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Post by galvanize on Feb 17, 2010 21:40:51 GMT -5
I think this means that now the Billboard R&B chart won't look as identical to the R&B/Hip Hop airplay chart.  New Charts, Policy Change February 17, 2010 - Retail By Billboard staff Nielsen Soundscan is launching new digital song genre charts, most of which will soon become part of the Billboard chart menu in print and on Billboard.biz. Billboard's chart managers will oversee the digital genre charts, which includes reviewing tracks, assigning appropriate genres, and designating one overall core genre per song. A song may fit many genres, but will only be counted under one core genre. The song core genres are blues, comedy, jazz, R&B/hip-hop, children, country, Latin, rock, Christian/gospel, dance/electronic, new age, world music, classical, holiday/seasonal and pop. The song genres are blues, children, Christian/gospel, Christian, gospel, classical, comedy, country, dance/electronic, holiday/seasonal, jazz, Latin, Lain pop, Latin rhythm, regional Mexican, tropical, new age, pop, R&B/hip-hop, rap, reggae, rock and world music. POLICY CHANGE Additionally, to ensure standardized Nielsen SoundScan reporting cycles and equitable Billboard charting periods, Nielsen SoundScan and Billboard will no longer hold sales that occurred in a normal retailer's tracking week for inclusion in a subsequent week. This policy will go into effect immediately. The Nielsen SoundScan and Billboard reporting week will continue to be based on a Monday-Sunday reporting cycle, with the understanding that some retailers operate under a Sunday-Saturday sales week. Please feel free to reach out to director of charts Silvio Pietroluongo with any comments and questions regarding the newly launched digital song genre charts or the announced policy change. He can be reached at silvio@billboard.com. |
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tshawn74
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Post by tshawn74 on Feb 18, 2010 11:58:47 GMT -5
I think this means that now the Billboard R&B chart won't look as identical to the R&B/Hip Hop airplay chart. New Charts, Policy Change February 17, 2010 - Retail By Billboard staff Nielsen Soundscan is launching new digital song genre charts, most of which will soon become part of the Billboard chart menu in print and on Billboard.biz. Billboard's chart managers will oversee the digital genre charts, which includes reviewing tracks, assigning appropriate genres, and designating one overall core genre per song. A song may fit many genres, but will only be counted under one core genre. The song core genres are blues, comedy, jazz, R&B/hip-hop, children, country, Latin, rock, Christian/gospel, dance/electronic, new age, world music, classical, holiday/seasonal and pop. The song genres are blues, children, Christian/gospel, Christian, gospel, classical, comedy, country, dance/electronic, holiday/seasonal, jazz, Latin, Lain pop, Latin rhythm, regional Mexican, tropical, new age, pop, R&B/hip-hop, rap, reggae, rock and world music. POLICY CHANGE Additionally, to ensure standardized Nielsen SoundScan reporting cycles and equitable Billboard charting periods, Nielsen SoundScan and Billboard will no longer hold sales that occurred in a normal retailer's tracking week for inclusion in a subsequent week. This policy will go into effect immediately. The Nielsen SoundScan and Billboard reporting week will continue to be based on a Monday-Sunday reporting cycle, with the understanding that some retailers operate under a Sunday-Saturday sales week. Please feel free to reach out to director of charts Silvio Pietroluongo with any comments and questions regarding the newly launched digital song genre charts or the announced policy change. He can be reached at silvio@billboard.com. It's about time. This is long overdue. |
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Post by areyoureadytojump on Feb 18, 2010 12:16:22 GMT -5
^Why quote the entire artcile when it's right above your post? SMH
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hitseeker.
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Post by hitseeker. on Feb 18, 2010 14:06:54 GMT -5
^what does "SMH" stand for?  |
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renfield75
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Post by renfield75 on Feb 18, 2010 16:14:26 GMT -5
Hopefully this means downloads will be factored into the main R&B and Country charts. Both genres sell strongly enough that it looks bad to not have digital sales represented on those charts at all.
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Post by neverduplicated on Feb 18, 2010 16:53:07 GMT -5
I know when physical singles were popular, singles bought in stores that mainly sell R&B and hip hop music would count towards the chart, but under this new system, are they going to make it to where every sale for a song classified as R&B will count on the R&B chart? Seems like it could lead to confusion because sometimes songs on Itunes aren't really labeled under the appropriate genre. Sorry if that question sounded confusing.
