Comments on: Free, Legal, On Demand Streaming Music? LaLa is Going to Give it a Shot

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 04:47:21 +0000

Free, Legal, On Demand Streaming Music? LaLa is Going to Give it a Shot…

cheers to a brilliant online streaming music site- and p.s. the (full length) songs are free to listen to! try it out & see….

By: mozartfan

mozartfan — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 06:04:08 +0000

i digg these lala folks; I’ve gotten a bunch of CDs for $1 from them

a friend of mine got on the preview of the next rel. he wouldn’t tell me much but sounded pretty excited

By: Cuube

Cuube — Wed, 30 May 2007 06:17:31 +0000

Great domain name!

By: listikal

listikal — Wed, 30 May 2007 00:13:09 +0000

Wow, sounds like an amazing service, but it will never work. They should attempt their own “Pandora” first, before they jump into something like this.

By: Marcelo

Marcelo — Tue, 29 May 2007 23:12:39 +0000

Good News

By: Jonathan

Jonathan — Tue, 29 May 2007 20:23:33 +0000

What, they saw imeem get sued and wanted some of the action?

By: Simon

Simon — Tue, 29 May 2007 19:25:57 +0000

sell CDs?!, wtf ?!?! Is LALA targeting 80 year olds or what? I have a fairly average music collection and it looks like this. CDs = x zero (I took great pleasure dusting them off and chucking them ALL IN THE TRASH) - MP3s = x 33,152. However, CDs are pretty excellent for reflecting sunlight in the rearview mirrors of asshole motorists. This sounds like a desperate startup without vision in it’s leadership. Their model belongs in the 1999 deadpool - lame

By: Amuseal

Amuseal — Tue, 29 May 2007 17:10:05 +0000

I didn’t get through whether lala allows downloading or not?

By: Glenn

Glenn — Tue, 29 May 2007 16:32:09 +0000

Yes, when I saw “steaming”, I just had to check it out… a steamin’ pile o’ … what? music? oh, same diff. (Another case where a simple spell-checker wouldn’t have helped)

By: eradicator

eradicator — Tue, 29 May 2007 16:06:22 +0000

Steaming music? Yeeowch, don’t burn your ears!

By: Rishi

Rishi — Tue, 29 May 2007 15:41:52 +0000

Micheal,
http://www.spool.fm does the same thing and its legal by a loophole. It doesn’t have advertising at the moment either.
http://forum.spool.fm/viewforum.php?id=17
Rishi

By: Greenski

Greenski — Tue, 29 May 2007 15:15:29 +0000

Big mistake here, Blogmusik (www.blogmusik.net) offers already this type of service. Blogmusik has signed few weeks ago with the French RIAA, the Sacem, contracts allowing them to stream on demand music. Users can for example upload mp3 on their blogmusik accounts. All free, all legal !

So Lala will be the second one…

By: Toby

Toby — Tue, 29 May 2007 15:06:42 +0000

cheers to lala for working on this. it is the solution that both music fans and the industry need.

so much listening is occurring that goes unmonetized. but many listeners resist paying for music.

a service is needed that is 1) free to the end user 2) generates ad revenue for the industry and 3) is compelling enough of an experience that users will tolerate the ads.

providing great discovery to go along with the music goes a long way on #3. additionally, as michael points out, $0.01 per song is a high hurdle. but overcoming it is possible. the ads need to be audio because, as many commenters have pointed out, audio apps are often minimized, so visual ads will be missed. great targeting will also be necessary to get the needed CPMs.

again, free, ad-supported, on-demand music is what both listeners and fans need. it will happen. look for more services to come out with this soon.

By: CSamarin

CSamarin — Tue, 29 May 2007 14:56:03 +0000

I guess they learned free is the way to go after watching us catch up to them in the trading game by offering it for free.

I think they’ve raised two rounds by the way for something like 14 or 15 million?

We have a couple rounds of shots on Friday nights!

Did you ask them where the Z Foundation is at??? You know, the big marketing piece they had when they first launched about them supporting musicians??? Or is that not important anymore now that they got the attention they wanted with it???

By: matthew

matthew — Tue, 29 May 2007 14:22:46 +0000

i love lala–it’s the best.
and i’ll be happy just so long as they don’t risk their core functionality with this venture.

By: pallet jack

pallet jack — Tue, 29 May 2007 14:00:39 +0000

- Yeah -

- I think its a good idea / but …..

- 1 CD per month per User / is not likely…..

- Can they sell commmercials like radio?

By: Steve S

Steve S — Tue, 29 May 2007 13:56:13 +0000

It’s a decent idea, especially if you do happen to spend a lot of time in front of your screen. However, I think unless they hardcap the number of streaming songs that you can have, there is going to be a lot of loss of inventory. I don’t know how many times I let Pandora stream away while I go to lunch or take a break. This is just burning money for them.

No the bright side, if they can build in the sort of incentives that you need to get each person to buy two CDs a year, then they might have something here.

By: Christopher Hogg

Christopher Hogg — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:07:03 +0000

I’m still trying to figure out what “steaming” music is (read the headline)

By: yannick

yannick — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:03:35 +0000

“When I want to hear a particular song I just search for the bands MySpace page and stream it off there.”
> Some of us like music from artists that, gasp, don’t have myspace pages. (Wagner, Bach, etc.)

That`s the thing, which isn`t so great..

By: the logo homepage

the logo homepage — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:01:44 +0000

hmmm, nice concept

but isn’t that what yahoo music is offering already?

By: bdb

bdb — Tue, 29 May 2007 11:58:02 +0000

“If users can listen to whatever they want on demand then why would they buy a CD?”
>Not all of us are sitting in front a screen 24/7. We go places…in the car, on a bike, on foot. CD’s are good for such things, but maybe just for old people and audiophiles.

By: Josh

Josh — Tue, 29 May 2007 11:30:19 +0000

I can see this working well with a subscription model. Free users get a certain number of streams per hour or day, and the rest of the time they are offered music Pandora style.

Personally I think that relying on one CD per user per month is a little crazy. If users can listen to whatever they want on demand then why would they buy a CD?

With regards to the streaming; MySpace has obviously got themselves a good thing going. When I want to hear a particular song I just search for the bands MySpace page and stream it off there.

By: dribller

dribller — Tue, 29 May 2007 10:38:58 +0000

as long as piracy is hanging loose they won’t make it!

By: * Beatles

* Beatles — Tue, 29 May 2007 09:46:20 +0000

Perhaps if they explained on their FAQ their situation - the way it was detailed here, happy users just might purchase from them to keep their free services alive.