Yahoo! Buys Musicmatch

Second rate! by mekkab · 2004-09-14 06:46 · Score: 5, Funny

Great! A second-rate search engine buys a second rate MP3 player! News at 11!

--
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.

Re:Second rate! by BobPaul · 2004-09-14 06:54 · Score: 2, Interesting

I know I'm going against the crowd, but has anyone found anything quite as good as MusicMatch's Smart Tagging capability? Winamp finally has a library, but it still doesn't manage music as well as MusicMatch and has no where near the tag-managment capabilities.

I've seen a couple of products that offer Tags from filenames, but nothing that does tags from file names and directory struture as well as the reverse.

(WinAmp 5 did actually win me over from MMJB, btw. So the question asked in this post is not rhetorical.)
Re:Second rate! by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 06:55 · Score: 0

Actually your post should have read news.google.com at 10am as that's when I first noticed this story there.

Hey Slashdot? When are you going to again become a leader in getting news to us first? It's getting kinda boring reading old, duplicate, and zealot-edited story blurbs.
Re:Second rate! by vijaya_chandra · 2004-09-14 07:00 · Score: 5, Informative

You might be trying to be funny.
But Yahoo! doesn't definitely mean just the search engine.
They do have other good services like mail and messenger. While gmail might have stolen have a big chunk of their email base, their messenger is definitely not sub-par (not that it'd matter much for users of gaim)

Add things like launch, games, news, groups, geocities, mobile .... and you have a pretty impressive list
Re:Second rate! by mrklin · 2004-09-14 07:01 · Score: 5, Insightful

How is Yahoo's search engine sceond rate?

A little bit late to the game but the Yahoo! Search interface at http://search.yahoo.com/ is almost as clean as Google's.

Yahoo's search results, supplied by algorithms combined from the once-superior Yahoo, Altavista, and Inktomi, is in my opinion (and many search engine watchers too) just as good as Google's too.

As for their music acqusition, personaly I use iTunes. I look forward to see what Google does next. Picasa/Hello are pretty good acquisitions.
Re:Second rate! by michael+path · 2004-09-14 07:06 · Score: 4, Insightful

It's gotten to the point where I've forgotten Yahoo! had a search engine.

I wouldn't agree about Musicmatch though, their player isn't bad - and I've used it for encoding and playback of much of my collection. My only complaint is that launching is a touch too resource intensive - almost as bad as WMP.
Re:Second rate! by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:09 · Score: 0

Actually MusicMatch is a decent jukebox player, at least in the realm of consumer-packaged players. I definitely recommend it to non-geeks who are getting a home computer going.
Re:Second rate! by rainman_bc · 2004-09-14 07:17 · Score: 4, Interesting

Personally, Yahoo lost me forever with their search engine with the X10 popups. Switched to google around that time, as I suspect many others did the same.

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09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
Re:Second rate! by mekkab · 2004-09-14 07:19 · Score: 1, Offtopic

Wait, slashdot was ONCE a leader in getting news to us first?!

I should have originally written:
"second rate geek news agency reports ..."

--
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
Re:Second rate! by ViolentGreen · 2004-09-14 07:41 · Score: 1

I know I'm going against the crowd, but has anyone found anything quite as good as MusicMatch's Smart Tagging capability?

Musicmatch has had that for years and I am very suprised that none of the other major players have picked it up. That was THE reason that I had musicmatch installed on my machine. I used it to tag downloaded mp3s then winamp to play them.

The "Tag from internet" (or something like that) was also incredibly useful for getting missing album information such as (album name and date of release) and album artwork.

In terms of features, it was at the top and perhaps still is. The non-standard interface was one of the worst that I have ever seen and the resource usage was entirely too high.

After I got my ipod, a bug in the bundled version cut a letter of of each field in the tag of every mp3 in my collection on each sync. It was off my machine after that.

--
Not everything is analogous to cars. Car analogies rarely work.
Re:Second rate! by pointyhairedmba · 2004-09-14 07:49 · Score: 1

Personally I think that Google has been going down hill. Do a search for "Mayfield Venture" or "Mayfield". Google returns inferior results. Many times, it feels like Google returns more blog type results.
Re:Second rate! by gordgekko · 2004-09-14 08:04 · Score: 2, Interesting

I know I'm going against the crowd, but has anyone found anything quite as good as MusicMatch's Smart Tagging capability? Winamp finally has a library, but it still doesn't manage music as well as MusicMatch and has no where near the tag-managment capabilities.
You aren't alone actually. I switched over completely to WinAmp just because I was tired of MMJB's bloat and speed issues and I miss its great tagging abilities. I haven't found any replacement software that does it as nicely as MMJB did.

--
You want to know who isn't running Firefox 2.x? They spell it "definately" and "rediculous".
Re:Second rate! by MvD_Moscow · 2004-09-14 08:24 · Score: 1

launch is sub-par, your much better of finding real fan sites. geocities is also a waste of time. Try http://web1000.com/ instead.
Re:Second rate! by theduck71 · 2004-09-14 08:42 · Score: 1

Well, if you dont use MM you would not realize that it offers the ONLY music on demand service on the net. Why, is this so great, you ask????? Well, if you are at work, and your boss(s) do not allow MP3's, this is a perfect way around that! I am very upset that this has taken place. Hopefully, this will not change the preformance of the media player!!! :@:@:@:@:@:@:@:@ QUACK
Re:Second rate! by frankthechicken · 2004-09-14 09:17 · Score: 4, Informative

Have you tried Foobar 2000(I would recommend the Special Install)?

It has excellent tagging capabilities, and more than a few useful plug-ins.

