Vimeo Launches Audiosocket-Powered Music Store To Bring Tunes To Video

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At F8 on Thursday, The Social Network will by all accounts be making its official foray into music, with scrobbling and music content galore headed straight for our news feeds. Ahead of Facebook’s new music service, Vimeo is announcing its own musical news, thank you very much, that has some interesting implications for artists and filmmakers and music technology. You may know Vimeo as the quality YouTube alternative that’s long been a place for semi-pro videographers, filmmakers, and Vloggers to host, share, and present their video content. Today, Vimeo is taking its long-awaited leap into the music world with the “Vimeo Music Store” — a custom-designed music licensing solution that will allow Vimeo’s video buffs to search for, discover, and license songs for both non-commercial and limited commercial use.

Powering the nuts, bolts, and backend of the Vimeo Music Store will be Audiosocket’s Music-as-a-Service (or MaaS) platform, a cloud solution designed to allow digital media companies to easily integrate music search, discovery, and licensing. The Vimeo Music Store, which represents the first commercial implementation of Audiosocket’s solution, will allow users to take advantage of all the benefits of a music library that contains more than 100 categories of integrated metadata, all from inside the friendly confines of Vimeo’s platform.

Vimeo users will also have the benefit of access to Audiosocket’s library of 33,000+ legit songs in the new music store, enabling the video platform’s users to select and license a wide variety of tracks that they can use as soundtracks for their video productions, with the ability to then distribute them over the Web, and film festivals, and so on, without worrying about an RIAA SWAT team descending from the roof.

On the flip side of the partnership, Audiosocket’s music artists will now have the benefit of a sizable new distribution channel (along with guaranteed royalty payments on licensed music) and exposure to Vimeo’s audience of more than 50 million monthly visitors — many of them semi-pro and professional filmmakers.

On this note, obviously the real key to Vimeo’s music store is that it opens the door for musicians to monetize their work in personal video creation: An area that’s traditionally been tough for artists to make any significant profits. In this way, Audiosocket’s MaaS platform could prove to be a great way for indie musicians to receive both widespread, multimedia exposure (with attributions) and make some extra income, potentially turning Vimeo into an even more appealing musical alternative to YouTube for the world’s melody makers. (Especially as Audiosocket’s catalog specifically features content from emerging bands, composers and record labels, making it a great tool for indie music discovery.)

It’s also great to see the evolution in the relationship between music and technology — and now the cloud — as Audiosocket’s MaaS platform, which is designed for integration into video and photo sharing platforms, virtual worlds, online games and social networks, could have a disruptive effect on the way music is licensed in digital media. And we all know how much music licensing has been in the need of workable, affordable solutions (really, innovation). Just ask Napster.

After all, when you get down to it, amateur filmmakers really have no idea where to start when it comes to music licensing, and vice versa; both parties want to take advantage of the benefits without the hassle, but they’re by and large clueless on where to start.

Of course, it remains to be seen whether Vimeo users will be willing to pay to license Audiosocket’s music content, the pricing structure of which currently stands at $1.99 per track for personal, non-commercial, and web-use for casual users and $98 per track for commercial, web-use licenses for professional users. Thankfully, much of the content will be available for free thanks to Creative Commons Licensing, but professional users may be heard issuing a few groans.

Nonetheless, this could really be a real future-altering partnership for Audiosocket and is no doubt a great bonus for Vimeo users, but it also seems as if the video platform will need to go bigger with its song catalog if it’s to truly make waves.

For more, readers can check out an embeddable widget which includes sample tracks from Audiosocket’s library here and for a look at the Vimeo Music Store, check it out at home here.

Vimeo is a cleanly-designed video sharing website that allows people to publish their videos for public consumption or just for friends and family. Vimeo launched support for high definition video in October 2007, further establishing itself as a leading video hosting platform. The website is owned by the media conglomerate IAC/InterActiveCorp and operated by Connected Ventures.

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Audiosocket is a music media and technology company that provides artists with the opportunity to monetize their work through both traditional and new media licensing. Placing high standards on the quality of their catalog, Audiosocket is very selective about the content it delivers to the market place. The company only works with artists, bands and composers that are active and creating culturally relevant content. When accepted onto the roster, artists have agents working to deliver their music to the market...

