INSIDE FACEBOOK -- Aug 19 -- MySpace has just become one of the largest
app developers on the Facebook Platform. MySpace announced that it has
acquired iLike, developers of the largest music app on Facebook and one
of the 15 largest app developers overall by total reach. iLike exploded
from zero to 2M users in the first two weeks after the Platform
launched in May of 2007. FULL ARTICLE @ INSIDE FACEBOOK
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TECH CRUNCH -- Aug 17 -- MySpace is close to acquiring popular social
music service iLike. The deal, which should close this week, will be
MySpace’s first acquisition since new CEO Owen Van Natta took control
of the company in April 2009. The price is ~$20M. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH
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TECH CRUNCH -- Aug 14 -- Popular music recommendation service iLike
launched a music download service, offering users MP3 downloads for
$0.89 to $1.29 per song. Previously the service only offered users the
ability to sample 30 second clips of songs, or restricted full
streaming via a partnership with Rhapsody. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH
TECH CRUNCH -- Oct 19 -- iLike has teamed with TuneCore, a music distribution platform, to help artists promote and sell their music as easily as possible. For a flat fee, TuneCore will help artists distribute their digital music to a collection of music stores that the company has forged deals with including Rhapsody, Amazon MP3, and iTunes. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH
TECH CRUNCH -- Aug 22 -- Music is MySpace's territory. MySpace says 35m people per month visit their music sites, including MySpace Music and various artist pages. Facebook, by contrast, has no real internal music strategy. Artists can set up Pages to promote themselves, but the pages are no different to any other fan pages. Next month MySpace is rolling out a new music joint venture with the major labels that will have music streaming, playlists, downloads, merchandise sales, ring tones and other features. Facebook doesn't appear to be engaging in any direct music strategy at all. Instead, they've placed their bet on iLike, a third party application that has no streaming deal (they piggyback on Rhapsody). FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH
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CNET NEWS -- July 20 -- iLike,
the social music service that rose to popularity with the launch of
Facebook's developer platform last year, is getting bigger. The company
announced that membership has surpassed 30m users. But more importantly, iLike has launched
an ad platform specifically geared toward bands and concert promoters.
Audiences can be targeted by music preferences and location, rather
than keywords, which iLike says will give advertisers a huge advantage. FULL ARTICLE @ CNET NEWS
TECH CRUNCH -- Mar 5 -- Facebook is in talks with the record labels to launch a music service that will include either free ad-supported music streams or paid downloads. MySpace is also preparing its own music service to be called MySpace Music. And other competitors from imeem to iLike to Last.fm are putting pressure on Facebook to respond with its own music offering. But Facebook should really stay out of the music business. Facebook's fan pages for musicians have not done well. 50 Cent's official Facebook page only gathered 8,213 fans, compared to 1,918,372 fans on iLike page on Facebook (which includes fans across other social networks as well). FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH
PBS -- Dec 3 -- With Internet radio "music discovery" or "social radio" users can listen to their favorite music whenever they want. The biggest music discovery is Last.FM, which was recently acquired by CBS for $280 million. Based on user's music, Last.FM starts to form profiles of their tastes and everything they listen to gets broadcast to the Last.FM community. Jango is less feature-rich than Last.FM. Pandora is easy to get started with and available with no downloads. Unlike Jango, Pandora has a more international selection of music. iLike is very popular with the Facebook set. iLike is similar to Last.FM, it's based on user's iTunes music collection. MyStrands is a desktop app. which provides the ability to organize "music parties" and synchronize user's iPods to the service. Mog.com is like a music magazine, MySpace and Last.FM all rolled into one. FULL ARTICLE @ PBS
BILLBOARD -- July 2 -- Ilike, a relatively unknown online music community, is now the fastest growing digital music service on the Internet, thanks to Facebook's recent changes. Facebook, which has 25 million users, opened its service to the general public in Sept 2006 and opened its platform to developers. Taking advantage of this by creating a version specifically for Facebook. Ilike's user base went from 3 million users to 6.7 million users in 3 weeks. The music industry has taken notice with many music companies developing Facebook profiles. FULL ARTICLE @ REUTERS