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jebsib
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Post by jebsib on Feb 18, 2010 20:09:18 GMT -5
I know when physical singles were popular, singles bought in stores that mainly sell R&B and hip hop music would count towards the chart, but under this new system, are they going to make it to where every sale for a song classified as R&B will count on the R&B chart? Seems like it could lead to confusion because sometimes songs on Itunes aren't really labeled under the appropriate genre. Sorry if that question sounded confusing. Never understood this policy. Isn't this what happened with the recent 50 Cent release? Like sales from "week A" were not counted till "week B". WHY on Earth?!? |
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jebsib
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Post by jebsib on Feb 18, 2010 20:13:41 GMT -5
This will be very interesting if they use it on the country chart. R&B not so much, as Hot R&B/Hip Hop Songs blends mainstream/ adult & r&b Sales.
But the country chart has been airplay-only for so many years (almost 20) that a change to include digital sales would be very jarring and would probably turn off a whole bunch of PDs who currently use BB.
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Post by galvanize on Feb 18, 2010 20:30:13 GMT -5
No, I'm sure the country chart also included physical sales in its methodology. I remember Leann Rimes' "How Do I Live" charting high on country for multiple weeks just because the physical single was selling in massive quantities - the Trisha Yearwood version of the track got all the country airplay instead.
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renfield75
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Post by renfield75 on Feb 18, 2010 21:08:22 GMT -5
No, I'm sure the country chart also included physical sales in its methodology. I remember Leann Rimes' "How Do I Live" charting high on country for multiple weeks just because the physical single was selling in massive quantities - the Trisha Yearwood version of the track got all the country airplay instead. No, LeAnn's version only reached no. 43 on the country chart based on scant airplay (as you noted, Trisha Yearwood's version was the country radio champ). Had sales been factored in, LeAnn's version would have been top ten on the country chart. |
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Post by galvanize on Feb 18, 2010 21:13:25 GMT -5
Sorry, my mistake. I know there's a Country Singles Sales chart and "How Do I Live" spent like 30 something weeks at #1 which is where I made my assumption from.  |
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jebsib
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Post by jebsib on Feb 18, 2010 21:41:06 GMT -5
Country used to include sales, but phased them out in the late 80s when retail country singles disappeared
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Post by galvanize on Feb 18, 2010 21:44:18 GMT -5
Country used to include sales, but phased them out in the late 80s when retail country singles disappeared Which is surprising because I thought that those like Faith Hill & Shania Twain released them on a regular basis. Maybe it was more during the late '90s when that became more of the norm afterwards. |
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Legoman
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Post by Legoman on Feb 18, 2010 22:31:13 GMT -5
^what does "SMH" stand for? uck My Huevos |
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Post by Adonis the DemiGod! on Feb 18, 2010 23:17:35 GMT -5
I actually don't like this move. Before BB had core R&B stores so they were more able to show what sales R&B radio was generating. Crossover tracks are going to have an unfair advantage and sales crossover songs have may be more likely to come from pop radio airplay will be more likely to chart higher on the R&B charts. It's simply going to be the Itunes top 1000 minus the tracks that aren't in the same genre. that doesn't do anyone any favors. There really is no way to track things like they were before with the brick and mortar stores. I think R&B and country should remain airplay based charts.
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Post by neverduplicated on Feb 19, 2010 5:17:12 GMT -5
I actually don't like this move. Before BB had core R&B stores so they were more able to show what sales R&B radio was generating. Crossover tracks are going to have an unfair advantage and sales crossover songs have may be more likely to come from pop radio airplay will be more likely to chart higher on the R&B charts. It's simply going to be the Itunes top 1000 minus the tracks that aren't in the same genre. that doesn't do anyone any favors. There really is no way to track things like they were before with the brick and mortar stores. I think R&B and country should remain airplay based charts. That's exactly what I was thinking. It seems unfair to me because this way a song can chart high on the R&B chart simply by being classified as R&B or a song can chart high on the country chart simply by being classified as country instead of reflecting what might actually be most popular with R&B and country listeners. Furthermore, some songs with crossover potential get labeled as "pop" when really they should be in another genre, and thus those songs could be hurt on the respective genre charts. It seems this way the genre charts are open to manipulation by leaving it up to the label to classify a song as they wish. |
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soundUPsceneDOWN
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Post by soundUPsceneDOWN on Feb 19, 2010 21:45:56 GMT -5
The article indicates that Billboard will be assigning core genre, so it seems the labels have no say. But I understand the argument against -- the pop chart is a cross-over haven, and most sales will be generated from Top 40 airplay since it's the largest format. Any R&B or country song that gets a cross-over hit on pop and gets classified as R&B or country, will rule the R&B or country chart, respectively, even if that song isn't necessarily doing well in its core genre.
No matter what, cross-overs are going to have the advantage under this system. But they already have the advantage on the Hot 100 and the digital charts anyway.
