Jobs named king of Web music by Blender

Apple CEO Steve Jobs was crowned the king of the online music revolution by U.S. music magazine Blender, just ahead of MySpace co-founders Tom Anderson and Chris DeWolfe (both whom who were ranked No. 2). The Apple co-founder was at the top of the magazine's "Powergeek" list of the 25 most influential people in Web music, which was compiled to show the behind-scenes-players reshaping the way people listen to, buy and watch music. Calling him a technology trendsetter, Blender's editor-in-chief said that the music industry influencers are shifting from the traditional music executies to technology experts, bloggers, and other types of industry leaders.

Universal Music Group chairman/CEO Doug Morris was the only person from the traditional music industry named in among top 10; Morris was recognized for his leadership changing digital royalty and licensing policy, although rival music label EMI started a DRM-free revolution earlier this year by offering DRM-free digital music via Apple's iTunes.

"Music fans spend much of their day, if not their life, sitting in front of their computer, discovering and downloading music," Blender's EIC Craig Marks said in a statement obtained by Reuters. "Today's power brokers no longer work in the steel-and-glass towers of the traditional record business; instead, they're tech geeks, bedroom bloggers and Silicon Valley visionaries."

Marks also said that the iTunes Store and the iPod have done more to change the way people listen to music than "anything since the CD, and maybe since the sound recording."

YouTube creators Chad Hurley and Steve Chen were No. 3, according to the list. Blender said that the immensely popular video file sharing site, now owned by Google, has become "the star-maker MTV used to be." Universal's Morris was No. 4, while Web magazine Pitchfork's Ryan Schreiber was No. 5 and Yahoo Music's Ian Rogers was No. 6. The founders the music community site Last.FM were ranked No. 7 and LimeWire's Greg Bildson was No. 8.

Filed under: industry
Other story tags: digital music/video