1113 FROM 'MR. 305' TO MR. WORLDWIDE, MIAMI'S PITBULL -WITH A MOVEMENT THAT INCLUDES DR PEPPER, KODAK, RCA AND HIS OWN EVER -EVOLVING ARTISTIC VISION- HAS THE GLOBE BY THE TAIL Pitbull has learned valuable lessons from a number of artists. First Still, ask this MC -born 30 years ago as Armando Christian Perez in Florida to Cuban -immigrant par- there was Luther Campbell of 2 Live Crew, who initially pushed Pitbull ents -whom he's looking to for inspiration these days, and it's not a chart-topping producer or an arena -packing to flex his -voiced freestyle Miami rap radio. gruff skills on Then there rapper. It's Apple CEO Steve Jobs. was Lil Jon, the crunk king who gave Pitbull his first major feature, on "You have to be constantly outdoing yourself," Pitbull says via the phone from Paris, where he's knee -deep in the 2002 "Kings of Crunk" album, and produced his debut solo single, a round of promotion for his new album, `Planet Pit," 2004's "Culo." And one mustn't forget Italian beatmakers Nicola Fasano due June 21 from Mr. 305 /Polo Grounds /J. Following the City of Light, he was off to Germany and the Neth- and Pat Rich, whose song "75, Brazil Street" served as the basis for Pit- erlands. "That's what [Jobs] knew: He had the Mac, but then he did the iPod, then the iPhone and then the iPad. bull's 2009 global smash "I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)," which in There's always room for improvement" addition to selling 2.6 million copies in the United States (according to A self -described entrepreneur who says he envisions music paving the way toward his own marketing firm, Nielsen SoundScan) has racked up nearly 200 million plays on YouTube. Pitbull measures success the way multinational corpo- JUNE 25, 2011 I www.billboard.biz I 13 .