTV
. Broadcasters use BigChampagne to help determine the list of songs performed on commercial radio and music television. Led Zeppelin
used BigChampagne to choose songs for a 2007 reunion "with good results." BigChampagne also collaborated with Radiohead
to assess the impact of the band's pay-what-you-wish album In Rainbows
.
In 2006, BigChampagne contributed data and analysis to Wired
editor-in-chief Chris Anderson and was featured in The New York Times
best-seller "The Long Tail: Why the Future Business is Selling Less of More"
.
BigChampagne's metrics and analysis are frequently cited by major media outlets including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal
, The Financial Times
, USA Today
, and National Public Radio (NPR). Founder Eric Garland is often listed among the most powerful executives in the music business.
, selling information "business-to-business," though some aspects of BigChampagne's data and analysis are available to the general public. The company's business model is similar to the Bloomberg Terminal
, Omniture
, or a number of Nielsen Company products and services, although public interfaces, both private and public are allegedly in the works.
BigChampagne charts the popularity of music most places where it is heard. Partners and customers include Clear Channel Communications
, Amazon
, Microsoft
, Mediabase
, MTV
, MySpace
, YouTube
, iTunes
, Last.FM
, AOL
, Napster
, and Real Rhapsody.
Partners and sources for data include retailers, online and traditional radio and television broadcasters (Clear Channel and Viacom
), major content companies (Universal Music Group
, Warner Music Group
), subscription services, social networks, and other venues where entertainment is enjoyed.
Billboard (magazine)
Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...
, Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
, and Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
, among others.
BigChampagne.com is a web site used primarily by entertainment industry professionals, major brands and their advertising agencies, and Wall Street analysts to access information about the popularity of music, film, and television as it is distributed and sold. BigChampagne's sources for data include retail accounts (point of sale), traditional radio and television broadcasters, internet radio broadcasters, internet on-demand streaming services, social networks and blogs, mobile device streaming and downloading services, as well as file sharing networks. BigChampagne's tagline is, "Now you know everything."
BigChampagne provides a number of services related to producing business intelligence
Business intelligence
Business intelligence mainly refers to computer-based techniques used in identifying, extracting, and analyzing business data, such as sales revenue by products and/or departments, or by associated costs and incomes....
(BI) and competitive intelligence
Competitive intelligence
A broad definition of competitive intelligence is the action of defining, gathering, analyzing, and distributing intelligence about products, customers, competitors and any aspect of the environment needed to support executives and managers in making strategic decisions for an organization.Key...
(CI) for users of the BigChampagne.com site: access to proprietary data, data management (integration and analysis), combined with web applications and other technologies for producing marketing recommendations. BigChampagne also provides consulting services.
BigChampagne was originally founded by co-founders Eric Garland, Adam Toll and Zachary Allison. The company's earliest service tracked the popularity of songs on the original Napster file-sharing service.
Co-founder Adam Toll has said that the company was named for a lyric in the Peter Tosh
Peter Tosh
Peter Tosh, born Winston Hubert McIntosh , was a Jamaican reggae musician who was a core member of the band The Wailers , and who afterward had a successful solo career as well as being a promoter of Rastafari.Peter Tosh was born in Grange Hill, Jamaica, an illegitimate child to a mother too young...
song "Downpressor Man": "You drink your big champagne and laugh."
BigChampagne is based in Beverly Hills, CA with offices in Atlanta, GA. The company was funded entirely by the founders, without outside capital. Musician Glen Phillips
Glen Phillips
Glen Phillips is a songwriter, lyricist, singer and guitarist. He is best known as the singer and songwriter of 1990s alternative rock group Toad the Wet Sprocket.-Personal life:...
was an early adviser and supporter of the company.
BigChampagne has courted some controversy. The company's early focus on Napster and other file sharing networks originally discouraged major music companies from working with BigChampagne. In 2003, founder Eric Garland testified before the California State Senate that online file sharing was "fundamentally unstoppable." The Recording Industry Association of America
Recording Industry Association of America
The Recording Industry Association of America is a trade organization that represents the recording industry distributors in the United States...
publicly criticized his remarks. Beginning in 2002, BigChampagne was involved in a lawsuit with a company called Webspins. Both companies alleged defamation and unfair business practices. The suit was settled out of court in 2003, but the terms of the settlement were not disclosed. Also in 2003, Altnet, a distribution partner of file sharing service Kazaa, sent legal threats to BigChampagne and eight other companies alleging patent infringement. BigChampagne was dropped from the list of targeted companies almost immediately.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation hoped to use the record industry's relationship with BigChampagne to defend file sharing networks like Kazaa
Kazaa
Kazaa Media Desktop started as a peer-to-peer file sharing application using the FastTrack protocol licensed by Joltid Ltd. and operated as Kazaa by Sharman Networks...
as they believed using the networks for market information constituted a non-infringing use of the networks. This defense proved unsuccessful.
Data provided by BigChampagne is used by major music companies to make decisions about signing artists and promoting music online and to radio stations and MTV
MTV
MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....
. Broadcasters use BigChampagne to help determine the list of songs performed on commercial radio and music television. Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin were an English rock band, active in the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s. Formed in 1968, they consisted of guitarist Jimmy Page, singer Robert Plant, bassist/keyboardist John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham...
used BigChampagne to choose songs for a 2007 reunion "with good results." BigChampagne also collaborated with Radiohead
Radiohead
Radiohead are an English rock band from Abingdon, Oxfordshire, formed in 1985. The band consists of Thom Yorke , Jonny Greenwood , Ed O'Brien , Colin Greenwood and Phil Selway .Radiohead released their debut single "Creep" in 1992...
to assess the impact of the band's pay-what-you-wish album In Rainbows
In Rainbows
In Rainbows is the seventh studio album by the English rock band Radiohead. It was first released on 10 October 2007 as a digital download self-released, that customers could order for whatever price they saw fit, followed by a standard CD release in most countries during the last week of 2007. The...