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Spotify CEO Daniel Ek On How The New Facebook Music Integration Will Work

Alexia Tsotsis currently works for TechCrunch as a writer. She is also a blogger who attended the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, CA. She majored in Writing and Art, moving to New York City shortly after graduation to work in the Entertainment/Media industry. After four years of living in New York City and attending courses at New York... ? Learn More

Before I lost my voice earlier today (yes, that’s me up there asking all those questions, NOT Marge Simpson), I sat down with Spotify CEO Daniel Ek at F8. Ek and I spoke about today’s “launch” of Facebook Music, which wasn’t a music console built on top of Facebook like some had conceived, but rather a partnership built around a dozen music apps — like Rdio, Mog and Iheartradio — through Facebook’s now extended Open Graph.

In addition to sharing their own and seeing their friends’ music listening activity in the new Facebook News Ticker, users will eventually see and share all music-related activity in a Music Dashboard in the left hand corner of their Facebook profiles, if they or their friends are using a partner app like Spotify. Users can access the “Listen with a friend” feature we reported on yesterday through either feed by hitting the Play button on their friend’s update.

Responding graciously to my pressing about the rumor I heard that Spotify was to power Facebook’s universal music player, an idea which eventually got scrapped, Ek went on to reveal that, because of the new Facebook integration, Spotify will be removing its invite-only barrier — In addition to giving non-paying users six months of unlimited music listening.

Okay great, but what if you don’t want your embarrassing musical taste to be broadcast to all your friends via Facebook? Hit up Applications > Spotify (or Rdio or whatever) > App Privacy >  Only Me.

Because only you need to know that you’ve been listened to that one Kid Cudi song basically on repeat since March.

Spotify has created a lightweight software application that allows instant listening to specific tracks or albums with virtually no buffering delay. It was launched in the fall of 2008 and had approximately 10 million users by September 2010. Spotify offers streaming music from major and independent record labels including Sony, EMI, Warner Music Group, and Universal. Users download Spotify and then log onto their service enabling the on-demand streaming of music. Music can be browsed by artist, album, record...

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Two Key Features Of Facebook Music: Scrobbling And Track Unification

MG Siegler has been writing for TechCrunch since 2009. He covers the web, mobile, social, big companies, small companies, essentially everything. And Apple. A lot. Prior to TechCrunch, he covered various technology beats for VentureBeat. Originally from Ohio, MG attended the University of Michigan. He’s previously lived in Los Angeles where he worked in Hollywood and in San Diego where... ? Learn More

Yesterday, we outlined a bit of what we’ve heard about Facebook’s upcoming f8 conference. One big launch will be their official foray into music. Today, we’ve heard more about that launch.

One thing we’ve heard from a very good source is that a key aspect of the service will be “scrobbling”. The term, made popular by Last.fm, means that when you listen to a song, it gets sent to your profile without you have to do anything. I assume there will be a way to turn this off, or a way for you to selectively share songs, but this is a key to the service.

Not that a post-music-to-profile feature should be surprising. Facebook’s core feature is the feed, and music will now make it even more robust. In fact, depending on how popular Facebook Music is, it could end up being one of the biggest sources of feed content.

And I think it will be pretty popular based on the second bit of information we’ve heard. Facebook Music will also apparently offer content resolution between all the different music partners involved. This means that if you’re listening to Rdio and a track goes up on your profile, a MOG user can click on the track and still hear the exact same song in full. Essentially, you’ll only need to sign up for one of the major music services Facebook is launching with to be able to access most content (there undoubtedly will be some songs available on one service but not another, so it probably won’t be fully seamless, but I assume you’ll be able to hear previews regardless).

This content resolution will likely be the most important aspect of Facebook Music. It turns Facebook into the great social music unifier. You can share songs without having to worry if your friends will be able to hear it or not based on what streaming service they use.

It’s not clear what partners Facebook has gotten to agree to this unification beyond Rdio, MOG, and Spotify. It’s certainly possible that while other services will be a part of Facebook Music, those three will be the key ones.

In terms of functionality, we’ve also heard that there will be a standard player that plays music without interruption from page to page as you browse Facebook. Om Malik previously reported on the persistent controls as well as a larger Music Dashboard area. Malik stated that the player would be at the bottom of Facebook, but we’ve heard that Facebook has been testing variations on this player, so it’s not yet clear where it will reside (top, bottom, etc).

