Siren Systems Signs First Agreements to Offer Music Discovery, Community Services to CDBaby, 1600 Radio Station Clients of MediaSpan

Siren Systems Signs First Agreements to Offer Music Discovery, Community Services to CDBaby, 1600 Radio Station Clients of MediaSpan Friendster Founder Jonathan Abrams Joins Siren Board of Advisors Partnership with CD Baby Creates Innovative Marketing and Distribution Service for Independent Artists Partnership with MediaSpan Offers Community Development and Music Commerce to Nationwide Radio Station Network SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 7 /PRNewswire/ -- Siren Systems, Inc., creator of the world's most accurate song-level music recommendation technology and the first online community technology for music destinations, today announced it has signed agreements that will allow it to offer its services to CDBaby and the 1,600 radio stations serviced by MediaSpan Group. In addition, the company said today that Jonathan Abrams, founder and Chairman of Friendster, will join its advisory board. Siren Systems' Soundflavor(TM) song-level recommendation, search, and navigation engine can be licensed by any music and community destination sites. The Soundflavor engine introduces undiscovered music to an audience most likely to appreciate it, creates unique communities around eclectic interests, offers a cost-effective marketing channel for independent artists and labels, and provides licensing partners with a ready-made solution to drive new revenue and create unique user experiences around music. -- Siren Systems today launched its "Get Found!" program, a first-of-its-kind marketing and distribution package for independent artists and labels. Created in partnership with CD Baby, the premier distributor of independent music, Get Found! bundles Siren Systems' ability to market songs directly to individual music consumers, based on their unique tastes, with CD Baby's artist-friendly physical and digital distribution services. -- Siren Systems' technology will be distributed through MediaSpan Group, the leading provider of integrated on-air/online Internet and new media products for broadcasters, to create and foster community, as well as drive incremental revenue around digital music, across a network of over 1,600 radio station websites. -- Siren Systems announced today that Friendster Chairman and Founder Jonathan Abrams, has joined the company's board of advisors. The music industry has succeeded in moving many of its CD catalogs online. However, in an age where music is sold as individual songs, and with millions of tracks now available online, the industry faces a significant challenge: how can music best be organized, packaged, and marketed for discovery by consumers, each with specific tastes? Developed over five years of extensive research and development, Siren Systems' Soundflavor engine is the only technology which combines highly accurate, song-level advanced search, navigation, and personalized recommendations in one package. The Soundflavor engine enables music stores, subscription services, and community sites to help their users discover music they love -- from the obscure to the overexposed -- and develop community with people who share their personal, eclectic tastes. "To date, music providers have applied physical-world analogies to organizing, marketing and selling songs online, but these approaches -- such as categorizing by genre and recommending by artist -- are inefficient in the world of digital music," said Steve Skrzyniarz, CEO of Siren Systems. "Digital music consumers want the convenience of accurate, personalized help in finding the songs, or playlists, which fit their highly individual tastes. We believe that our Soundflavor technology will radically transform the way music is discovered and purchased, for the benefit of consumers, artists, and the industry as a whole." Siren Systems' technology marries objective and unbiased metadata, artificial intelligence, and listener ratings to yield unparalleled accuracy. The patent-pending technology filters on hundreds of objective measures, from simple attributes such as tempo, year, and genre to a complex set of deeper attributes, such as an analysis of the role of each instrument in the song, and extensive lyrical qualities. This means that songs from emerging artists or the back catalog are as likely to show up as the Top 40. The company's Soundflavor engine combines objective qualities at the song level with "color commentary" based on the ratings of people a user trusts to yield a personal relevancy ranked list of songs for each end-user. "Music is both a personal and a communal activity -- people are very interested in what their friends are listening to," said Jonathan Abrams, Friendster founder and Siren Systems advisor. "Soundflavor technology enables this dynamic in online communities, allowing people to find new music based on both their personal taste and the opinions of their friends, express themselves with playlists, exchange playlists with one