Google Music search launched today, and it reminds me a lot of the original Listen.com MP3 directory. It's a sub-set of Google's general search available at http://www.google.com/musicsearch or just by typing any artist name into Google and then clicking on the "More Music Results for xxx". The overall experience is a clever repackaging of the standard Google filters (site, images, news, groups), but also starts to add in the commerce part (Froogle) by offering direct links to both digital and physical retailers. Google has similar sub sets of search available for movies and for financial stocks, so this continues a trend for them.
So what's interesting about this? First is that it handicaps Apple's iTunes a bit since it does not have any web-only way to get to music content - you must download iTunes to access any music information. Other more web-centric digital retailers should be able to take advantage of this, although the RealNetworks links, for some unknown reason, do not link to the web version of Rhapsody, but instead link to a decent artist information page at real.com which then forces you into a registration and download process.
Second interesting debate going on is whether Google is taking a referral fee from any of the retailers, and how they are deciding which retailers to list first, since one would assume there is much value in being listed higher, a la the Overture bidding system. I've seen speculation on both sides today, but it looks to me like it's just taking a Froogle spider crawl and repurposing it for this service, so I assume the answer is no, and that it's not related to any type of business arrangement. The only one I can't figure out is the RealRhapsody link, which looks technically to me like a feed was given to them, but I'm probably wrong and should stop pretending to be an engineer.
The original Listen.com MP3 directory was very similar to this vision, as is today's GoFish commerce service We had an editorially reviewed and categorized directory of all of the legally available digital music, and we did deals with the leading search engines of that era to integrate the results, and then we shared the resulting commerce or ad revenue. Unfortunately, there was almost no major label content legally available in those days, P2P Napster was dominant, and then the advertising business collapsed across the Internet, so we were forced to change the company to create Rhapsody. In this case, times have changed enough that both the amount of digital content and the cost effectiveness of advertising and commerce links are coming together to make this type of experience a much better one.
The key unknown is whether Google's immense reach begins to drive customer acquisition in the sector, which would push the sector even harder towards a web-centric approach, and does that affect Apple at some point?
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