Updated. It hasn't been an easy year for MySpace. It's numbers have been down for months, earlier this week the company let go of 47% of its staff and parent NewsCorp is publicly trying to offload it. But at least until recently, a core portion of it's user base—musicians and the fans that support them—have remained, all be it reluctantly, active on the site. But as the numbers continue to fall, where are musicians and their fans headed?
The obvious answer is Facebook, but despite some popular apps like RootMusic, it has not caught on with musicians in quite the way that the early MySpace did. And, again despite some interesting apps, new music discovery is not easy on Facebook.
paidContent points to an eclectic group of alternatives including The Sixty One, Sellaband, Bandcamp, Pledge Music, Tunecore and last.fm. But that list is populated primarily with sites created to serve a specific function like fan funding, direct to fan sales or distribution; and none offer the mix of both popular and niche music that MySpace did (does?).
A new Nielson study shows that YouTube leads the current crop of sites for music consumption. But again, YouTube was created for another purpose—to air videos—and not music discovery.
What do you think? Will there be a new dominate destination for both musicians and fans? If so, what it is? Or have we entered an era of many sites serving more specific communities?
The obvious answer is Facebook, but despite some popular apps like RootMusic, it has not caught on with musicians in quite the way that the early MySpace did. And, again despite some interesting apps, new music discovery is not easy on Facebook.
paidContent points to an eclectic group of alternatives including The Sixty One, Sellaband, Bandcamp, Pledge Music, Tunecore and last.fm. But that list is populated primarily with sites created to serve a specific function like fan funding, direct to fan sales or distribution; and none offer the mix of both popular and niche music that MySpace did (does?).
A new Nielson study shows that YouTube leads the current crop of sites for music consumption. But again, YouTube was created for another purpose—to air videos—and not music discovery.
What do you think? Will there be a new dominate destination for both musicians and fans? If so, what it is? Or have we entered an era of many sites serving more specific communities?