Their forum's quite useful as well.
Re:Second rate! by g-doo · 2004-09-14 09:31 · Score: 4, Interesting

How about...a first-rate portal since its founding? It seems that quite a few people scoff at anything that's not Google/Apple/Linux/etc. without much basis. While Yahoo! Search may have lost its number one position a few years ago, it has certainly reworked its search engine to the point where it's comparable to Google's. It's just that many Slashdotters have tried no search engine recently other than Google, so they wouldn't know.
Re:Second rate! by 3terrabyte · 2004-09-14 09:38 · Score: 3, Informative

I may be wrong, because I have only used it on other people's machines, but I think the reason why it has such great internet tagging features is becaues Music Match licenses AllMusic.com's database. You get album art, titles, genre, the whole thing.
Personally, due to the *ahem* huge amount of mp3's I deal with, I personally tag and rename all my mine manually with Tag & Rename.
It connects to CDDB or FreeDB or Allmusic. It takes a little longer than the close-your-eyes and hope MusicMatch is correct, but then I know it's tagged correctly.

--
Why are there only 19 people folding@home for slashdot?
Re:Second rate! by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 09:39 · Score: 0

You mean like Winamp's not a hog?
Re:Second rate! by mekkab · 2004-09-14 10:04 · Score: 1

yeah, when you shill for X11 and sell your top slots, slashdot users tend to bitch and moan. Or maybe you don't remember that...

--
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
Re:Second rate! by BobPaul · 2004-09-14 10:17 · Score: 1

I used tag and rename, but I remember it pissed me off quite a lot when I first used it. I forget off the top of my head what limitation I didn't like (I know it wasn't the cheap looking interface, but that was a bit of a distraction)...

I'll be looking into foobar, though. Anything with plugins is going to be better than anything without ;)
Re:Second rate! by gordgekko · 2004-09-14 10:39 · Score: 1

Yes, at the moment it's using 1,136K but I've seen it grow as high as 18MB (I have a few plug-ins so my Winamp isn't stock, in case that makes a big difference). Despite that, it doesn't bog down as badly as MMJB did where I had to wait for it to restore itself.

--
You want to know who isn't running Firefox 2.x? They spell it "definately" and "rediculous".
Re:Second rate! by dextroz · 2004-09-14 10:40 · Score: 1

>> Search interface at http://search.yahoo.com/ is almost as clean as Google's. wtf!?? "clean" doesn't even start if I can't type "google " and jump to the search page!

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Where's my free iPod!? Until then, I'll settle for a kiss...
Re:Second rate! by drinkypoo · 2004-09-14 10:56 · Score: 1

Pssst I think you mean X10.

--
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Re:Second rate! by Gentlewhisper · 2004-09-14 11:02 · Score: 1

"I know I'm going against the crowd, but has anyone found anything quite as good as MusicMatch's Smart Tagging capability?"

Yes, it is called "foobar2000"

The tagging capabilities in foobar are really second to none!

And it's an opensourced player too!

--
Online backup with Mozy, sounds like Ozzie, but more!
Re:Second rate! by fermion · 2004-09-14 11:03 · Score: 1

In all fairness, Yahoo! was not primarily a search engine. It was a man made index of sites that early participants in the great WWW experiment might find useful. There wan't much out there, and the good stuff was evident, so there was no need to crawl around the underside of vanity domains to find content.
It was the first at what it did, and still provides a good service. When I am looking for something in a specific catagory, Yahoo! is always a good place to start. The shopping interface is very good. I don't use it as a search engine because it never really was.
Automated search engines fall prey to the ease of stacking the results. Indexes such as Yahoo cannot keep up with all the relevent content. Google will either survive or die depending on if it can defeat the forces of spam. Yahoo will still provide a good service.

--
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Re:Second rate! by mekkab · 2004-09-14 11:28 · Score: 1

thanks for the correction! I've got X-windows on the brain!

--
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
Re:Second rate! by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 12:55 · Score: 0

Musicmatch...is a touch too resource intensive...

That's like saying a floppy is a bit small for file storage.

Windows iPod users try EphPod instead.

"Nietzshe is dead." -God
Re:Second rate! by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 15:23 · Score: 0

A second-rate search engine buys a second rate MP3 player! News at 11!

The reason you might see Yahoo as a "second-rate" search engine is that Yahoo is NOT a search engine! It's a directory. People who work for Yahoo look at submitted web sites, decide if they are worthwhile, categorize them, and add them to the directory. This is very useful for relevance in giving you official sites for things, but on the down side means that the newest stuff might take a while to get added.

A "real" search engine used automated crawlers and indexing. Lost more content, and potentially more up-to-date, but worse on the relevance. The engine is not necessarily good at separating "official" sites from fan sites or shops.

Two different animals entirely.
Re:Second rate! by shutdown+-p+now · 2004-09-14 15:43 · Score: 0

J.River Media Center
MusicMatch is nowhere even near.

Money by Stevyn · 2004-09-14 06:46 · Score: 2, Interesting

I guess Apple's initial thoughts that online music distribution wouldn't yeild much of a profit hasn't quite shown to be true.

Internet Conglomerations? by aldeng · 2004-09-14 06:47 · Score: 5, Interesting

Is it just me, or are all of the internet portals (MSN, AOL, Yahoo) building their own little digital life empires? How long till Google follows suit, or will the even?

Re:Internet Conglomerations? by Nos. · 2004-09-14 06:50 · Score: 3, Interesting

Don't forget, google bought Picasa not that long ago.
Re:Internet Conglomerations? by AKAImBatman · 2004-09-14 06:50 · Score: 4, Interesting

Is it just me, or are all of the internet portals (MSN, AOL, Yahoo) building their own little digital life empires?

I'm surprised it took you this long to notice. The only way you become a mega-corporation is by diversifying across your product lines. The search engines have been in a unique position to do this in the technology world.

How long till Google follows suit, or will the even?

You mean they're not? Between the search engine, Froogle, Google Blogs, GMail, Google Groups, Google News, and other features, I'd have thought they'd be on the top of the list for "digital empires".

