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EM411 vs Other Social Music Sites
StoreTags: em411, myspace, social, rant
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Rant forthcoming...
I've seen and participated in a few of the community music sites out there (albeit on a limited basis), yet they all left something to be desired. To me, EM411 is the only one that seems to put a majority of the focus on users rather than jerk itself off all over the users (MySpace and PureVolume come to mind).
As I see it, EM411 does this in three distinct and very useful ways: releases, blogs and forums. Each are on the home page, and everyone is showcased. It really keeps the concentration of "social wealth" spread evenly across its users and not held up in the power of a few (yet it also "rewards" popular blogs in the center column). Compare this to a site like MySpace where artists get popular by spamming and running bots and scripts to comment on other profiles and to build up their friend count to a tipping point where they might get noticed.
Yet I don't see any of those bad trends on EM411. Most users are genuinely interested in hearing new music and enjoy giving feedback and participating in the community. Why? I think it's the difference between wanting to make music and wanting to get famous by making music. The latter is so prevalent on the larger social music sites - the "what can you do for me?" mentality. People only want "friendships" because it increases their friend count, which, in turn, may help them get "discovered." It's deplorable, and it's why I've largely stayed away from online social sites even though I spend a lot of time on computers and the internet - hell, I even work on teh interwebs for a living.
And just in case you need some evidence as to the sheepish mentality of a site like MySpace: link
But I digress. Thanks for listening...
Cheers,
The Stringed Theory
p.s. Can anyone clue me into old "versions" or "designs" of EM411 and how things have changed to what the site is now? | |
Comments
01/11/07
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astroid
monkvolcano said: "i'm a sluice for your biowaste!"
that's good, because your mom, my last cum dumpster, is all rotted out.
edited: Jan 11 2007
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monkvolcano
what's a sluice? i must know so taht i can serve you better.
p.s... you should really try reading that post of yours in the Stuart Smalley voice.. i only did it in my head, but it was still quite amusing.
EM411 ROX!!! YAY!
01/11/07
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astroid
a sluice is the natural kin of a cum dumpster
edited: Jan 11 2007
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monkvolcano
lol... i reallly mean it.. I"M REALLY LOLLING RIGHT NOW@!!!! jesus i'm gong to bed.
01/11/07
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lunatinker
quote=tooth]...I like surfing over people's profiles but I'm only on there once a week whereas I come on here everyday.[/quote]
i'm the opposite now. ok. that's a lie - I go there like all day and her like half the day...
01/11/07
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bbwax
myspace sounds like a hell of a time-sucker. em411 is all the online socialness i can handle. all the rest of my free time is reserved for drug binges and gambling. and croquet.
01/11/07
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celibacyclub
in suquamish we have sluets
01/11/07
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mlbot
and sasquatches.
I've seen you in fotographs, CC.
YOU EXIST
01/11/07
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craque
em411 is the cozy local pub up on the hill to myspace's playground on just this side of the tracks
01/11/07
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electrodan
those fotos are all fixed. or they're all blurry and look like ancient animals and stuff. I doubt the CC really exists.
01/11/07
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mlbot
01/11/07
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jdg
LfuckingOL
01/11/07
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mrpanda
I think the key word is community. Sure there's a higher volume of users on sites like myspace, and I admittedly have an account there figuring even if 9 people find it and think it's crap, 1 will think it's ok and maybe start following my work, or tell a friend about me. That being said though, as a whole, I don't expect to get much out of sites like that myself. They isolate the artists from one another and from the fans, much in the same way that the recording industry has done with music in the past, but at the same time there have always been unknowns who have a nice following and are prefectly happy being unknowns, doing the DIY thing. I know I am. Within the past few years, with the internet gathering steam, being used for exposure and distribution, and also with the shared ideals of open source and copyleft being applied to music, it seems that the unknowns are finally being able to not only stand apart from the mainstream recording industry, but to actually thrive quite well without them. Sites like Myspace, Purevolume, Etc have tried to unify the two in order to make a profit, but they lack the same motivation that em411 has with it's userbase.
I couldn't agree more with you though. Nice post. I think all of us have thought that same thing at some point or another.
01/11/07
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mulletballet
MySpace is a living gallery of bad web design, and how NOT to build a website.
99 out of 100 pages are a MESS of crap and embedded songs and videos and sparkles and slideshows and... uuuuuuugh.
01/11/07
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flies
said: "I come on here to associate with intelligent, funny, creative people who know what a VCO is and there aren't that many of us"
lolz. VCO=muy importante
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