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Post by Adonis the DemiGod! on Feb 19, 2010 22:19:27 GMT -5
The article indicates that Billboard will be assigning core genre, so it seems the labels have no say. But I understand the argument against -- the pop chart is a cross-over haven, and most sales will be generated from Top 40 airplay since it's the largest format. Any R&B or country song that gets a cross-over hit on pop and gets classified as R&B or country, will rule the R&B or country chart, respectively, even if that song isn't necessarily doing well in its core genre. No matter what, cross-overs are going to have the advantage under this system. But they already have the advantage on the Hot 100 and the digital charts anyway. That's okay on the HOT 100 but not okay for the R&B chart. R&B and country charts should reflect what R&B and country listeners like. |
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Post by neverduplicated on Feb 20, 2010 7:47:59 GMT -5
I think it could be just as problematic for Billboard to assign a core genre to a song as the label assigning it. I think in most cases there won't be any contention over a song's genre, but for crossover hits, there's always the big debate over whether a song is country or pop, R&B or pop, R&B or rap, dance/electronic or pop.... For instance, would Lady Gaga's songs be counted as dance/electronic? If so she's going to be #1 on that chart pretty much forever. Or what about songs that have multiple versions? A pop song might have an R&B remix or a country song might have a pop remix.
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stetz
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Post by stetz on Feb 20, 2010 15:42:23 GMT -5
OF COURSE there's going to be only one chart for rock-ish bands haha. that'll be putting stuff like bright eyes with bring me the horizon. joy. also, if these genre based digital charts are counted towards the airplay-by-genre charts, then these new charts still will be heavily airplay based. if this didn't apply, then Boys Like Girls would be the number one song on Top Rock Songs. HAHA. so hopefully they'll only count like 20 or 30%.
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Alex
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Post by Alex on Feb 20, 2010 22:58:51 GMT -5
What are you guys whining about? The article says it will CREATE new genre-based digital songs. Britney will always be Pop, Trey Songz always R&B, and Snoop always Rap. Artists VERY rarely change genres.
The R&B Songs chart will not be affected. And who cares if Crossover songs are more successful on the charts? So I guess Billboard should only count songs downloaded by black people (equivalent to R&B mom-and-pop stores sales) and not include other races. You are RIDICULOUS!!!
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Post by radicaltheory on Feb 21, 2010 2:07:13 GMT -5
This is good news.
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Post by Adonis the DemiGod! on Feb 21, 2010 3:26:33 GMT -5
What are you guys whining about? The article says it will CREATE new genre-based digital songs. Britney will always be Pop, Trey Songz always R&B, and Snoop always Rap. Artists VERY rarely change genres. The R&B Songs chart will not be affected. And who cares if Crossover songs are more successful on the charts? So I guess Billboard should only count songs downloaded by black people (equivalent to R&B mom-and-pop stores sales) and not include other races. You are RIDICULOUS!!! It's better to ask questions when you don't comprehend something rather than flying off the handle. No one said anything about black people. Additionally, Billboard's old panel of Urban stores didn't just include mom and pop stores fyi. The R&B chart should reflect the sales that are generated by R&B radio not the sales that come as a result of pop radio or radio airplay at the other formats. Since there is no way to track this as it stands right now, they should just leave the genre specific charts as airplay only charts. If you were going add in these new genre based downloads charts in the way billboard has described, you might as well take the songs classified as R&B and just listen them in order of how many total cumulative points they earned at all formats and overall sales and call it the R&B chart. At least this way you wouldn't be comparing apples to oranges. You would be comparing oranges to oranges. This new method of doing things is not informative especially as it relates to helping Urban/R&B radio programmers build their playlists or for record companies to know what is popular in a given genre to help them plan their marketing and promotion. Billboard is for the industry not for everyday people. Urban music is whatever the urban music community listens to under the old and correct methodology. Now you are going to have someone randomly assigning genre's to a track. What happens if a song is labeled a pop song but gets urban airplay. Do we not include it's sales? I'd rather Billboard stay out of the business of classifying the music and let the radio programmers do their jobs that they are paid to do and play the songs their listeners like. |
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jebsib
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Post by jebsib on Feb 21, 2010 9:55:50 GMT -5
I'm not 100% behind this yet, but ...
Don't forget that Billboard has been doing this for an awfully long time, and their chart managers know what they are doing. No change - particularly the big ones - are done without agonizing and pain-staking talks with the major labels, radio programmers, etc (Does anyone remember how long it took BB to admit airplay-only songs to their big charts??? Not because the tech wasn't there, they just needed to make sure everyone IN THE INDUSTRY was comfortable with the changes).
These changes aren't for us. They aren't just for the radio industry. They are for the record labels who want to know how their genres are performing overall.
Look at the Top R&B albums chart. It no longer just selectively samples urban based retail stores - and the labels seemed to like that change.