--
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Re:Internet Conglomerations? by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 06:51 · Score: 0

Google seems to be expanding with their own projects, but I'm betting it will be a while before they start buying up outside companies like this. Sergei Brin's too obsessive over mathematical completeness to want to saddle the company with outside code, I suspect.
Re:Internet Conglomerations? by kfergos · 2004-09-14 06:51 · Score: 2, Insightful

The question now is, what will the effect be on online music consumers? Greater competition is always advantageous for buyers, driving the price down. If the major internet portals are building their own empires - monopolies? Is such a thing possible online? - it seems that the consumers will once again get screwed as our choices decrease and prices increase.

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Snazzier than a Three-Piece Suit: http://kf.rainydaycommunications.net/
Re:Internet Conglomerations? by peragrin · 2004-09-14 06:55 · Score: 2, Interesting

Hey you want to know a little tiny secret???

AOL, MSN, Yahoo Google, all want to control how yuo view content. That whole WWW thing just got in the way. Think about it, if anyone could access everything what would happen??? Free speach, na just no money for the providers.

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i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
Re:Internet Conglomerations? by michael+path · 2004-09-14 07:04 · Score: 1

Definitely on point, but you left out Google's orkut - perhaps the 'digital life' feature that keeps them even further ahead of the rest of the pack.
Re:Internet Conglomerations? by sxtxixtxcxh · 2004-09-14 07:08 · Score: 1

i, for one, welcome our digital empire overlords.

personally, though, i think google rocks. they make it very easy to leave the google empire. or it would appear so anyway, you'd probably have to take me out in a static bag...

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for a minute there, i lost myself...
Re:Internet Conglomerations? by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:14 · Score: 0

You mean like department stores? supermarkets? fast-food chains?
Re:Internet Conglomerations? by kfergos · 2004-09-14 07:32 · Score: 1

You mean they're not? Between the search engine, Froogle, Google Blogs, GMail, Google Groups, Google News, and other features, I'd have thought they'd be on the top of the list for "digital empires". Although Google has begun building its own "empire," it's only just IPO and maintains the highest-quality search engine & associated tools. I would liken Google to the early Greek city-states: a group of cities loosely joined that were highly influential in the most positive possible way. Even the Roman Empire copied the Greeks, and we still rely on tenets of ancient Greek culture. Now if the Internet follows that pattern and is emulated after Google's style of working, only good things can happen.

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Snazzier than a Three-Piece Suit: http://kf.rainydaycommunications.net/
Re:Internet Conglomerations? by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:33 · Score: 0

WTF? Anyone can access everything, they just need to know the correct URL. And they can find these URLs the same way the search engines do, by following the links from one website to another... Yeah links, remember that whole hyperlinking craze from the 80s? What was it called again? Something-something-web? AOL .. Google aren't controlling your content, your laziness is.
Re:Internet Conglomerations? by marshmeli · 2004-09-14 07:37 · Score: 0

That is true, but MSN and Yahoo have their "digital life empires" but I know no one that uses their services...

As for Google, someone said (and I agree) they have their own empire, but the main difference there is that people us Google's features and many of them. They actually have a great purpose and I like the no frills idea of them. People prob use the Yahoo and MSN features, but no one I do and prob not many techies out there...
Re:Internet Conglomerations? by aacool · 2004-09-14 09:39 · Score: 1

The impact will be limited because of the restrictive contracts with the music companies - they hold the power.
There's not much flexibility on 49-cent and 99-cent items - the business model of Dollar Tree and more.
The competition might get interesting if one of the online stores decided to specialize in quality indie music - to the extent of introducing a convenient interface that allowed people/indie bands to upload music for free and listeners to listen/purchase/rate music and thereby drive attention to lesser known bands
Re:Internet Conglomerations? by MonsterChicharo · 2004-09-14 16:07 · Score: 1

If only this Orkut thing would work:

Server Error in '/' Application
Runtime Error

Yeah, right.
Re:Internet Conglomerations? by MonsterChicharo · 2004-09-14 16:11 · Score: 1

Google seems to be expanding with their own projects, but I'm betting it will be a while before they start buying up outside companies like this
Well, if I recall correctly, both Blogger and Orkut were bought, and none of these two were coded at Google.

Will they merge Launchcast and MM..... by ARRRLovin · 2004-09-14 06:49 · Score: 3, Interesting

so MM knows what you like and will better suit your musical tastes? That would be an interesting data-merge project.

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-Randy

Narrows? by LittleVito · 2004-09-14 06:49 · Score: 5, Insightful

As far as I can tell, Yahoo has an on-line radio service, but not a music services system like MusicMatch. It's not so much narrowing the field as Yahoo was never really in the field to begin with. It's more like moving a player around.

Re:Narrows? by slagdogg · 2004-09-14 07:08 · Score: 1

Let's hope this works out better than Yahoo's last digital media acquisition. I wonder if Musicmatch's CEO is looking to star in a reality show ...

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(Score:-1, Wrong)
Re:Narrows? by Neward+Rylet · 2004-09-14 09:15 · Score: 1

It's Launchcast radio. I just started listening to it at work. It makes you your own station based on your ratings of songs, albums, genres, and artists (which can be done during playtime). They have a 20 second ad every few songs, normally promoting their pay for radio service. The quality is also typical for steamed music.
Re:Narrows? by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 09:45 · Score: 0

I prefer shoutcast. Most stations have no ads and you can save the music to mp3 files using streamripper or stationripper.

Major Narrowing? by TheGax · 2004-09-14 06:49 · Score: 5, Insightful

How exactly does this represent a major narrowing of the online music industry?
Yahoo didn't have any sort of pay music service that I can think of. Their "Launch" thing is basically just a radio station kind of deal. And MusicMatch doesn't say "online music" to me. They're a late comer in the game. Yahoo probably figures they can enter the game buy snapping up the newest (cheapest) player.

