Grooveshark: P2P Music Just Got Legal

By Guest on Thursday, July 3, 2008

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Filed Under: Web Apps

By: Luis Sandoval

Amidst the myriad of online music options such as Last.fm and Pandora, Grooveshark has come into play as a more social networked option of the previous two. While this is a great way to connect like minded listeners via their music selections, the product could still use some major adjustments.

I’d like to start with installation. Like Last.fm, Grooveshark has an executable file which taps into your system to install an application. Groovesharks download is called Sharkbyte, and essentially attempt to connected with other media folders to extend your sharing options via the music you already have on your computer, for example in the iTunes folder. Once you’ve selected what you want to share you’re off to their website. I personally selected nothing since I do not like applications sharing anything that I currently have on my computer, feels too invasive.

As a user I was overwhelmed with the options the website offered. I felt the design was not fluid, and options were not clearly labeled as to their uses. While it seems like the site is very informative, for a first time user it’s crowded and hard to follow. What I found fascinating with Pandora is the ability to surf the options without ever leaving the main page where the music is playing; and when you did have to open a new page, it opens as a new tab in the browser for ease of use. I got lost too often on Grooveshark’s site. In an attempt to salvage my online experience I clicked on their FAQ’s and became frustrated when there was not sufficient coverage for my question to warrant even a click.

Now for the meat of the site, the music. From what I was able to see, the music options seem aplenty, and the created music playlists are very helpful. I enjoyed the fact that you could take existing playlists and make your own playlists by selecting only the songs you want. Creating playlists was fun, and the instant option to purchase is always good to have right at your fingertips. The quality of the music was clear, the player was a little awkward, but once you set the music to play, I overlooked the player. When the first song completed a major flaw came to light, it did not go onto the next track. I attempted several times to see if I could play entire playlists to no avail. One song? I only get the pleasure of listening to one song at a time? No thank you!

Grooveshark truly has a lot of potential, and of all the music networks I am on, this was definitely the most social. You can add friends who have similar interests in music, chat with them, drag and drop songs to share, broadcast your playlist onto Twitter and Pownce so your friends know what you are listening to. This could be an amazing social music network if only the rest of the site was not so frustrating.

Luckily this site is still in beta, so there’s hope. What are my suggestions to Grooveshark? Drop the install app, I don’t know many that want to openly share their library. Is sharing our playlists and favorite songs through the site not enough? Streamline the design of the site, make it intuitive, think of a first time user as opposed to someone who is familiar with Groovesharks offerings. Finally, let the music play. Let entire playlists play and use the site’s music engine to match new music onto our playlists to expose us to new groups. That is a way to grow a community; that is an excellent way to expand a listeners horizons.

Foxytunes: Control Your Music and Video Through Your Browser

By Steven Finch on Thursday, June 26, 2008

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Filed Under: Web Apps

Yesterday we wrote about Firefox 3 and potential themes that you can download, but today we are going to talk about one of the most popular add-ons on Firefox 3, Foxytunes. Foxytunes is currently owned by Yahoo and improved a lot in the last 6 months or so.

Foxytunes lets you control almost any media player and find lyrics, covers, videos, bios and much more with a click right from your browser.

Foxytunes can either be download from their website or via the Firefox add-on section. Either way this free download is a must for all web users!

Firefox 3 Download Day Is Here and Where Is The Download?

By Steven Finch on Tuesday, June 17, 2008

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Filed Under: Analysis

Today is Firefox 3 Download Day and it is past the launch time of 10am PDT and still no download to be available. Im sure there are thousand if not millions of people trying to get this download at exactly the same time, but come on they had months to prepare for this!

I think I am just going to have wait until tomorrow my time to get the download and actually review it for everyone here.

Firefox 3 Is Coming On June 17th: Make Sure You Join Download Day!

By Steven Finch on Friday, June 13, 2008

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Filed Under: Blogging, Web Apps

Firefox 3 is coming on the 17th of June. So next Tuesday make sure you are online and actually downloading the new firefox. Seriously, it’s been a long time. 34 months of development, 5 betas and 2 RCs, that’s enough to make any user squirm with anticipation. If everything goes well, we’ll finally be able to wave memory leaks and instabilities goodbye. If not, we’ll be the first to complain, don’t worry.

