Get your mix on

September 29, 2003 1:33 PM

My Mixtapes is a site for users of emusic. Members can post album reviews, create mixtapes, and compile thematic lists of albums, all with direct links to the songs or albums so that subscribers to the mp3 service can download directly "via" my mixtapes.
posted by dobbs (6 comments total)

It's a shame the site isn't categorized better -- say, by simple genres, at least. In many ways, it's miles beyond the message boards at emusic.com. (Note, I've been a member of emusic for about 2 years.)

The emusic community has been interesting to watch as of late, as it's somewhat indicative of how an online subscription service (with a flat fee) can pan out. There is a core community devoted to exposing others to new music ("punish me" lists have grown popular - they're mixtapes of songs that may change your mind about a genre you dislike). And any time someone complains of there being no "good" music, folks are ready to jump to the plate with recommendation after recommendation.

However, this enthusiasm runs somewhat counter to emusic's business model, in which one would assume the less downloads, the better -- each download incurs a royalty fee to the artist/label, plus the use of bandwidth. Whether or not emusic's spartan message boards are an oversight or by design remains to be seen. I myself am curious how sites like My Mixtapes, along with emusic's own message board, may result in a change in business plan in the future.
posted by Sangre Azul at 2:46 PM on September 29, 2003

I've been looking for something like this for a while, so it's good to see that it's happened. I'd like more eMusic input into it though. A download all button, and the facility to save all tracks into the one folder would make it much more convenient. I can't see this happening until eMusic provides this facility.

re... "eMusic business model". I'd much rather see something like this with a reduced song downloading capacity, than the current "Absolutely huge" capacity you're given. If there was a vote button for A limit of 100 songs a month, and extra mixing/finding/sorting facilities, then I'd tick it.

I also think that a lot of eMusic users are aware of the implications of royalty fees/bandwisth, and don't misuse the system. Hopefully, eMusic will survive. With the RIAA shenanigans and a serious dearth of good music in the mainstream, it has been the one bright musical light for me this last year.

Currently listening to : Janet Panic (Available on eMusic).
Currently hoping that: more people will subscribe to this service.
posted by seanyboy at 3:44 PM on September 29, 2003

It's sort of like Art of the Mix with links.
posted by dogwelder at 5:12 PM on September 29, 2003

What are tapes?
posted by ricecrazy at 7:36 PM on September 29, 2003

ricecrazy- they're what you use to copy music off of vinyl records.
posted by dogwelder at 8:10 PM on September 29, 2003

I labored and labored creating a site much like this one (without even the downloading music element) and it's amazing by how much this eclipses my work >_<

Still, this is a great thing for the music community.
posted by themadjuggler at 10:03 PM on September 29, 2003