Re:Major Narrowing? by joeljkp · 2004-09-14 09:30 · Score: 1

It might not say "online music" to you, but their music store currently offers the highest-quality WMA encodings available (last time I checked): 160kbps for $0.99. They're really the only music store I've bought from.

--
WeRelate.org - wiki-based genealogy
Re:Major Narrowing? by IndependentVik · 2004-09-14 14:51 · Score: 1

OK, I'm taking off my karma bonus for this b/c of the potential flamebait, but isn't talking about the highest-quality WMA recordings available just a little like raving about the most delicious shit sandwich you ever had? :)

--
I'd suggest you don't use Slashdot as your only news source, or you will suffer permanent brain damage.
Re:Major Narrowing? by dmehus · 2004-09-14 18:26 · Score: 1

I disagree. Yahoo! could've bought Napster (the company formerly known as Roxio) for roughly the same price, based on the latest ROXI market capitalization and stock quote figures. Plus, they already have a co-branded Yahoo!/Napster distribution deal. The reason they didn't? Napster is bleeding red ink. Musicmatch, if I'm not mistaken, has been profitable for over a year (perhaps more). Though, I'm not sure *how* profitable as they're privately held.

Cheers,
Doug

--
Doug Mehus http://doug.mehus.info/

shocking by -kertrats- · 2004-09-14 06:49 · Score: 4, Interesting

yet another pointless add-on to clutter up yahoo more...they're reminding me of that new game katamari damacy...

--
The Braying and Neighing of Barnyard Animals Follows.

why is this in any way important by aardwolf204 · 2004-09-14 06:49 · Score: 4, Insightful

Why is this in any way important?

This means little to most slashdotters. We dont use Yahoo, we all switched to google ages ago. We dont use Musicmatch Jukebox, thats what cdex, winamp, xmms, mplayer, etc is for. Didnt we just go through this a few hours ago with Real's player. We bitch, moan, but we dont even use the services / software anyway. This headline is just about exciting as popular desktop wallpaper site merges with popular desktop icon site.

I'm wearing slashdot green today.

--
Im dreaming ofa big bndwdth, That can resist the /.crowd.May ur days b merry & bright & may al

Re:why is this in any way important by Chess_the_cat · 2004-09-14 06:53 · Score: 4, Insightful

This means little to most slashdotters. We dont use Yahoo, we all switched to google ages ago.
Why do people still consider Yahoo! a search engine when it's clearly a web portal and a popular one at that. Can you play Fantasy Football at Google.com? Can you play chess online? Can you watch trailers, listen to music, shop, check your calendar...etc. etc. Google is a great search engine but that's all it is. Yahoo! is a web portal that features a search engine. They're not even in the same game as Google.

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Support the First Amendment. Read at -1
Re:why is this in any way important by Jeff+DeMaagd · 2004-09-14 07:06 · Score: 2, Interesting

I don't use Yahoo for the search engine. I do use it for the email (occasionally) the mapping & directions (not perfect but usually provides a workable starting point), yellow pages, the occasional news story linked from a forum thread and other things.
Re:why is this in any way important by Khomar · 2004-09-14 07:09 · Score: 1

This means little to most slashdotters... We dont use Musicmatch Jukebox...

I have found Musicmatch to be a great little MP3 player with some nice features (Auto-DJ, stay on top, etc.). While I do not use the online portions of the software, I have not found another MP3 player that I like better (iTunes came close but it didn't work with my keyboard buttons). A little while back, I remember Musicmatch was recommended by PC Magazine, and it has a fairly substantial user base. Just because you don't use a product does not mean that there aren't others out there that do.

--
I believe in de-evolution. God made the world perfect, man fell, and its been going downhill ever since!
Re:why is this in any way important by StevenHenderson · 2004-09-14 07:16 · Score: 1

Can you play chess online?
Only on Slashdot would that be a reason to support a portal. :)
Re:why is this in any way important by Zorilla · 2004-09-14 07:17 · Score: 1

This means little to most slashdotters....We dont use Musicmatch Jukebox, thats what cdex, winamp, xmms, mplayer, etc is for.

You must be new here.

(Yeah, I see the UID)

--

It would be cool if it didn't suck.
Re:why is this in any way important by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:23 · Score: 0

You don't sound like a savvy consumer. You pick one company and do all your consumption there. Loyalty is good, but you end up "paying" more for some things or just plain miss out on better products that are not carried by your chosen provider.

If you're savvy, for every service you need, you'd evaluate all providers objectively, looking for the best "price"/quality combination. Perhaps you might choose Google for searching and email, but Yahoo for stock quotes, music, and weather. And periodically you want to reevaluate your choices, again objectively.

As it is, your cult-like loyalty/hatred is only harming yourself.
Re:why is this in any way important by aardwolf204 · 2004-09-14 07:24 · Score: 1

I don't use Yahoo for the search engine. I do use it for the email (occasionally) the mapping & directions (not perfect but usually provides a workable starting point), yellow pages, the occasional news story linked from a forum thread and other things.

www.gmail.com
local.google.com
news.google.com

And labs.google.com if your curious

And always remember to, run linux, switch friends to firefox, read slashdot, hate the DMCA, support the EFF, drink the GNU koolaid, and profit.

--
Im dreaming ofa big bndwdth, That can resist the /.crowd.May ur days b merry & bright & may al
Re:why is this in any way important by DarkMantle · 2004-09-14 07:30 · Score: 1

"Can you play Fantasy Football at Google.com? Can you play chess online?"

No... but I can find other, specialized, Fantasy Football and specialized games sites. Since most of Yahoo's Games were just taken from PopCap anyway I'd rather go to the source and let them get money for the advertisements. So they can continue to develop these, and other, games.