another, and find new friends in the process. There couldn't be a more natural way for communities of people to discover and share music." Get Found! Program Partners Siren Systems with CD Baby Today, Siren Systems announced its Get Found! program, which bundles the marketing of any artist's music through the Soundflavor recommendation engine, with physical and digital distribution through CD Baby, the largest seller of independent CD's on the web. "Independent musicians have historically faced huge challenges in finding an audience," said Derek Sivers, founder of CD Baby. "The Get Found! program combines CD Baby's fair, artist-friendly distribution services with Soundflavor's unique ability to recommend songs directly to the right listeners. The combination of our two services creates a powerful, cost-effective marketing channel for independent artists, labels, managers, and promoters." For $49.95, independent artists and labels may list up to five songs from any CD in the Soundflavor engine, and receive physical and online distribution plus a custom marketing page and two-minute clips of their songs on CD Baby. Artists with CD's already carried by CD Baby may list up to five songs in the Soundflavor engine for $24.95. Siren Systems and MediaSpan In a deal announced today, MediaSpan's First MediaWorks Division, the leading provider of integrated on-air/online Internet and new media products for broadcasters, will make the Soundflavor web platform available to its network of over 1,600 radio station websites. "We're seeing the emergence of an increasingly individualized media consumer," said F.R. (Frank) Campagnoni, CEO of MediaSpan Group. "Using Soundflavor technology, we plan to empower our radio station customers to offer music personalization, community and commerce features to their traditional broadcast audiences via their websites, to increase revenues and listener retention. Furthermore, Get Found! gives our radio station customers the opportunity to promote local, independent artists through their web sites." About CD Baby CD Baby handles online sales and distribution for independent artists and labels. Founder and musician Derek Sivers was selling his own CD online in 1998, and as a hobby offered to let a few friends use his system. Friends told friends and now over 75,000 artists sell their music through CD Baby, making it the largest seller of independent music on the web. CD Baby has sold over one million CDs to customers worldwide, and paid over $10 million directly to the musicians. CD Baby's Digital Distribution program has deals with all major digital outlets such as Apple iTunes, MSN Music, Rhapsody, Napster, and Sony Connect, making CD Baby one of the leaders in the aggregation of digital content. For more information, visit www.cdbaby.com. About MediaSpan Serving more than 4,500 media customers worldwide, MediaSpan Group, Inc. is a diversified media technology company delivering solutions that bridge offline and online business functions for traditional media companies. MediaSpan's First MediaWorks Division is the broadcast industry's leading provider of integrated Internet marketing products, website development and listener preference survey tools. The Division has a blue chip customer base of more than 1,600 broadcast properties worldwide including Infinity Radio, Citadel, ABC Radio Networks, Entercom, Radio One and the Armed Forces Radio Networks. First MediaWorks is well known in the Radio industry for its highly sophisticated, yet easy-to-use Web site development and management systems, online site and content editing technology, database development, and email-based marketing programs. More information can be found at www.firstmediaworks.com. About Siren Systems Siren Systems has spent several years perfecting its Soundflavor engine, the world's most advanced song-level search, navigation, and recommendation technology. Soundflavor marries objective (and unbiased) metadata, artificial intelligence, and listener ratings to yield unparalleled accuracy. The Soundflavor engine helps consumers discover, sample, and purchase music as playlists by suggesting songs or playlists which match their unique tastes in music. Soundflavor enables community around music commerce through playlist sharing, recommending people with similar tastes, and influencing recommendations based on trusted friends. Independent artists will find their music recommended alongside (or above) major recording artists. Labels can find markets for new artists and back catalog content. Music providers can direct customers with distinct tastes to songs they'll truly appreciate. More information can be found at www.sirensystems.com, or visit the company's demo web site at www.soundflavor.com. Web site: http://www.sirensystems.com Source: Siren Systems, Inc. CONTACT: Amy Janzen, +1-866-262-7373, ext. 104, or amy@sutherlandgold.com, for Siren Systems Web site: http://www.cdbaby.com/ Web site: http://www.firstmediaworks.com/ Web site: http://www.soundflavor.com/ ------- Profile: International Entertainment