Not like Steve Jobs to Present a shit product.

Last week, during a presentation to the Media by CEO Steve Jobs, Apple unveiled Ping, the star feature of the latest version of their Music and Media Management Software, ITunes 10. I watched the presentation live and I have to admit to a bit of scepticism as I was watching, although I decided to reserve judgement until I had at least played about with it a bit over the weekend.

Having done so, my verdict is as overwhelming as to most the presentation was uncharacteristically underwhelming:

Ping is SHIT!

Let’s take a look at the seven reasons why, I think, Ping is so totally SHIT…

1. Ping does not take into account artists in your music collection before recommending artists to follow.

After downloading the new version of Itunes you can access your Ping profile by following the link under that of the Itunes Store, start adding personal details, and start following other users as well as artists.

But Ping does not look at what artists are in your music collection before making recommendations. Instead promoting the likes of Lady Gaga and Taylor Swift to everyone, regardless of music taste.

2. Ping recommendations don’t get any better even after you have started following your favourite artists.

This might be down to there still being a limited amount of bands with public profiles only a few days after the network’s launch, but come on Apple… Shakira? You already know that I am into Nine Inch Nails and Soundgarden…

3. You cannot connect to Facebook to find your friends there…

Now, to the fair to Apple, this was one of the features, which unfortunately got removed after a day due to Apple and Facebook failing to agree an arrangement to use the service. It’s not the first time Facebook has cut off an application from the Facebook Connect API. Sites with a lot of users do require a special agreement.

Had I been quicker in downloading Itunes10, I would have been able to connect to my Facebook Friends who are also on Ping, and might have felt slightly different about it.

Until Apple are able to get this back on, and that’s a big IF, I will not be moved from my stance that Ping is a load of crap.

4. There is also no other way of finding or inviting your friends in bulk.

Come on Apple… do you really expect me to type all of my friends email addresses, one by one, so that I can connect or invite them to join? Maybe in 1998, but with the portability API’s out there today, why should I?

Even if Facebook isn’t playing ball, you can still use OAuth to let me find my Twitter connections. Or at least let me import my email contacts!

5. You can’t send updates out to Facebook or Twitter.

You cannot call an application Social, if it is not going to allow it’s users to communicate with their friends where they happen to be, and for most people that will be not be in Ping, but in Facebook or Twitter.

It’s as simple concept, and the reason music applications like Spotify, which are truly Social, are so popular.

You are missing a big trick there Steve-O…

People aren’t about to ditch their online hang-outs to go chill at your shop. But let them bring their Facebook and Twitter conversations to it, and you might just bag a few new customers.

Spotify lets you find your friends on Facebook, share tracks and playlists and send updates out to Facebook and Twitter.

6. (This one has less to do with Ping itself, and more with Itunes) Still no Music Locker!

Late in 2009 Apple acquired Lala, an online music service with the technology to allow users to scan their music collections and access all those songs on Lala, from whatever web connected device they chose. Anywhere!

In May Apple closed down Lala, prompting speculation that they were about to add their technology to Itunes, and that Iphone and Ipod touch users would soon be able to access their music collections from the cloud…

Alas, we are still waiting for that.

It isn’t clear yet what Apple’s objective was in this acquisition. Were they genuinely interested in their technology, or were they just eliminating a potential competitor?

Either way, it looks like Apple is  siding with the major labels, who do not like the idea of users being able to access one copy of their content from multiple devices.

7. No Music Sharing.

Ok, I might be asking for a bit much. Sharing links to tunes is something that is possible on streaming services like Spotify, Last.fm and Grooveshark because there is a per play royalty involved. And the labels are still very weary of these, as there is only a fraction of the money in per play royalties as there is in CD and download sales.

But who is to say that there isn’t  a feasible business model for a controlled sharing of owned copies of songs? If you can share CD’s with your friends, then why the hell should you not be able to share a link to a tune, which your friend can listen to, say once or twice before access expires?

If I was an artist (or a label executive for that matter), I like to think that I would be quite happy if people were able to share my material freely. I might get a lot more fans, and ultimately paying customers, than I might otherwise.

Of course, for that to happen there would have to be a music locker on the cloud in place first… and for that to happen, Apple will likely require the approval of the major record labels.

So the question really is… Will the labels ever see this opportunity, or will they continue to protect their old publishing interests?

I suspect they won’t see sense any time soon.

So… Do you think Ping is shit?

7 Reasons why Apple’s Ping is totally SHIT. is a post from: evenflowdave.com

How the mighty fall. MySpace was not so long ago the go to place for social networkers. But that was an age past in web trend years. Facebook, with it’s simple and unclutered design and intuitive features is now the place to be.

But MySpace was never really invented with Social Networking for the masses in mind, so should they be disappointed to have lost the Social Networking crown to Facebook?

