Twitter Inks Deal With Startup to Unearth Future Music Stars

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Image: Mashable composite, images via iStockphoto, yewkeo

By Brian Anthony Hernandez2014-02-02 18:26:35 UTC

Twitter will begin opening up its public and private music data to 300 Entertainment, a startup that plans to analyze the information to pinpoint emerging artists, and help record labels, brands and musicians understand it all.

"Music is the largest topic of conversation on Twitter, so we're really invested in building a win-win environment for fans, artists, labels, promoters and music services," Bob Moz, Twitter's head of music, told Mashable. "This partnership is a great example because it is about helping artists and labels find each other. We're looking forward to working with [300 Entertainment head Lyor Cohen's] team in the coming months, and we hope they find great artists to sign as a result."

See also: 8 Ways to Discover Your New Favorite Band Online

The music-discovery approach sounds similar to what Twitter #Music, the mobile app and desktop service, set out to do when it launched to much fanfare in April 2013. Although rumors of its demise ran rampant because of its lack of popularity, the service is still available.

300 Entertainment shared the news on Twitter after the deal was announced Sunday at the Midem music conference and festival in France.

Little is known about 300 Entertainment, but The New York Times reported the company "signs artists for recorded music, publishing and other deals," and is lead by Lyor Cohen, "one of music’s biggest power brokers."

It appears that aside from helping Twitter and consumers unearth emerging artists by scouring data for trends, 300 Entertainment could take Twitter's discovery ambitions to the next level by helping those artists navigate the music industry.

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Topics: Entertainment, Music, music discovery, Startups, Twitter, Twitter Music