.
In 2006, BigChampagne contributed data and analysis to Wired
Wired (magazine)
Wired is a full-color monthly American magazine and on-line periodical, published since January 1993, that reports on how new and developing technology affects culture, the economy, and politics...
editor-in-chief Chris Anderson and was featured in The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
best-seller "The Long Tail: Why the Future Business is Selling Less of More"
Long tail
Long tail may refer to:*The Long Tail, a consumer demographic in business*Power law's long tail, a statistics term describing certain kinds of distribution*Long-tail boat, a type of watercraft native to Southeast Asia...
.
BigChampagne's metrics and analysis are frequently cited by major media outlets including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the Journal....
, The Financial Times
Financial Times
The Financial Times is an international business newspaper. It is a morning daily newspaper published in London and printed in 24 cities around the world. Its primary rival is the Wall Street Journal, published in New York City....
, USA Today
USA Today
USA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...
, and National Public Radio (NPR). Founder Eric Garland is often listed among the most powerful executives in the music business.
Business model
BigChampagne generates revenues through a combination of data subscription fees, syndication fees, and consulting fees. The company is primarily a "B2B"Business-to-business
Business-to-business describes commerce transactions between businesses, such as between a manufacturer and a wholesaler, or between a wholesaler and a retailer...
, selling information "business-to-business," though some aspects of BigChampagne's data and analysis are available to the general public. The company's business model is similar to the Bloomberg Terminal
Bloomberg Terminal
The Bloomberg Terminal is a computer system provided by Bloomberg L.P. that enables financial professionals to access the Bloomberg Professional service through which users can monitor and analyze real-time financial market data movements and place trades on the electronic trading platform...
, Omniture
Omniture
Omniture is an online marketing and web analytics business unit owned by Adobe Systems. The Omniture Business Unit is based in Orem, Utah, with offices worldwide. It serves customers in 75 countries worldwide.- History :...
, or a number of Nielsen Company products and services, although public interfaces, both private and public are allegedly in the works.
BC Dash
BigChampagne's BC Dash is a software platform for integrating, analyzing, and reporting information about the sale, broadcast and consumption of popular entertainment media.BigChampagne charts the popularity of music most places where it is heard. Partners and customers include Clear Channel Communications
Clear Channel Communications
Clear Channel Communications, Inc. is an American media conglomerate company headquartered in San Antonio, Texas. It was founded in 1972 by Lowry Mays and Red McCombs, and was taken private by Bain Capital LLC and Thomas H. Lee Partners LP in a leveraged buyout in 2008...
, Amazon
Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc. is a multinational electronic commerce company headquartered in Seattle, Washington, United States. It is the world's largest online retailer. Amazon has separate websites for the following countries: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Japan, and...
, Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
, Mediabase
Mediabase
Mediabase is a music industry service that monitors radio station airplay in 180 US and Canadian markets. Mediabase publishes music charts and data based on the most played songs on terrestrial and satellite radio, and provides in-depth analytical tools for radio and record industry professionals...
, MTV
MTV
MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....
, MySpace
MySpace
Myspace is a social networking service owned by Specific Media LLC and pop star Justin Timberlake. Myspace launched in August 2003 and is headquartered in Beverly Hills, California. In August 2011, Myspace had 33.1 million unique U.S. visitors....
, YouTube
YouTube
YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....
, iTunes
ITunes
iTunes is a media player computer program, used for playing, downloading, and organizing digital music and video files on desktop computers. It can also manage contents on iPod, iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad....
, Last.FM
Last.fm
Last.fm is a music website, founded in the United Kingdom in 2002. It has claimed 30 million active users in March 2009. On 30 May 2007, CBS Interactive acquired Last.fm for UK£140m ....
, AOL
AOL
AOL Inc. is an American global Internet services and media company. AOL is headquartered at 770 Broadway in New York. Founded in 1983 as Control Video Corporation, it has franchised its services to companies in several nations around the world or set up international versions of its services...
, Napster
Napster
Napster is an online music store and a Best Buy company. It was originally founded as a pioneering peer-to-peer file sharing Internet service that emphasized sharing audio files that were typically digitally encoded music as MP3 format files...
, and Real Rhapsody.
Partners and sources for data include retailers, online and traditional radio and television broadcasters (Clear Channel and Viacom
Viacom
Viacom Inc. , short for "Video & Audio Communications", is an American media conglomerate with interests primarily in, but not limited to, cinema and cable television...
), major content companies (Universal Music Group
Universal Music Group
Universal Music Group is an American music group, the largest of the "big four" record companies by its commanding market share and its multitude of global operations...
, Warner Music Group
Warner Music Group
Warner Music Group is the third largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry, making it one of the big four record companies...
), subscription services, social networks, and other venues where entertainment is enjoyed.
BC Breaking News
BC Breaking News is a music industry news aggregator. Syndicating live content from mainstream media, trade magazines, Twitter and leading industry bloggers. Breaking News offers a real-time look at these sources in a magazine-style interface.BC TweetStream
BC TweetStream is a BigChampagne-curated slice of the larger Twitter conversation. TweetStream aggregates and editorially filters dispatches from BC Breaking News sources.Blog
The company maintains a blog focused on company news, press releases, and some broader entertainment industry news and analysis.External links
- BigChampagne Homepage
- BC Dash
- BC TweetStream
- BC Breaking News
- BigChampagne Company Blog
- BigChampagne on Twitter
Further reading
- Mantis, Amy Big Champagne: The Meaning of Success, Music Business Journal.