iLike, the music service with a massive following on Facebook and increasing popularity elsewhere, has introduced full-song playback on its flagship site, iLike.com. Through its partnership with music subscription service Rhapsody, the site will be offering over 5 million songs from all of the major labels and a variety of indie artists, too. In conjunction with the launch of full song playback, the site is also launching a new self-serve ad platform for concert promoters.
Unfortunately, the full-song playback will be partially restricted for users that aren’t Rhapsody subscribers. Non-subscribers will only be able to listen to a maximum of 25 songs per month, while Rhapsody users under the service’s $12.99 monthly plan will be able to listen to an unlimited number of songs. iLike competitor Last.fm began offering less restrictive playback options in January, but has had issues with keeping its content-providers satisfied (Warner Music Group pulled out of the deal in June).
The new ad-platform, which also launches today, is designed to give concert promoters a way to create feature-rich ads without much effort or technical know-how. Ads will be distributed across iLike’s network (namely their website and social network applications), and will display content depending on a user’s geographical location. On social networks, the ads will also include elements like “invite your friends” and “see who’s going”.
iLike has also announced plans for a new developer platform that will be launching in the near future (likely in the next few weeks). While iLike has offered widgets for syndication in the past, the new platform will allow developers to customize their own web applications.
I like ilike. These guys have really shown that it’s not all about making quick buck and selling out. For a change the users are actually getting some value out.
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damn, they are good!
Good to know that ilike still exists. They were anonymous for some time.
I like iLike too. It’s good to see them make some progressive moves (re: the ad platform).
Jason, this article is fundamentally flawed.
The headline and first paragraph lead one to believe that full length streaming is free and clear. WRONG. You must have a Rhapsody account for that… Sure you correct that later in the post, but come on… And then you go on to mention Last.fm but fail to note that imeem.com has been offering full length, ad-supported streaming for what? 6, 9 months?
Not to shill for imeem, but really, is it that hard to regurgitate facts from previous coverage?
Following on Someguy’s post, you could also have titled this post, “iLike signs up for Rhapsody affiliate program.” This is not news.
I’ve been in this digital music industry for a few years working with a few different startups, and I’ve always thought very highly of the iLike crew and there offerings.
But this time, I have to agree with some of the other posts – signing up with Real Networks is a weak move in this market.
According to Compete.com, MOG has actually seen visits decline since joining up with the Rhapsody service.
Rhapsody just isn’t a good user experience for the majority of users, and I have to question the logic of iLike going this route when there are other much better options available.
The ad platform is interesting, and the live music promotions area is really heating up – this is where my current company HearWhere is focused.
I doubt the market is big enough for iLike to turn this into a significant revenue stream. I suspect fans already know of the larger artists who can afford to advertise this way (though I haven’t looked at the pricing model), and the independent smaller bands that need help getting discovered wouldn’t find this to be an effective marketing method.
That’s just my guess at this point. Time will tell.
Interesting that the two points in this post are 1) listen to music, 2) promote live music – and yet like most sites, these two elements remain independent.
This is where HearWhere is different from the current offerings – including iLike. The site has over a million show listings, of both Major artists and undiscovered bands, AND you can listen to tracks from the artists to decide what to go see.
Seems that most sites either promote only the undiscovered artists, OR the majors, tough to find a happy medium of both, and it seems nobody makes the connection to ‘here’s who’s playing, you may not know them, so have a listen and decide if you want to go see’.
Seems obvious in hindsight, no?
yawn
ilike sure is growing. deservabley so
this is Ali Partovi, CEO of iLike. Thought I’d chime in to respond to a couple of the comments.
Re Someguy and Anotherguy: you may wanna take a look at the implementation — I think you’ll find that your comments are not quite accurate. Go to http://www.iLik...om/artist/feist for example, and click to stream some music. The implementation is much cleaner than you might expect. If you try it out I think you’d take back some of what you said.
I do agree that iMeem would have been more appropriate to include in the article than LastFM.
Indeed iMeem does offer full-song streaming whereas LastFM does not (or at least they haven’t implemented it yet, or maybe they are missing a whole lot more than just Warner’s music).
Compare for example:
http://www.last...c/feist/+charts
http://www.ilik...ist/feist/songs
Re Pedalpete: The iLike Concert Ads is a brand new program that we’re committed to improve over time. Even as of day one, your implications are off — iLike’s concert notifications do include playable music (as the screenshot of the Nine Inch Nails ad above showed). An unsigned band can start an ad campaign for as little as $5 today at http://www.ilike.com/advertise.
iLike… is that the one that is also on facebook profiles?
I forgot to add specifically: you don’t need to register for an account to start streaming music. Just click play and enjoy music.
Re One Year Millionaire — yes, this is the same iLike that’s on Facebook.
-Ali
is good !
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this site will be super massive, may have to keep using this one in the office.
is good
Living Chinese users to recommend that can be used mobile phone to visit the website http://www.tp230.cn
iLike… is that the one that is also on facebook profiles?
I like ilike. These guys have really shown that it’s not all about making quick buck and selling out. For a change the users are actually getting some value out.
iLike… is that the one that is also on facebook profiles?