MySpace to push music features in social networking community
Although MySpace is still a hugely popular social networking site in certain parts of the world, its appeal has been steadily slipping in the over eighteen crowd, who have mostly begun moving to Facebook en masse, especially in Europe. It’s because of this threat that MySpace has decided to reposition itself in the market as the go to site for ‘musical’ social networking.
This is something that Facebook has yet to approach officially although various applications have attempted to bring the sharing and listening to music onto the site.
The move has been set up in an attempt to help the previous king of social networking to distance itself in what has become a pure fight for user figures with Facebook. The focus will shift to the musical side of things, using a variety of new global features including integration with Apples iTunes store, music videos and a range of artist data via the Artist Dashboard.
The Artist Dashboard in particular should appeal to many indie and start-up bands who wish to have a better idea of just who is listening to them, further bridging the gap between artists and fans.
The CEO of MySpace, Owen Van Natta has been pushing the site into a more content and entertainment driven direction since his appointment in April, and believes that both the artist dashboard and focus on music videos are an “important step forward in our mission to define the future of how content is socialised on the Web.”
This seems like a very wise decision from MySpace- the site has maintained much of its strength due to its excellent music features and few bands and artists see Facebook as a good way of showcasing their music – at least for now. Facebook has already announced that it will be teaming up with music provider Lala to allow users to purchase tracks through them. It’s likely that Facebook will be looking towards more extended musical features in the near future.
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