Sometimes you have to remember where you came from and return to your roots. And for MySpace, that is Music.

Since their new CEO,  Owen Van Natta, took over last year, it has been clear that is exactly what MySpace are doing. Their new focus… to be the undisputed online platform for Entertainment.

They have definitely been making some very clever decisions, like bringing Gaming into the Mix and implementing Facebook Connect. The latter is further proof that they have given up on competing with Facebook in the personal profile space and instead opted to focus on music, films and gaming and leverage Facebook traffic to bring consumers into MySpace.

But they are missing a massive trick….

What is the single best feature on display in a MySpace page? The thing that we all go straight for when we click through to a bands profile… The Music Player.

That MySpace Music Player is to music, what the Youtube Player is to video. With one massive difference. You can take the Youtube Player with you into Blogs, Websites, Facebook, MySpace… everywhere, but the MySpace Music Player is not embeddable!

MySpace, are you mad?

I’ve been getting asked to write quite a few band reviews recently, and the place I generally go to to get a feel for their music is MySpace. Yet when it comes to giving my readers a sample within the post, it is services like Sound Cloud that provide me  with the ability to embed tracks onto my page.

Why would you not want to make your best feature available outside of your site, MySpace? Don’t you want traffic from blogs?

The best thing about MySpace, which doesn’t exist. is a post from: evenflowdave.com

So, basically at MyBandStock.com you register for a virtual share of your favourite band, participate in site activity by submitting music, videos and photos and the most active users are rewarded with virtual band equity and a bigger chance of getting to win prices and interact with the bands through online chat sessions, back-stage meets, etc.

At least that’s what I make of it – a lot of it is still quite vague.

(Come on MyBandStock… give us a more comprehensive view.)

Not sure how successful this will be. If you need 1000 fans to register for a single band, then the site has alot of work to do before contacting their first artist (the one with the most has 50 shareholders).

Of course, 1000 is not a lot, but unless mybandstock has the funds to advertise this through mainstream media, then they are going to rely on fans crowd-sourcing their promotional efforts.

For me, interacting online with Pearl Jam (or a number of other of my favourite bands) would be awesome, winning back-stage passes would be out of this world. So here’s my contribution.

I’m only the third PJ share holder so far

As much as I like the idea, I do believe that this kind of effort to bring the fans closer to the artist has to be adopted more by the artists themselves…

It’s a tough market, anyone can make music very easily now and competition will be what makes the music business a lot more personal again.

This has reminded me of last years Josh Freese’s (formerly of Nine Inch Nails) album promotion, for which he offered the following packages…

$7

* Digital download of Since 1972, including 3 videos

$15

* CD/DVD double-disc set
* Digital download

$50

* CD/DVD double-disc set
* T-shirt
* “Thank you” phone call from Josh for buying Since 1972. You can tell him what you like about the record that you purchased, or what you thought sucked. Ask whatever you want, like “Is Maynard really THAT weird?” or “Which one of Sting’s mansions has the comfiest beds?” or “Are Devo really suburban robots that monitor reality or just a bunch of dads from Ohio?” or “Why don’t the Vandals play more stuff off the first record?” It’s your 5 minutes to yack it up. Talk about whatever you want.

$250 (limited edition of 25)

* Signed CD/DVD and digital download
* T-shirt
* Signed drum head and drumsticks
* Go on a lunch date with Josh to PF Changs or The Cheesecake Factory (whatever you’re into)

$500 (limited edition of 15)

* Signed CD/DVD and digital download
* T-shirt
* Signed cymbal and sticks
* Meet Josh in Venice, Calif., and go floating together in a sensory-deprivation tank (to be filmed and posted on YouTube)
* Dinner at Sizzler (get your $8.99 steak and “all you can eat” shrimp on)

$1,000 (limited edition of 10)

* Signed CD/DVD and digital download
* T-shirt
* Signed cymbal, drum head and drumsticks
* Josh washes your car OR does your laundry … or you can wash his car
* Have dinner with Josh aboard the Queen Mary in Long Beach, Calif.
* Get drunk and cut each other’s hair in the parking lot of the Long Beach courthouse (filmed and posted on YouTube, of course)

$2,500 (limited edition of 5)

* Signed CD/DVD and digital download
* Get a private drum lesson with Josh, or for all you non-drummers, have him give you a back and foot massage (couples welcome)
* Pick any 1 member of the Vandals or Devo (subject to availability) to accompany you and Josh to either the Hollywood Wax Museum or the lunch buffet at the Spearmint Rhino
* Signed DW snare drum
* Take 3 items of your choice out of his closet (first come, first serve)
* Change diapers and make bottles with him for an afternoon (after hitting the strip club)

$5,000 (limited edition of 3)