--
DarkMantle I been bored, so I started a blog.
Re:why is this in any way important by aardwolf204 · 2004-09-14 07:34 · Score: 2, Funny

Sure, I could do tons of stuff on Yahoo. Get driving directions, play games online, read news, check stocks, do email, auctions, personals, movie trailers, but then my bookmarks would all have little yellow "Y!"'s next to them and that's only one step above butterflies and flags on my web browser, instant messenger, email client, and media player and that wreaks of conformity.

We've got to have tabbed browsing, odd codec playing, grass roots protocol speaking, vi and emacs running, happy little apps with a logo zoo full of loveable creatures. *Imagines tux dancing in a field with the fox, bird, gnu, and squirrel in slow motion*

Nobody doubted that yahoo provides a cool service, what you failed to notice was the little green logo on the top left of this page.

This is not an attack on yahoo or your character, its just a generalization about the demographics of slashdot, so start drinking the kool-aid.

--
Im dreaming ofa big bndwdth, That can resist the /.crowd.May ur days b merry & bright & may al
Re:why is this in any way important by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:37 · Score: 0

Tried it too once, too bloated for me. Try winamp, especially the 2.9 version if your into light.
Re:why is this in any way important by aardwolf204 · 2004-09-14 07:43 · Score: 1

Maybe you didnt read it right, thats exactly what I was saying. I'm not cult-like loyal to anything. I mentioned 3 different media players, all with pros and cons. I'm not cult-like loyal to google either, theres tons of great stuff between all the portals its just a matter of finding what you like and keeping tidy bookmarks.

Anyway, like I said, I'm wearing my slashdot green today, take what I said with a grain of salt. Consider it an over generalization. The feel around slashdot seems to be about choice, not conformity or loyalty, though there are strong feelings of loyalty among operating systems and search engines, the underlying message is choice and without slashdot I would probably not ever known that so many alternatives to so many things were out there.

Nod your head, smile, drink the kool-aid, and be merry, its only a matter of time before the original post gets modded -1 funny or offtopic anyway.

--
Im dreaming ofa big bndwdth, That can resist the /.crowd.May ur days b merry & bright & may al
Re:why is this in any way important by Unkle · 2004-09-14 07:48 · Score: 1

Though I use Winamp 5 for most of my MP3 playing enjoyment, I have found a good use for MusicMatch - ripping/recording. I use it to rip my CD collection (out of 120+ cds, only a couple extreme oddballs were not recognized by it's CD database), and also to do the initial recording from cassette tape to .wav for conversion of some old tapes to CD. I know there are other, more powerful, just as free programs out there, but MusicMatch has the added benefit that it is extremely easy to use.

--
Against stupidity, the gods themselves contend in vain.
Re:why is this in any way important by dswensen · 2004-09-14 07:59 · Score: 1

...and that wreaks of conformity.

Man, you're hardcore. Even your spelling doesn't conform!
Re:why is this in any way important by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 08:05 · Score: 0

Furthermore, can you check your email at Google? If so, please send an invite to C4AtOutgunDotCom!
Re:why is this in any way important by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 08:06 · Score: 0

1v3 g0t 4sc11 g04ts33 t4t00'd 0n my a55%!@#!!oneone!!
Re:why is this in any way important by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 08:08 · Score: 0

"We dont use Yahoo, we all switched to google ages ago."
How is this anything but cult-like loyalty/hatred?
Re:why is this in any way important by Quarters · 2004-09-14 09:07 · Score: 1

That's an interesting statement considering Yahoo! is my home page, MusicMatch is my music application of choice, and I have a Slashdot ID that's only five digits long.
Please don't generalize. Please don't think that Slashdot isn't a varied community of people with different needs and different choices. If you want to be a Linux isolationist then go hang out in #linux on irc and just say "RTFM" to any newbie that comes in with a problem.
Re:why is this in any way important by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 12:28 · Score: 0

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarcasm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humor
Re:why is this in any way important by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-16 13:38 · Score: 0

You forgot the camel.

Fine, as long as they dontt "Yahoo!" it! by jbarr · 2004-09-14 06:50 · Score: 4, Insightful

Well, I PAID for the "lifetime" update subscription for MusicMatch a couple years ago, and have been very happy withe the app. Unfortunatly, Yahoo! is notorious for filling its pages (mail, groups, etc.) with huge, obnoxious ads--even on paid eamil accounts. So if Yahoo! junks up MusicMatch with its typical ads like their other online services, I'll dump it in a heartbeat.

MusicMatch has been a lean, mean app that has worked on systems that WinAmp couldn't. If Yahoo mucks this one up, I'll be really pissed.

--
My mom always said, "Jim, you're 1 in a million." Given the current population, there are 7000 of me. God help us all!

Re:Fine, as long as they dontt "Yahoo!" it! by milkisgood · 2004-09-14 07:01 · Score: 0

I couldn't agree more.I love MM's artist on demand service, well worth the money. Yahoo buying MM is like Toys R Us buying Mandrake. If that damned red Y! starts popping up all over MM I wouldn't hesitate to drop my subscription.
Re:Fine, as long as they dontt "Yahoo!" it! by jazman_777 · 2004-09-14 07:01 · Score: 1

MusicMatch has been a lean, mean app...
Let me guess. You weigh 468 pounds?

--
Slashdot: Failed Car Analogies. Amateur Lawyering. Anecdote Battles.
Re:Fine, as long as they dontt "Yahoo!" it! by sjs132 · 2004-09-14 07:10 · Score: 2

And this hurts MM/Yahoo how?

"Dammit, I paid for the software, and if you change it I'm gonna quit using it!"

Hmmm... Sounds like you just cut off your nose...

