A VC - Latest Comments in Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

fredwilson — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 07:56:08 -0000

I was at a friend's house in brooklyn last night (of course it was brooklyn,
the coolest city in the US) and we were pulling vinyl out

Zappa, funkadelic, early elvis costello

It was a blast

Nothing like vinyl, that's for sure

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

jackson — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 18:23:59 -0000

Ages ago, seriously, a great while past, Fred detailed the future of how folks will enjoy music to me. I knew then that it would happen, and it seems he's going to be proven right......again.

Attention 30 to 50 year-olds; I 'll buy your vinyl...........well some of it, I'll pass on the Loggins and Messina.........

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

digitalshaman — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 20:21:04 -0000

Yes *authenticity* is the value ... Make the subject the object & the object the subject - people connect with great stories, narratives, SONG ... Trust is fungible with these services (yahoo music, MSN music, real's subscription services are great examples) - no trust & they quickly disappear for unknown reasons (fungibility) - what $2.99 for a ringtone & 99 cents for the MP3?

Great post - worth more than any $2.99 ringtone & certainly more than 2 cents! What is piracy anyway? Fair use? Value?

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

digitalshaman — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 20:14:15 -0000

I'm waiting for a model for measuring/valuing bandwidth as currency for this & other ventures - we lack currency that is equitable or consistentvwity the fact there is no bandwidth scarcity nor a shortage of music or talent ...

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

Hip Hop Beats — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 13:38:04 -0000

it is clearly Myspace ONLY kissing up to the major labels so they dont get sues etc. Undies got screwed even though the made Myspace. What does a indie need a major label for? at http://www.beatslocker.com I get my instrumentals and hip hop beats all produced by a producers that are making the hits for the major artists, I get the hip hop beats A&Red by important music a&R execs that still work with the majir artists and record labels.. all for a low price. Then I distribute thru ITunes... so the only thing left was promotion and marketing.. and thats where Mysoace could of been valuable but they blew it....

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

Taylor McKnight — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 10:14:45 -0000

Small world, Ben's my roommate!

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

johnmichale1 — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 02:43:07 -0000

Hey, so i just made a piczo site and it looks so awesome but it seemed that something was missing. Than I realized I should add some music so my friend recommended a really cool site.www.hypster.com. It's so quick and easy, anyone could do it! In a matter of minuets I had made a account and uploaded the music onto my music player, not only that but You can also edit your music player to match your site colours! And if you don't want to upload your own music, you can search on other user’s playlists and take any songs you want! It works for piczo, myspace; facebook, bebo etc. check it out! www.hypster.com

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

Rich C — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 19:18:58 -0000

I'm trying to figure out how they are going to make this work financially - let's assume they are paying less than the going rate per stream to the record companies - say they are paying $.005 per stream. That's still a $5 cpm and MySpace doesn't typically get a $5 cpm, but they seem to be refreshing ads every 20 seconds, so maybe 10 times in a 3+ minute song. Say their avg ecpm in this area of he site will be $1; that means 1 cent in advertising for song that is played through and cost them 1/2 a cent. Sure they have the expense of streaming and ad serving and maintaining the site, but they'll get some bounties from amazon and jamster and something from the adsense box. Of course, they had to pay a massive settlement to the record companies to get these deals done, but all in all, this could work.

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

bwc — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 18:01:33 -0000

It's nice to see steps in the right direction (as Fred mentioned, a free, comprehensive on-demand streaming service), especially from big players. I agree with you, however, that it's more than concept: it's execution. The MySpace Music homepage is atrocious (since MySpace is known for their great UI), the exclusion of indie labels and artists is disappointing, and I'd much prefer it if they focused on just letting me find whatever music I want to listen to and share rather than trying to portal me through advertisements/sponsored content. Eh.

Sites like HypeM, Last.fm, and Grooveshark (full disclosure: I work there) all offer fully-fledged content that isn't hindered by interests of major labels, music-oriented UI, and much easier ways to find music you want and playlist/share/discover.

Again, a step in the right direction, but so far the wrong product for the right problem.

-Ben

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

Alex R — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 16:49:24 -0000

Maybe it's just me, but I think the sounds is terrible... I'm only on a headset right now, but it sounds mono.

As much as I hate the interface and lack of social features, I'll stick with Rhapsody for quality of sound and quantity of songs.

However, if I need to send a cool song to a friend that doesn't have Rhapsody, I'll probably use MySpace.

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

Guest — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 16:33:39 -0000

I have no idea though, how this venture will make any money! The record labels get equity and they get ad revenue, and they get paid every time a song is played!

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

fredwilson — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 16:28:54 -0000

we like "way out there" here at avc. it stimulates the mind. thanks.

