TastemakerX is a new music discovery app that allows users to develop an influence score, building a follower base based on music tastes, social graphs and finding the right bands at the right times; CEO Marc Ruxin called it "fantasy sports for music lovers." Elsewhere, CDs remain a valuable commodity, while consumer confidence rose but still lags far behind.

The short films and Midnighters sections of SXSW Film were announced today, with short films on TV on the Radio and a Chopin piano competition will screen, as will music videos from Battles, OK Go, Cults and Gotye.

The Concord Music Group/Hear Music catalog of Paul McCartney was ordered removed from subscription services, affecting some of his recent solo albums, as well as a slew of older releases by McCartney and Wings that were reissued in 2010.

iLike, an online service for sharing and discovering music that was one of digital music’s most exciting startups, is officially dead. Visits to the iLike.com URL are being redirected to a MySpace page with a notice about iLike’s demise.

AT&T and Samsung Telecommunications America (Samsung Mobile) has inked a sponsorship pact with hot fashion brand rag & bone for the U.S. launch of Samsung’s new device, the Samsung Galaxy Note. Band Of Horses will perform the launch party in New York during fashion week,

The first ever live stream of the Super Bowl drew 2.1 million unique viewers, which according to NBC made it the most-watched single-game sports event online.

Vevo made headlines last week when the video service announced it had generated $150 million in revenue in 2011. A week later some independent music publishers are saying it’s time they got their share. Also, Flingo plans to use the $7 million it has raised in Series A funding from August Capital to build out the infrastructure for its automatic content recognition technology. And comedian Louis CK proves that young People will pay for content through his recent video offering.  

With her second studio album set for this April, hip-hop diva Nicki Minaj has announced a wave of news, including her next single, Grammy plans, and a performance at the 2012 NBA All-Star Game.

The Guild Of Music Supervisors will hand out awards in nine different categories at a brunch prior to the Grammy Awards, honoring music supervisors for film, television and games.

The subscription service's Android app has finally caught up with its iPhone one, adding a new home screen and the ability to view new releases and top charts with just one touch.

ReDigi, an upstart digital company that sells "used" digital music, has announced that it has successfully fended off the recording industry's motion for a preliminary injunction.

Phone company Verizon Communications Inc. will challenge Netflix and start a video streaming service this year with Redbox and its DVD rental kiosks.

Fresh of her halftime performance at Super Bowl XLVI comes details of the Madonna 2012 World Tour. The trek will begin May 29 in Tel Aviv, Israel, and will be her most extensive tour ever in terms of number of dates, according to Arthur Fogel, CEO of Live Nation Global Touring, worldwide producers of the tour. The tour will take Madonna to Australia for the first time in 20 years, as well as many markets she has never played before.

Music-tagging app Shazam said that its experiment in audio tagging led to "record engagement" during the Super Bowl, when it encouraged fans to tag songs heard during advertisements and the halftime show

File-sharing site BTJunkie shut down of its own accord, following in the footsteps of FileSonic and FileServe in willingly removing itself from the fray in the wake of the highly-publicized Megaupload and Pitate Bay legal actions. Elsewhere, the death of SOPA leads to even more questions about Internet law, and Google+ keeps growing but still lags behind.

The Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville played host to the launch of Artist Growth, a suite of cloud-based artist management tools for web and mobile. The launch brought out stars from Vince Gill and Steve Winwood to Artist Growth CEO Matt Urmy and Nashville Mayor Karl Dean.

The country star is second to only Eddy Arnold, who posted 92 top 10 country songs between the years 1945-1980. Strait has sent at least one song to the top 10 every year since 1981.

After only three days in release, "Luvin'" has sold over 100,000 downloads in the U.S., while her "Celebration" greatest hits album sold between 13,000-14,000 download copies (up from a couple hundred units the week previous).

Madonna’s performance during halftime of the Super Bowl produced 10,245 tweets per second, one of the busiest moments in Twitter history. The halftime performance topped recent events regarded for their online reaction.

According to BrandBowl, the marketers with the top scores in volume and favorability were Doritos, H&M and Chrysler, with Pepsi and Chevrolet finishing close behind, while music recognition app Shazam saw record engagement during the game.