I bucked up and bought winamp "Pro" version... I too have MM Jukebox lifetime... I like the Winamp much better and haven't felt bad about the extra $$$ for a decent mp3 player... But as a previous poster stated, the MMJB Smart tagging is awsome... .It's about the only thing I use my MMJB for...

Old version 6 of MMJB too, as somewhere along the line, it got SLOW AND CLUDGY when it starts up... sometimes bogging down the system a good bit... MMJB tech said they won't say what the changes were because it proprietary software... No problem, just didn't do any upgrades since.

ooops, look at that, the horse just died... Guess we can stop beating it now...

--
--- Relax, that mass muderer is just trying to reduce our carbon footprint, one fetus at a time...
Re:Fine, as long as they dontt "Yahoo!" it! by rmezzari · 2004-09-14 07:15 · Score: 1

MusicMatch has been a lean, mean app that has worked on systems that WinAmp couldn't

What? Lean and mean? MM is bloated beyond hope. And if you need a mp3 player that works on any system, try WinAmp lite, even on the 5.x version. Its about 700k and just works.

--
"Emancipate yourself from mental slavery, none but ourselves can free our minds !"
Re:Fine, as long as they dontt "Yahoo!" it! by Zorilla · 2004-09-14 07:20 · Score: 3, Informative

I actually test installed 9.0 a few days ago. Instead of one 40 MB process, there's four or five 9 MB processes for just one instance of MusicMatch Jukebox. That and the 5 seconds it takes to load is enough to discredit it being a lean, mean app.

--

It would be cool if it didn't suck.
Re:Fine, as long as they dontt "Yahoo!" it! by value_added · 2004-09-14 07:39 · Score: 1

"So if Yahoo! junks up MusicMatch with its typical ads like their other online services, I'll dump it in a heartbeat."

Since you mentioned it ...

As a DSL subscriber, I get Yahoo! email accounts but thankfully, I've had to use their web-based interface only twice. The "home page" they've set up for subscribers like me is so bad that I cringe having to go there to make an account settings change.

As for Yahoo! Groups, my opinion is that if similar content isn't available directly from my usenet server (or someone else's web-based archive), I can't possibly need it that bad. Nevertheless, it is annoying when stumbling across yet another "Press here to continue" advert-laden archived page when searching on Google. The advertising is insidious, but they're making money, right?

My own complaints aside, I feel bad for everyone who gets advertising footers added to each email they send -- but not as bad as I feel for myself having to change my procmail recipes to strip them off. Never been able to tell my friends the trouble I go to to "clean off" what they send me, so whinging on Slashdot for a day will have to suffice.
Re:Fine, as long as they dontt "Yahoo!" it! by Ciannait · 2004-09-14 09:04 · Score: 1

Go download AdMuncher. Best $30 I've ever spent.

--
A good traveller has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving.
Re:Fine, as long as they dontt "Yahoo!" it! by Dr.+Trevorkian · 2004-09-14 13:54 · Score: 1

Regarding Musicmatch, I'll definitely agree that it's chunky, but I'm also a subscriber and have been since version 3 or 4 (I forget). I mainly purchased a license for ripping CDs to MP3 (which in short order I found wasn't the best move) and I've continued using it as such over the years. It's a stable app with enough bloat and feature creep to make me annoyed, but it's no more a system hog than iTunes is and I have more options than iTunes provides as well.

Also, just for giggles, here's what I find in Task Manager regarding Musicmatch:
3,248 K mm_director.exe 6,224 K MM_TDM~1.EXE 3,548 K MMDiag.exe 9,420 K mmjb.exe 2,896 K mmtask Total: 25,336 K
I also happen to be ripping all tracks from a noisy CD to MP3 at variable bitrates up to 320 kbps. So those numbers are a little higher than normal. YMMV, of course.

Narrowing? by LowneWulf · 2004-09-14 06:50 · Score: 4, Insightful

Does Yahoo own other online music shops already? Otherwise, how is this narrowing the market?

Re:Narrowing? by corrosive_nf · 2004-09-14 07:45 · Score: 1

Not yet. I know plenty of retards who would gladly buy a mp3 player with that stupid yahoo logo plastered on it just becauase Yahoo is the internet to them.

Branching out by StevenHenderson · 2004-09-14 06:51 · Score: 3, Interesting

Does anyone think that this is Yahoo's way of not putting all their eggs in one basket since they are losing search engine "marketshare" to Google?

This might re-invigorate Musicmatch if Yahoo decides to roll out the Marketing Machine.

Re:Branching out by LostCluster · 2004-09-14 06:55 · Score: 2, Informative

Yahoo always has been in the business of branching out and becoming a "web portal" rather than a search engine. That's why they've got e-mail, fanatasy football games, a music news site, an IM client, and all sorts of other things in their brand image.

It's Google who always stayed as a search engine only and is making newsworthy branch out efforts in the form of GMail and such.
Re:Branching out by DrEldarion · 2004-09-14 06:56 · Score: 1

Yahoo has had other markets for a LONG time. They've got a messenger, personals, auto reviews, classifieds, maps, shops, hosting, etc. etc. They're a lot more than just a search engine.
Re:Branching out by StevenHenderson · 2004-09-14 07:04 · Score: 1

Yes, you are right - I meant to ask if they are trying to get their hands in as many things as possible due to the fact they are losing out to competitors in a lot of categories - especially as Google branches out. Sorry for being unclear...
Re:Branching out by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 08:04 · Score: 0

Son, Yahoo was a web portal before google even existed. Yeah, a "web portal" with all kinds of different services. There were Yahoo, Excite, Go.com, and a whole bunch of others. Wow... I can't believe the web is so old now that some people are too young to remember the pre-google years.
Re:Branching out by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 09:12 · Score: 0

michael{at}healthyhealing.com

thanks in advance!
Re:Branching out by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 10:20 · Score: 0

sent....enjoy!