Update: Inside Facebook’s Josh Constine has an interesting thought: what if the desktop software team at Facebook was working on a scrobbler that could also work with iTunes to import listens? Those tracks could then by matched and played via Spotify, MOG, Rdio, etc, on Facebook Music itself. Constine notes that he doesn’t have any inside information on this, but he did outline that possibility following our post from May on Facebook’s Seattle-based desktop software team.

Even if that isn’t a part of the initial roll-out, this makes a lot of sense down the road for Facebook Music. Or what about a Last.fm partnership for the service? And what would Apple think of all this?

Facebook is the world’s largest social network, with over 500 million users. Facebook was founded by Mark Zuckerberg in February 2004, initially as an exclusive network for Harvard students. It was a huge hit: in 2 weeks, half of the schools in the Boston area began demanding a Facebook network. Zuckerberg immediately recruited his friends Dustin Moskowitz and Chris Hughes to help build Facebook, and within four months, Facebook added 30 more college networks. The original idea for the term...

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Aiming To Be The Dropbox Of Music, Mecanto Launches An Affordable Streaming And Storage Service

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If you’re a fan of cloud-based music lockers, it’s a good time to be alive. Back in March, Amazon somewhat surprisingly beat Apple and Google to the music streaming and storage punch with their “Cloud Drive” and “Cloud Player”. Both Google and Apple have since launched cloud music offerings (or betas thereof), and all three continue to improve and evolve as time marches on.

As a music fan, it’s great to see cloud music storage and streaming services moving forward in tandem, even if we all have to admit to having our own personal favorite. Because, frankly, the more competition in this space, the better. Which is why you should be paying attention to a new startup that’s entering stage left: Mecanto. Yes, today, a new cloudy music service enters the arena, promising unlimited music streaming and storage to listeners all over the world — that won’t put a dent in your wallet. (Mecanto is offering TC readers 1,000 free 6-month subscriptions. Huzzah! See below for more info.)

Tel Aviv-based Mecanto is hitting the scene this week with a cloud-enabled music-player and storage service that is easy to set up and features all the things a user wants from their trusty neighborhood music locker: Unlimited storage and streaming, the ability to automatically sync your iTunes library and PC folders with your online account (from multiple PCs), global availability, playlist editing, video, easy browsing, and cross-platform functionality. Also doesn’t hurt that users can find Mecanto on the Web, or go mobile on iOS, Android, Windows Phone, and Symbian.

The MeCanto mobile interface is pretty nifty and offers users the ability to easily listen to songs and albums, or create playlists. Songs stream over 3G or WiFi, and users can listen to any song they want without having to worry about how much space the song takes up on their phone. Here’s to you, cloud.

It’s sounds like a great start, right? Sure, but with names like Amazon, Google, Apple, Spotify and umpteen others staring them down, Mecanto definitely has an uphill climb ahead. That being said, right now affordability is a strong selling point for the Israeli music service. Take a look at its competitors: Spotify Unlimited and Premium cost $60 a year and $120 a year, respectively, iCloud comes in at about $25 a year, Amazon’s Cloud Drive and Cloud Player cost at least $20 a year (and unlimited storage may be a limited-time offering).

Google, on the other hand is currently free, but there’s little likelihood that it will stay that way for long. In comparison, at $20 a year, Mecanto is an appealing alternative to the big players, especially as it offers worldwide availability, cross-platform integration, and instant uploads — a suite which its competitors only offer in pieces.

Furthermore, first time Mecanto users get a free month-long trial of the service, at the end of which they can pay $20 for the whole year or split it up at a $2 monthly rate. To begin using, users only have to download a small application to their desktops, which will then upload and sync all of your music automatically. Bada bing, bada boom. The best part: Mecanto’s upload process is accelerated, which means that users can access their music almost instantly, even before the upload is finished. Listeners can access their music right away, or they can choose to upload their files at a slower pace, saving bandwidth without having to worry about delays.

