…to what end?
I think that’s the real question. For those of you that have followed the MySpace Acquisition of imeem and the eventual realization that users could not access their playlists, Crenk is wonders if people still care. There was no doubt that users of the imeem music service were dedicated to the platform and infuriated at how MySpace handled the acquisition.
With no warning at all the entire platform was shut down leaving developers and users in the dark. A lot of users left for other music sites, sites that appeared to be more stable. Now acquisitions can happen at any time, but two things were for sure. First users wanted to know where their music was and were unhappy with the response by MySpace, and secondly that many users detested the MySpace music platform and did not want to be affiliated with it.
Still, it’s nice to see that MySpace as still followed through with its promise of bringing back the playlists and there will be no doubt that users will migrate and begin to engage one another again, just on a different platform. Now it’s only fair to note that MySpace was not officially responsible for the imeem platform going down. Users were unawares that money had run out and services were on their way to being shut down with or without MySpace’s involvement.
For full reports and a step by step process to access your music accounts, take a look at the article from TechCrunch.
In what was practically the unplug heard around the world, imeem users were rudely awakened when upon loading their favorite playlists, they
imeem playlists moving to MySpace Music
were nowhere to be found. MySpace’s acquisition is not responsible for imeem going away, as the suffering company would have surely gone the way of the dinosaur on its own, but rather, shutting off the API killed a lot of apps, desktop and mobile alike. The impact was felt the world over as no word was even given, no warning, not even an explanation was made at the time of this event.
Recently MySpace has done right with the imeem community by assuring them that their playlists are fine, and are simply being ported over to MySpace music playlists. While I’m not entirely sure of MySpace’s music porting capabilities, I’d have to assume this is not an overnight process. Nevertheless, MySpace’s imeem acknowledgement provides some comfort to avid imeem users, but little those that have already migrated to other platforms. The service’s dedicated fans were the most spurned by this transition in ownership, and perhaps MySpace’s assurance comes too little too late.
In the announcement MySpace encourages users to use the existing music service provided by said company while the transition is taking place. It states it has the largest licensed digital catalog of music, hoping to lighten the blow even more, but for some of us, MySpace is not a site we thought of when we thought of music. Will the acquisition of imeem, will this change? Should be interesting to see the response once the imeem playlists have been brought over.