Slashdot summary wrong yet again... by LostCluster · 2004-09-14 06:52 · Score: 4, Insightful

This is a major narrowing of the online music market.

Excuse me? I don't see any "Yahoo! Music Download" service folding up. "Launch Music on Yahoo" is a music news site, now likely to see its brand image tied closer to the MusicMatch music delivery service.

Yahoo!'s favorite music delivery service at this point according to the launch.yahoo.com page appears to be going out and buying the CD the old fashioned way at Target.

Re:Slashdot summary wrong yet again... by DogDude · 2004-09-14 07:11 · Score: 1

Actually, Launch is probably the best streaming radio service on the Net. I've been using them since before Yahoo bought them, and Yahoo has only improved it. I only hope that they don't screw up Launch in favor of MusicMatch.

--
I don't respond to AC's.

Pre-installed crap by bubbaprog · 2004-09-14 06:53 · Score: 3, Insightful

Has anyone noticed how impossible this stuff is to remove from a new Dell computer? Hopefully Yahoo! does something about this bloated piece of ubiquitous spyware.

Re:Pre-installed crap by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 06:59 · Score: 0

You buy Dell? Ha ha

Guys, guys, lookie. HE BUYS DELL. Ha ha ha ha.

Boom boom, chika boom boom.

HE FREAKIN' BUYS DELL AND COMPLAINS. BOO BOO

Ok Ok. Seriously, assemble your own computer. That way you don't pay WinXP tax and don't need to uninstall nothing.
Re:Pre-installed crap by theGreater · 2004-09-14 06:59 · Score: 1

That's why you should go for the n series and save yourself a whole lot of hassle to start with. I just installed 20 of these things and they work great.
One thing to note, however, is that you should REALLY get the $20 Dell floppy add on. They don't come with a standard floppy mount or faceplate, and I had to fabricate 20 ugly metal kluges while simultaneously defacing my pricewatch special FDD's.

-theGreater nSeries Fan.
Re:Pre-installed crap by bubbaprog · 2004-09-14 07:06 · Score: 1

I was talking about friends' computers. You know, the "my computer quit working come help" kind. I *do* assemble the ones I use myself.
Re:Pre-installed crap by gcaseye6677 · 2004-09-14 07:18 · Score: 1

In all seriousness, who the hell needs floppys anymore? I know Apple was a bit premature in removing the floppy from the IMac, but now that external storage devices are so cheap and easy to use, the 1.44 MB (won't even hold a powerpoint file) floppy drive belongs in a museum. Use a writable CD for data/software transfers and system recovery. Use a USB keychain drive for small file transfers. Please people, let the dinosaur die already!
Re:Pre-installed crap by m2bord · 2004-09-14 07:38 · Score: 1

now that you mention it...i have noticed that Yahoo's new pest patrol app embedded in it's IE toolbar reports the MusicMatch dll's as spyware. i guess we can expect that result to be tweaked a little bit.

--
Is it 5:30 yet?
Re:Pre-installed crap by Rude+Turnip · 2004-09-14 07:49 · Score: 1

MusicMatch uninstalled itself from my Dell laptop just like any other app. It looked like an OK program, but I was already set in my ways.

--
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
Re:Pre-installed crap by toddestan · 2004-09-14 14:39 · Score: 1

I think the grandparent's point is that if you don't get the floppy, but later decide you need one, you're pretty screwed due to Dell's crappy case designs.

Besides, no one is forcing you to use a floppy disk anyway.
Re:Pre-installed crap by iamacat · 2004-09-15 03:47 · Score: 1

Seriously, assemble your own computer

Every time I tried that I ended up with mystereous lockups, screen-streaking deaths, random failures to power on properly and so on. I suspect parts from different vendors are just slightly out of spec and PC makers know not to use a particular memory chip with a particular motherboard. Also, they might run some kind of test on assembled PCs and if you discover a problem you can just return the whole thing in one place.

With a homemade PC, the source of the trouble may not be obvious and you may have to return parts to all the different web stores and possibly pay for return shipping.

Funny by StevenHenderson · 2004-09-14 06:53 · Score: 5, Funny

Funny how now you can use a company's search engine to crack a piece of its software!

Re:Funny by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:20 · Score: 0

And if search engines blocked warez searches, you'd hear the complaints from people who "only use cracks on legitimately bought software, honest".
Re:Funny by hendridm · 2004-09-14 07:35 · Score: 1

Funny how now you can use a company's search engine to crack a piece of its software!

Same with Google's Picasa.

Oh wait, they give that away free...

Comment removed by account_deleted · 2004-09-14 06:53 · Score: 3, Interesting

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Not Dell.... by Fenceman · 2004-09-14 06:55 · Score: 3, Interesting

And I thought for sure that Dell would have been the one to buy up MusicMatch. Oh well, as long as Yahoo can keep up the high quality that I've become accustomed to with MM, I'll be happy--not likely given their history though :(

Re:crappy engine, crappy player by mfrnka · 2004-09-14 06:55 · Score: 1

ITunes does not offer a streaming on-demand music service.

been a while since I tried musicmatch by John_Allen_Mohammed · 2004-09-14 06:56 · Score: 3, Interesting

but the last time I did, it just skipped over all 37,000 of my music files because it didn't support .ogg. Any change since then or is it still crippleware ?

--

Skype Me! username: john_allen_mohammed

Re:been a while since I tried musicmatch by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:07 · Score: 1, Insightful

what the hell are you doing with .ogg?...not trying to be rude...just ignorant, i guess.
Re:been a while since I tried musicmatch by pgrst · 2004-09-14 08:12 · Score: 1

but the last time I did, it just skipped over all 37,000 of my music files because it didn't support .ogg. Any change since then or is it still crippleware ?