Currently, I am already using the Firefox 3 RC2 and it is great. Im looking forward to seeing if they make any more major changes before they launch to the public. Remember if you want to download Firefox 3 RC 2 now then you can, all you have to do is head over here and download it. Im guessing that when they upgrade to the public Firefox 3 then the current users will just see a basic update appear.

Download Day 2008

Spiral Frog Claim To Be Third Largest Legal Music Download Store

By Steven Finch on Monday, March 31, 2008

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Filed Under: News

Minic over at 901am has reported that Spiral Frog is now the third largest legal music download site. Spiral Frog reports that they have 850,000 registered users, thus putting them in third largest behind iTunes and Rhapsody. The company also reports that their traffic is also increasing at a constant rate, already surpassing two million unique visitors for March.

Im not really too sure if Spiral Frog should claim the fact that they are the third largest legal download store, mainly because they dont actually sell anything compared to iTunes and Rhapsody. Therefore, they should really be in first place, because people are willing to sign up to something in which they have the opportunity to get something for free rather than paying.

Napster Is Now Web Based

By Steven Finch on Tuesday, October 16, 2007

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Filed Under: All Posts

Napster have announced that they are dumping their desktop client and re-launching with a new web-based version. Napster customers will now be able to listen to their music from any computer anywhere in the world. This will hopefully enable Napster to also develop embeddable widgets that can push their products on possible web enabled devices.

Napster is still going to be based as a subscription model, which most industry experts think is holding back the company, because it makes Napster incompatible with the iPod. Consequently Napster has lagged behind Apple’s end to end iTunes system which reportedly controls 70% of the digital music market.

UMG has announced they are now happy with iTunes and the revenue split, so it is only a matter of time before DRM free becomes standard and Napster will really need to gain some market share before Apple.

If you would like to see a slideshow of the new Napster service, please head over to Crave.

Grooveshark With An Idea I Think Just Wont Work!

By Steven Finch on Thursday, October 11, 2007

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Filed Under: All Posts, Analysis

grooveshark.jpg

P2P music sharing and sales service Grooveshark has raised their level of compensation for sharing music from 10 cents to 25 cents a track, their entire profit on each sale. Users upload their music to Grooveshark, and any member can listen to those tracks for free. If they want to download a song, they can purchase it DRM free and the user who uploaded the song gets a cut of the sale; previously this was 10c and now its 25c. The remainer of the 99c sale goes to the record companies; the service is legal and Grooveshark has agreements with the record companies to provide the service and to cover copyright obligations.

I dont see how this program can actually succeed! I really need someone from Grooveshark to explain to me the finer details. As far as i know it runs the same as any other P2P, where companies and users each run their files from a folder on their computer and thus allowing other users to purchase audio tracks, movies, etc. How is Grooveshark going to monitor copyrights on songs for example, because i know a lot of people out there have illegally downloaded songs on their computer and if they are in the same folder that Grooveshark is using how will they track it all and keep control? Especially also considering a user could change the name of the songs in their folder and then make it more suceptable to being accepted at owning a copyright.

Finally, why would i want to purchase from a P2P network when currently I can head over to LimeWire and get it all for nothing??

RouteNote Signs with AudioLunchbox

By Steven Finch on Friday, October 5, 2007

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audio lunchbox

RouteNote has just signed a deal to provide our content on Audio Lunchbox. Audio Lunchbox will sell our content on their sites and services for the next three years. Audio Lunchbox has a licensed catalog of over 2 million songs in 79 sub-genres. Audio Lunchbox is the only service on the web to offer both a la carte and permanent subscription downloads side by side. Well thats what they claim.

Amazon Download Store Finally Open

By Steven Finch on Tuesday, September 25, 2007

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Filed Under: All Posts

Amazon_mp3storefrontlogo_v2936426_2
After more than a year of speculation, The Amazon DRM-free download store has finally opened with an impressive 2,323,235 mp3’s available from 180,000 artists on 20,000 labels. All tracks are 256 kps mp3’s priced at 89 to 99 cents.

Included are thousands of tracks from Universal (more it appears than are available elsewhere) and virtually the entire EMI catalog including Radiohead and Pink Floyd. Missing are digital hold outs The Beatles and Bob Seger.

Leading independent labels offering their catalog of music for the first time DRM-free include Alligator, HighTone, Madacy, Sanctuary, Rounder, Righteous Babe, Sugar Hill, Trojan and Phillip Glass’ Orange Mountain.

Press Release