* Signed CD/DVD and digital download
* T-shirt
* Josh writes a song about you and makes it available on iTunes
* Co-direct a video with him for the song about you and throw it up on the YouTubes
* Josh gives you and a friend a private tour of Disneyland
* Get drunk together. If you don’t drink, we can go to my dad’s place and hang out under the “Tuba tree”
* Stone Gossard from Pearl Jam will send you a letter telling you about his favorite song on Since 1972

$10,000 (limited edition of 1)

* Signed CD/DVD and digital download
* T-shirt
* Signed DW snare drum from A Perfect Circle’s 2003 tour
* Josh gives you a private drum lesson OR his and hers foot/back massage (couples welcome, discreet parking)
* Twiggy from Marilyn Manson’s band and Josh take you and a guest to Roscoe’s Chicken ‘n’ Waffles in Long Beach for dinner
* Josh takes you and a guest to Club 33 (the super-duper exclusive and private restaurant at Disneyland located above Pirates of the Caribbean) and then hit a couple rides afterward (preferably the Tiki Room, the Haunted Mansion and Tower of Terror)
* At the end of the day at Disneyland, drive away in Josh’s Volvo station wagon. It’s all yours … take it. Just drop him off on your way home, though, please.

$20,000 (limited edition of 1)

* Signed CD/DVD and digital download
* T-shirt
* A signed drum from the 2008 Nine Inch Nails tour
* Maynard James Keenan, Mark Mothersbaugh from Devo and Josh take you miniature golfing and then drop you off on the side of the freeway (all filmed and posted on YouTube)
* Josh gives you a tour of Long Beach. See his first apartment, the coffee shop on 2nd Street where his buddy paid Dave Grohl $40 to rip up tile just weeks before joining Nirvana. See the old Vandals rehearsal spot, the liquor store he got busted at using a Fake ID when he was 17 (it was Dave from the Vandals’ old ID). Go check out Snoop Dogg’s high school. For an extra 50 bucks see where Tom and Adrian from No Doubt live. For another $25 he’ll show ya where Eric from NOFX and Brooks from Bad Religion get their hair cut.
* Spend the night aboard the Queen Mary and take the “Ghosts and Legends” tour. (Separate rooms … no spooning.)
* Josh writes 2 songs about you and both are made available on iTunes and appear on his next record (you can sing back up on ‘em, clap, play the drums, triangle, whatever)
* Drum lesson OR foot and back massage (once again … couples welcome and discreet parking available)
* Pick any 3 items out of Josh’s closet

$75,000 (limited edition of 1)

* Signed CD/DVD and digital download
* T-shirt
* Go on tour with Josh for a few days
* Have Josh write, record and release a 5-song EP about you and your life story
* Take home any of his drum sets (only one, but you can choose which one)
* Take shrooms and cruise Hollywood in Danny from Tool’s Lamborghini OR play quarters and then hop on the Ouija board for a while
* Josh will join your band for a month … play shows, record, party with groupies, etc.
* If you don’t have a band he’ll be your personal assistant for a month (4-day work weeks, 10 am to 4 pm)
* Take a limo down to Tijuana and he’ll show you how it’s done (what that means exactly we can’t legally get into here)
* If you don’t live in Southern California (but are a U.S. resident) he’ll come to you and be your personal assistant/cabana boy for 2 weeks
* Take a flying trapeze lesson with Josh and Robin from NIN, go back to Robins place afterwards and his wife will make you raw lasagna

(via mashable.com)

Now that’s what I call revolutionary

Have a piece of your favourite band is a post from: evenflowdave.com

via mint.com

Posted via web from short posts by EvenFlowDave

Music Sales Trends: CDs versus Music Downloads | MintLife Blog is a post from: evenflowdave.com

TheSixtyOne is a digg like site where indipendant artists can publish their music, and the community will vote up the best tracks.

TheSixtyOne is a music social networking site where users can vote up the best tracks

And it looks good. Really good!

The danger with any site of this type is that it can attracts spammers trying to cheat the system. But from what I’ve seen so far in the two days that I have been playing about with it, the developers have thought of pretty much everything.

Having to listen to more than a minute of a track before giving the thumbs-up (a love heart) should stop impatient users voting up any old crap.. and the ten votes limit per day should keep the spammers at bay.

Great work TheSixtyOne! I’m going to have a lot of fun with this indie music social networking site.

I plan on doing a review of the top social networking tools for music artist in the coming weeks, one I get my head properly round this one. But for now, my advice to any indie artist looking to promote their music… click here, sign up, upload your tracks and don’t forget to say EvenFlowDave referred you!

Know any good Music Social Networking sites? Please leave a comment and subscribe by email at the top of this page to get my updates.

A great music social networking site – TheSixtyOne is a post from: evenflowdave.com