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

rah33ls — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 16:25:01 -0000

in my opinion all these services will ultimately fail. all these models assume that talent is scarce. this won't be the be the case.

on the periphery the hit model will continue to work at along the head, but this is only because music is inherently a social object - however, the return from aggregating attention will be tiny in the future. the good old days are gone. and the the industry will continue to shrink

what about taste makers then? - can they provide value? this is the REAL question. this is probably where most of the value will eventually MIGRATE to. but economic value will not be extracted through a traditional revenue model. taste is inherently linked to authenticity (esp good music)- this is inherently the antithesis of record labels (current taste makers) -

in my opinion music has for the first time the chance to become truly free and become once again (as it should be) ONLY a social byproduct of subculture counter culture movements (punk was one example). this is where the most exciting (valuable) music is created (socially authentic). not from current the majors and indie crop.

THE MUSIC FROM EACH SUCCESSIVE GENERATION HAS TO BE AUTHENTICALLY NEW - MOST IMPORTANTLY DESPISED BY THE PREVIOUS GENERATION :)

most music currently listened to by youth - parents could also enjoy in most cases - BY DEFINITION THIS IS NOT BE HAPPEN- the music that every successive generation of youth enjoys and relates to - must be despised by the previous :) this used to happen, but not so much anymore.

do these authentic counter culture movements suffer from scare resources? - not anymore. platforms are dirt cheap.

it comes down to authenticity and purpose (the only good sign of a social movement) - THIS IS ALREADY FREE. And talent is not a scarce resource anymore.

my $0.02

sorry if this a bit way out there

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

Nate — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 15:33:43 -0000

The Music homepage is a wasteland. It's 95% ads or paid placement and 5% navigation. All fat and gristle, no meat.

Why is it so hard to "take action" on a song? I want to hear something (or hey, maybe even buy something) right now, not try to figure out the clickstream for building a playlist.

The problem is MySpace looks like a website, but acts like TV. MySpace is about selling non-relevant mainstream ads to passive eyeballs, not building interesting stuff that emerges from user interactions, so it makes sense for them to inflate pageviews with bad UI.

Any good music service should get smarter about what I like over time, and be able to make good recommendations. As far as I can tell MySpace never builds anything that learns from its users. iTunes, Amazon, and any service that already knows what I'm into or what my friends are into has a huge advantage in this space.

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

NICCAI — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 13:39:42 -0000

Last.fm and HypeMachine I can listen to in Canada. MySpace Music is another walled garden in the world of web services. Don't get me wrong, I GET why services like this launch in the US only. It just doesn't make it a game changer.

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

monsur — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 12:11:25 -0000

I played around with MySpace music this morning, and just felt lost. The search interface is lacking (how are the results sorted? Why can't I narrow results by album?) As far as I can tell you can't queue up tracks in an already playing playlist, which kills the ability to browse around and listen to a stream of tracks. There are just some serious usability issues all around.

I would love to see AmazonMP3 offer a streaming, playlist and community options, integrated with their soundunwound.com site. This would provide a simple, powerful interface for discovering music and then buying the DRM-free MP3.

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

Josef — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 10:49:31 -0000

I've only spent a few minutes with it. What pulled me in was hitting the profile of another product/music geek and looking at the songs he just tagged for a playlist. Made me click and listen, and that 'pulled me in.'

That's the right direction (followers of your blog get pulled into band/songs, but are still a click away from an immersive music experience with a link to hypemache/lastFM) but about 5 years too late. (post Napster - more like 8 )

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

deancollins — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 10:32:38 -0000

Fred, did you see the recent changes to USA music royalties collections?
http://deancollinsblog.blog...

Time for some new investments at Union Square Ventures?

Cheers,
Dean Collins
www.Cognation.net

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

perry chen — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 10:23:30 -0000

Fred, a noisy interface has never been a measurable negative for MySpace's core audience. While you and I may gravitate to cleaner sites like Hype Machine, I think the greater audience (not just MySpace's audience) either has no problem with a glut of content/advertising noise, or in many cases feels more comfortable with it.

Realizing your post just a voicing of your own personal preferences for interface-design, excuse me for seizing upon this opportunity to note how it is always interesting to hear the voices of "needs to be cleaner and more intuitive!" vs "wha? who cares!"

Another battle of that war will likely be fought Android to iPhone starting next month.

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

fredwilson — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 09:55:05 -0000

the all you can eat streaming for free is actually pretty novel.

it's very expensive to offer that legally and myspace is doing that.

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

fredwilson — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 09:53:24 -0000

nope, here is my profile

http://www.myspace.com/fred...

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

bombtune — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 08:37:00 -0000

Actually a B-.

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

bombtune — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 08:15:23 -0000

There's nothing new to online music about the services featured on Myspace Music that's not already existing in other social music services. Last.fm and iMeem have allowed users to build their own playlist and buy tracks via a digital retailer as well. This feature has been around for years, not to mention when I tried to buy track it simply didn't give me the option. Myspace Music should have waited to get its digital store right before going live.

The only thing Myspace has going for it is traffic, as fans flock to either the artist page of the artists Myspace site to find more information. And Myspace will have no choice but to make it easier for users to share and buy music and tickets from artists. I give it a B.

Re: Initial Thoughts On MySpace Music

Michael Arrington — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 07:23:52 -0000

Fred, is the playlist linked on your myspace profile page?