Bada Ping? We yet don’t know what the “Ping” effect will bring but Apple’s latest & sharpest move announced today wasn’t a nano with a touchscreen or an iPod touch with a front facing camera… it was the “Facebook & Twitter meet iTunes” move….
Just like Google is constantly looking for new revenue models jumping from search & advertising to mobile & now pc market, Apple needs to stretch the on-line music business model it monopolizes via iTunes & all its devices. Despite representing around 30% or Apple’s revenues their music model isn’t as trendy (= growth of the market is slowing) as it used to be. New model revenues like apps or e-books are Apple’s new core strategies.
So how can we make the iTunes boom last a bit longer? Well, let’s do like Google did with Buzz… we have 160 million iTunes users ready (not all)…. let’s turn them all into “Ping” users!
And tada! The latest & hottest music social network is born! Ping is pretty much like Myspace + Last.fm with the events & wall taken from Facebook. You shall be able to follow both artists and your friends.You’ll also get custom song and album charts to discover new music. And obviously post, comment, criticize all music-related stuff.
Good move Apple… let’s engage (& force) our users with an Apple social network for music; you had to have your own like everyone else didn’t you? (which will surely expand into other Apple products). And all those who don’t use iTunes? Well… f*** them! After all, iTunes controls around 70% of the on-line music market. (Ping will be available with the new iTunes10).
The question is… what will be Google music’s answer to this? mmmmmmmmmmmm
