Steve Gottlieb

In order to bring Television’s Greatest Hits to the marketplace, Gottlieb employed a unique business strategy: he bypassed both major label distributors and independent distributors, and in the process, created what became one of the world's most successful self-distributed record labels. With its own proprietary distribution network, Television's Greatest Hits became one of the highest charting and biggest selling independent label releases of 1985. It was available in retail outlets across America—including all major chain stores—and was sold directly to consumers via t.v. commercials and mail order. The San Francisco Chronicle called the double album "the most fun you can have with your pants on", and The New York Times said that it was one of the most innovative business ideas of 1985. Over the next 20 years, a series of 12 volumes of Television's Greatest Hits were released, chronicling the history of the TV theme genre from its beginnings in the 1950s through the early 21st century.

Shindig launched a beta release of its platform for video chat book tours in May 2012. By August of the same year, the company had hosted over 150 events for such best-selling authors as A.J. Jacobs, Dan Ariely, Joel Stein, Scott Sigler, and James Howard Kunstler.

Beginning in September 2012, Shindig targeted music events, online nightclubs, magazine subscriber events, and interactive classroom applications as uses for its video chat platform technology.

Vice President of Engineering Manik Bambha, a former technology executive at MySpace and Fox Interactive Media, joined Shindig in 2011.

TVT Music Publishing was sold to Reservoir Media Management in 2010.

Steve Gottlieb is an American entrepreneur and music executive. He is founder and CEO of Shindig, a platform for large scale online video chat events. Prior to Shindig, Gottlieb founded the independent record label TVT Records and its publishing arm TVT Music, discovered the recording artists Nine Inch Nails, Pitbull, Sevendust, and Ja Rule, produced the "Television's Greatest Hits" series, helped to found the independent music organization A2IM, and served on the boards of Musicmatch (sold to Yahoo! in 2008), Napster, and Tune Up Media. He was the influence for the albino boy character in the film "Powder".

TVT Music Publishing's notable popular writers/producers included Scott Storch (ASCAP 2004 Songwriter of the Year) and Lil Jon (BMI 2005 Songwriter of the Year).

In 2001, Gottlieb appeared as a witness—along with Don Henley, Alanis Morissette, Jack Valenti, Richard Parsons, and other noted entertainment industry figures—before the Senate Judiciary Committee at a hearing entitled "Online Entertainment And Copyright Law: Coming Soon To A Digital Device Near You". He spoke about independent labels and changes in the music business resulting from the digital music revolution.

Gottlieb decided to leverage the distribution network that he had developed with "Television's Greatest Hits" by signing artists and building his label, which he renamed TVT Records. TVT would ultimately grow into one of the most successful independent labels in U.S. history, and was named independent label of the year by Billboard Magazine and Soundscan for 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, and 2005.

In the early 2000s, Gottlieb sought to place TVT at the forefront of the digital music revolution when he offered its library as free downloads and provided its repertoire to the leading digital music retailers, including Rhapsody, Liquid Audio, and Napster.

In 2000, assembled a team of leading independent label executives to establish a body that would represent the interests of independent music labels.

Gottlieb was selected in 1996 as one of the "40 Under Forty", a listing of leading New York executives, by Crain's New York Business. In 2001, he was featured in a commercial for Credit Suisse during the Super Bowl, where he was cited as a successful and visionary media/technology entrepreneur. Later in the year, he appeared as a witness before the Senate Judiciary Committee at a hearing titled "Online Entertainment And Copyright Law: Coming Soon To A Digital Device Near You". In 2005, he was named to the Hip Hop Power 30 by The Source magazine. In the same year, he delivered the keynote address at the In The City Urban Music Summit, which is the UK's top international music convention and Europe's largest city-based music festival.

Under Gottlieb's direction, TVT Music Publishing was begun in 1990. The goal of the company was to sign and develop the talents of new songwriters and place their compositions with viable artists and labels for release.

In 1986, Gottlieb produced Television's Greatest Hits, which he released on his own label Tee Vee Toons. The double album featured a collection of 65 themes from hit TV shows of the 1950s and 1960s in their original arrangements, production styles, and lengths, including The Flintstones, I Love Lucy, Star Trek, Hawaii Five-0, Bonanza, and Batman.