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colson
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Post by colson on Feb 21, 2010 11:34:46 GMT -5
What are you guys whining about? The article says it will CREATE new genre-based digital songs. Britney will always be Pop, Trey Songz always R&B, and Snoop always Rap. Artists VERY rarely change genres. The R&B Songs chart will not be affected. And who cares if Crossover songs are more successful on the charts? So I guess Billboard should only count songs downloaded by black people (equivalent to R&B mom-and-pop stores sales) and not include other races. You are RIDICULOUS!!! It's better to ask questions when you don't comprehend something rather than flying off the handle. No one said anything about black people. Additionally, Billboard's old panel of Urban stores didn't just include mom and pop stores fyi. The R&B chart should reflect the sales that are generated by R&B radio not the sales that come as a result of pop radio or radio airplay at the other formats. Since there is no way to track this as it stands right now, they should just leave the genre specific charts as airplay only charts. If you were going add in these new genre based downloads charts in the way billboard has described, you might as well take the songs classified as R&B and just listen them in order of how many total cumulative points they earned at all formats and overall sales and call it the R&B chart. At least this way you wouldn't be comparing apples to oranges. You would be comparing oranges to oranges. This new method of doing things is not informative especially as it relates to helping Urban/R&B radio programmers build their playlists or for record companies to know what is popular in a given genre to help them plan their marketing and promotion. Billboard is for the industry not for everyday people. Urban music is whatever the urban music community listens to under the old and correct methodology. Now you are going to have someone randomly assigning genre's to a track. What happens if a song is labeled a pop song but gets urban airplay. Do we not include it's sales? I'd rather Billboard stay out of the business of classifying the music and let the radio programmers do their jobs that they are paid to do and play the songs their listeners like. Agreed |
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Post by Adonis the DemiGod! on Feb 22, 2010 0:44:46 GMT -5
I'm not 100% behind this yet, but ... Don't forget that Billboard has been doing this for an awfully long time, and their chart managers know what they are doing. No change - particularly the big ones - are done without agonizing and pain-staking talks with the major labels, radio programmers, etc (Does anyone remember how long it took BB to admit airplay-only songs to their big charts??? Not because the tech wasn't there, they just needed to make sure everyone IN THE INDUSTRY was comfortable with the changes). These changes aren't for us. They aren't just for the radio industry. They are for the record labels who want to know how their genres are performing overall. Look at the Top R&B albums chart. It no longer just selectively samples urban based retail stores - and the labels seemed to like that change. Here is what Silvio told me: This is my response: Thanks for responding to my emails. Had you all thought about taking the percentage of format airplay and then attributing a certain percentage of sales as a result of that format? So say 30% of a songs total airplay comes from the R&B/Urban radio format. Maybe then you could attribute 30% of the sales that it received to that format. Is the assumption that 30% of the songs total sales are the result of the R&B/Urban radio format a safe assumption to make? With this method songs that got some R&B airplay but were really more of a crossover hit or a bigger hit at another format would get an accurate amount of R&B/Urban sales based on that airplay. I am really excited to see what you all come up with in terms of the formula for the genre based charts. |
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jebsib
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Post by jebsib on Feb 22, 2010 14:20:31 GMT -5
Cool. Silvio's awesome.
Great emails, Adonis.
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Post by Adonis the DemiGod! on Feb 23, 2010 11:55:04 GMT -5
Thanks jebsib!
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Post by Deleted on Feb 23, 2010 14:57:35 GMT -5
Country digital songs for the week Feb 8 - 14
TW LW Artist Title TW Sales LW Sales
1 1 LADY ANTEBELLUM Need You Now 156,000 212,000
2 2 TAYLOR SWIFT Today Was A Fairytale 70,000 55,000
3 8 JOSH TURNER Why Don¡¦t We Just Dance 36,000 25,000
4 4 TAYLOR SWIFT You Belong With Me 31,000 39,000
5 5 CARRIE UNDERWOOD Cowboy Casanova 31,000 34,000
6 6 JASON ALDEAN The Truth 28,000 28,000
7 10 CARRIE UNDERWOOD Temporary Home 27,000 25,000
8 3 ZAC BROWN BAND Chicken Fried 24,000 41,000
9 14 BLAKE SHELTON FEAT. Hillbilly Bone 21,000 18,000
TRACE ADKINS
10 11 MIRANDA LAMBERT White Liar 21,000 22,000
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Post by Adonis the DemiGod! on Feb 23, 2010 15:12:49 GMT -5
^I can tell you right now that I already hate the change. They just took the highest selling songs that are labeled country songs and listed them in order despite the fact that a significant amount of the sales from the Taylor Swift song and the Lady Antebellum song were generated by pop radio airplay and not country airplay. How do you measure what's popular on country radio? Need U Now has already peaked at the country radio format.
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