Comments for Comment of the Day: Time For iTunes to Become More Social

Comment of the Day: Time For iTunes to Become More Social

2008-03-20T04:17:39Z

In our post Social Networks Will Be Tomorrow's iTunes, Sarah Perez reported on new research indicating that social networks have the potential to be the content distribution platforms of tomorrow. "MySpace the next iTunes?", said Sarah, "It's coming."

However commenter Rian from DailySplice.com thinks it should be the other way round: iTunes to become social like MySpace! Rian wrote: "What if the iTunes store was more like MySpace or Last.fm where you were given a little corner of the store and could even promote your favorite bands?"

]]> Congratulations Rian, you've won a $30 Amazon voucher - courtesy of our competition sponsors AdaptiveBlue and their Netflix Queue Widget.

Here is Rian's full comment:

"Agreed. Last.fm is one of my favs for this. What if you could purchase and sync up your latest playlist onC Last.fm. We're banking on this kind of concept too as we develop our features for podcasts at DailySplice.com.

But I don't think it's time to say goodbye to iTunes. I think it's just time for iTunes to become more social. This seemed like the game plan for Zune when it came out. What if the iTunes store was more like MySpace or Last.fm where you were given a little corner of the store and could even promote your favorite bands? Hmmm... even make commissions off your sales... haha, ok, maybe now I'm dreaming."

Comment from Thomas Bergman on 2008-03-20

2008-03-20T11:58:23Z

Maybe the first step to the Social iTunes is Mojo?

http://lifehacker.com/369747/download-music-from-your-friends-itunes-libraries-over-the-internet-with-mojo

Comment from Andrew Wise on 2008-03-20

2008-03-20T12:17:09Z

Richard, interesting point (re: your own myspace store), that's the exact model we're looking to achieve with Grooveshark.

Fans upload their whole libraries, then, within Grooveshark fans can review albums, rate, tag, share, play, just about song, and the more of these types of contributions they make, the more likely their "merchandise" will sell.

You see, we're trying to monetize the content that's currently being traded illegally, for free, on Bittorrent by allowing fans to have a marketplace that allows them to share music and also ensure that the artists/labels receive their share as well.

For more on how labels get paid, see our related post:
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/grooveshark_analytics_suite.php

Comment from Neil on 2008-03-20

2008-03-20T19:10:25Z

Does anyone want to buy SoTunes.com from me? £10m and it's yours!

Actually, I don't think iTunes needs to become more social - I think it's the iPod which needs to become more social. Fire eagle + iPhone....

Comment from Michael on 2008-03-20

2008-03-20T20:02:28Z

Wouldn't that be like copying Zune Social?

Comment from Tom on 2008-03-21

2008-03-22T05:03:56Z

What I don't get is... why does everything have to be social? iTunes is a music player and a music store, why does it need to be anything else? The user reviews are an obvious benefit, but beyond that... I don't need to make friends with other iTunes users, I just want it to play my darn music!

Maybe it's time for the 8 million things that don't need to be social but are to be less so.

Comment from Jamie Thingelstad on 2008-03-22

2008-03-22T12:17:37Z

There are a lot of ways that iTunes can get more social beyond what's described here. I wrote in November about my wish for iTunes Social Edition.

http://www.thingelstad.com/2007/11/itunes-social-edition/

There are "sharing" problems, that are totally legit, that iTunes could help solve.