The First Million: Music Discovery Service To Watch For
April 26th, 2007 by Lior ShamirIn a press release dated the 24th April 2007, social music discovery service, iLike, announced one million registered users, twice the figure reported less than 30 days prior. Boasting 200 million track plays a month, iLike, at barely six months of age, proves that third time’s a charm…
Funded by Ticketmaster (IAC), Khosla Ventures, Bob Pittman, and other private investors, the Seattle based company that failed to make a splash with their almost decade old indie music community, Garageband.com, and its relatively new and unheard of podcasting off-shoot, Gcast.com, seems to have struck it lucky with iLike, offering a number of friendly features through a crisp and steadfast interface – appealing to a much larger audience.
iLike is an obvious shift in business strategy. Both Garagband and Gcast cater to the musician community, providing the tools and forums for artists to self-promote and integrate. iLike, however, caters to the all-encompassing music listening population and seamlessly links into one of the safest bets on the net: iTunes.
Although iLike bridges between the other two sites, featuring hot unsigned acts and newcomers, the “unsigned” ethos seems to be lending itself to popular demand – popular music – rather than the core of truly discovering new music (which MySpace holds the undisputed title for).
As most new music is questionable, signed or not, why not reach for the stars? It’s great SEO and attracts the majority of music lovers who want to hear what they grew up on, made love to for the first time, saw on David Letterman etc. – not Henry’s home demo.
Showcasing unheard-of talent is a tricky business – not a business at all really – so mixing it up with brand names and no-names, as iLike seems to be doing, is certainly a nice gesture for all.