Music Tech Startup News: Bre.ad, HumanFankind, TwitMusic, Audiosocket

Bre.ad url shortener is attempting to raise $4.3 million in investments. (click on image to enlarge)

HumanFankind artist donation site adds identifying info and shares endorsements.

TwitMusic gets a deep look from The Next Web's Asia editor.

Audiosocket adds MOFILM to its growing list of partners using MaaS: Storefront.

DETAILS:

Bre.ad Raises Money

Bre.ad hit Hypebot's radar last summer when Troy Carter, Lady Gaga's manager, was getting some media attention for his involvement with Backplane. Bre.ad is a promotional url shortener that inserts a brief ad between clicking on the link and taking you to your destination.

I had some doubts because it sounded rather annoying but they're now reporting a higher click-through rate than other forms of web advertising. It's also been revealed that they are "raising a $4.3 million round of which $3.3 million has already been secured." So much for my doubts!

HumanFankind Develops Site

HumanFankind is a web service focused around accepting and passing on donations to musicians from their fans. In a review of HumanFankind I raised some questions about the fact that they did not have any identifying info on the site and that such information was needed in order to help establish credibility.

I recently heard from founder Justin Silverman who shared the news that he had responded to my suggestions with such changes to the site as the addition of a mailing address to the contact page where one also finds a link to a downloadable media kit. The media kit contains more information about Silverman and why he started the site along with additional contact info.

HumanFankind has also added some endorsements from artists to their FAQ thanking the site's users for their contributions and linking to the tweet or Facebook post. Definitely a positive step forward for a unique service.

TwitMusic Gets Profiled

TwitMusic is a musician-focused site that supports promoting music on Twitter. I discussed it briefly last month as part of a roundup of Twitter-related music marketing tools.

This week they received an extended review on The Next Web, one of the longest I've ever seen on a tech blog. TNW's Jon Russell spoke with one of the cofounders and dug into the details of how the site works, shared some stats and discussed future plans.

Audiosocket Adds a Partner

Audiosocket announced a partnership with Vimeo in October and the launch of MaaS: Storefront in December. Now the music licensing site for crowd use has teamed with MOFILM to offer indie music licensing for film, TV and new media projects.

MOFILM's "global community of filmmakers that create ads for today's top brands" will have access to Audiosocket's catalog of "37,000 songs that come from more than 2,200 artists."

Hypebot Features Writer Clyde Smith maintains his business writing hub at Flux Research and blogs about dance at All World Dance. To suggest topics for Hypebot, contact: clyde(at)fluxresearch(dot)com.