Not wanting to be antisocial in the Age of Facebook, the music service also offers social features, including the ability to add YouTube videos to one’s account and playlists as well as the ability to share those YouTube clips on Facebook and Twitter, Last.fm scrobbling of tracks, sharing current tracks to social networks, multi-desktop sync, and smart categorization of tracks. As to file support? Mecanto works with MP3, M4A, WMA, OGG, FLAC, and most of their derivations.

Mecanto’s so-called “three screens and a cloud” platform really is a great alternative to the big names in the space, and a “Dropbox for music” isn’t an unfair analogy. Sure, it’s design isn’t quite up to par with some of the others, but its affordability, worldwide availability, and cross-platform functionality may just give Mecanto the legs it needs to be taken seriously in a space crowded with familiar names.

So far, the startup has raised $2 million in funding from private angels, but you can be sure the startup will be seeking more cash as it begins to scale and rolls out worldwide.

The Israeli music locker is definitely worth a look, especially under the auspices of a free month-long trial and the fact that the first 1,000 TechCrunch readers that click here will receive free six-month-long trials of the service. I mean, who doesn’t like a music deal? Check it out.

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RIM Launches Inexplicable BBM Music App

Jordan Crook studied English Literature at New York University before entering the tech space. Prior to joining TechCrunch, Crook dabbled in mobile marketing and mobile apps as well as doing device reviews for MobileMarketer and MobileBurn. Crook is fascinated with alternative energy production and greentech. She is now a writer for CrunchGear. ? Learn More

Though Slacker and Pandora have made the migration, the BlackBerry App World’s selection of music apps is pretty limited compared to competing platforms. In fact, the App World is found wanting in a couple different categories. But that doesn’t mean RIM isn’t open to improvement, albeit incremental improvement. That said, RIM today announced its BBM Music app.

It’s basically a subscription music app with a strong social element. For $4.99 monthly, you can have 50 different songs on what RIM is calling your BBM Music profile. From there, it really all depends on popularity. You have access to all of the music on each of your friends’ BBM Music profiles, so theoretically your selection could extend way past the original 50 songs. It could also remain at 50 songs if you can’t learn to play nice with others. Oddly enough, you can only swap out 25 of your songs a month.

In other words, it’s a VD-like music service except that the more you spread it, the more popular you are.

Since it’s all going down BBM-style, BBM will of course be a part of the mix. While in BBM Music, you’ll be able to message your friends through BBM as well as sharing songs. Users can also check out their friends’ music activity in a timeline to get truly stalkerish about it.

In truth, the bang you’ll be getting per buck isn’t all that great, especially if you’re lacking in the social department. But you have to applaud RIM for testing out the musical waters this way. They’re basically forcing users to invite and add friends because the more friends you have, the more music you can access.

RIM expects the app to roll out later this year, but the Beta is ready to roll in the U.S., U.K., and Canada right now. You must download BlackBerry 6 first to get in on the fun. More information is available at the BlackBerry Blog.

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Music Search Startup SoundHound Partners With Spotify For Instant Streaming

Robin Wauters currently works as a staff writer for TechCrunch and lead editor of Virtualization.com. Aside from his professional blogging activities, he’s an entrepreneur, event organizer, occasional board adviser and angel investor but most importantly an all-round startup champion. Wauters lives and works in Belgium, a tiny country in Europe. He can often be found working from his home or... ? Learn More

Music search and discovery company SoundHound has inked a deal with digital music service provider Spotify to enable SoundHound users in Europe to instantly access the latter’s catalogue (of over 15 million tracks). From the sound of it, the partnership doesn’t enable users outside of Europe to cross that particular bridge just yet.

Starting today, SoundHound users on iOS and Android devices who also subscribe to Spotify Premium will be given the option to ‘Play Now in Spotify’ after identifying a song through the music discovery and recognition service. That goes for users of both the free and the paid SoundHound apps.

SoundHound users in Europe who don’t subscribe to Spotify Premium will be redirected to a page inviting them to become Spotify users before proceeding to listen to the track.

A direct Shazam (Encore) competitor, SoundHound’s ‘Sound2Sound’ technology searches sound against sound, thus bypassing traditional sound-to-text conversion techniques.

Headquartered in San Jose, California, SoundHound is backed by Global Catalyst Partners, TransLink Capital, Walden Venture Capital, and other Silicon Valley investors.

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