Yes it is still "crippleware" if by "crippleware" you mean it doesn't support the 0.0001% of users who have music stored in .ogg format.
Re:been a while since I tried musicmatch by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 08:13 · Score: 0

I know how ya feel...My VCR still won't play any of my beta's OR my big round laser discs.

MEDIACHEST.COM by MalaclypseTheYounger · 2004-09-14 06:57 · Score: 0

This still has no effect on my offline music/gaming/movie sharing ...

http://www.mediachest.com./

It's free, it's simple, and you get to meet new people in your area with your same interests.

--
Check out the best P2P sharing website: MEDIACHEST.COM

Oblig. Simpsons quote. by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 06:58 · Score: 0

And in entertainment news, we have Lisa Simpson singing her Number 2 hit: "Born to Runner-Up."

Yahoo: the place for everything by glass_window · 2004-09-14 06:58 · Score: 1

You knew they had to do it eventually, the question always was, "Which music-providing company is it going to be?" Now we know.

blah by Tirinal · 2004-09-14 06:59 · Score: 5, Insightful

This is a major narrowing of the online music market.

Not really. For all practical intents and purposes, Apple has the online music market under its thumb. Barring some very unYahoo-like innovation, the consequences of this sale will likely be nothing more than surface ripples.

--
~Tirinal

Re:blah by metlin · 2004-09-14 08:28 · Score: 0, Troll

Not really. Please stop trolling.

I can never really understand why the Slashdot crowd goes all out for Apple, when some of their policies are just as shitty.

Apple is trying to tie you down to their hardware, and their music service while good, is not the only one nor is it the best.

Try Microsoft's online music service. It's much better than Apple's. Apple had a good ride because they were the first - I'll hand that to them. Nothing more. When better services come (and yes, Microsoft's service seems *much* better - go have a look) along, Apple will fall back and not care about it's existing users. Think it hasn't happened before?

All Apple does is come up with new technologies, use them while they're new and dump them once they're done. Sometimes I think that if Steve Jobs invited some of the Mac-heads to hell, everyone will follow him.

Barring some very unYahoo-like innovation

Excuse me? Yahoo in and of itself was an innovation. When nobody cared about webhosting, they acquired Geocities. And they broke into the IM market long before even Microsoft cared to notice.
Re:blah by Tirinal · 2004-09-14 08:56 · Score: 1

Trolling: "The unwanted excessive display of opinion designed to inflame other users."

Nowhere in my post did I say anything about either the quality or the merits of Apple's business model, products, or services. All I said about said company was that they were the dominant player in the distribution and management of online music. And if you think that's merely an opinion and not a fact you need to look at some marketshare numbers.

Concerning the rest of your post:
1) Apple does not tie you into their hardware, or at least not nearly as much as most other companies. Want to use IE instead of Safari or Word instead of Office? Go ahead. Want to upgrade Windows XP with anything but IE? Tough luck.
2) Everyone has their preference about what music service they use. My personal opinion is that Microsoft's is pretty lousy, but if you tell me why you favor them I can debate their merits with you.
3) Yahoo does not generally innovate. They are very good at recognizing a new thing and consolidating several new things together, but actual novel conception isn't their forte. Neither is, historically speaking, refinement of an already existing service. Yahoo bought Geocities. Yahoo consolidated several services (Yellow pages, online maps) that had already existed into one site. This is all very fine, but it is very different from a company like Apple who realized before anyone else had done it that online music purchasing could work or that, yes, people really did like not having to deal with security errors every other day.

I don't mean this as a bashing or fanboy post, but in the spectrum of the points you raised I think Apple does outshine the competitors.

--
~Tirinal
Re:blah by metlin · 2004-09-14 09:32 · Score: 1

1) Apple does not tie you into their hardware, or at least not nearly as much as most other companies. Want to use IE instead of Safari or Word instead of Office? Go ahead. Want to upgrade Windows XP with anything but IE? Tough luck.

Earlier on in the article with Real's CEO's interview, he compared Real's policies with Microsoft - and a poster commented that comparing something with turd does not make it smell like roses. Comparing Apple with MS does not make it any better. Ofcourse they're better. But that does not mean that their bad policies go away.

2) Everyone has their preference about what music service they use. My personal opinion is that Microsoft's is pretty lousy, but if you tell me why you favor them I can debate their merits with you.

Ease of use? The fact that it does not tie me down to any one player? They sell just a service, just the music - and leave the choice of the hardware to you (okay, this is arguable, but given Apple's attitude towards Real is quite detestable - interoperability is a good thing, and I can never understand why Apple acts that way).

But then again, like you said, it's about choice and opinions.

3) Yahoo does not generally innovate.

Had you included that word - generally - in your previous post, I would not have beleagured on. However, the fact remains that Yahoo has innovated in the past. Yes, they stopped innovating after the dotcom boom. Why? Because when you are under pressure from investors to downsize and optimize your resources to show a bottomline, you do not really have much leeway for innovation. I know, this is not an excuse - but having been up and down in the dotcom era, I've seen it happen and it's sad.

Apple was not the first to realize about music online - it is the fact that Apple has the kind of *userbase* who will take up what Apple brings out and make it work. Few companies have that ability, and that is what was initially responsible for Apple's success. Online music is an old, old concept. And many had implemented it well enough.

Besides, Apple is used by people who deal a lot in Audio/Video (I have an ibook for my graphics stuff). These are mostly the artsy people who will definitely pay and buy the kind of stuff that Apple brought out.

I don't mean this as a bashing or fanboy post, but in the spectrum of the points you raised I think Apple does outshine the competitors.

I understand, and my apologies if my post came across as inflammatory. But I'm just tired of Apple users who praise all of Apple's actions, when I find some of their actions just as despicable as anyone else's. I use Apple myself (right tool for the job and stuff like that) - but I do not approve of the way Apple handled the Real rights scenario.

Your post merely sounded like Apple has complete control over the music market, which I do not quite think is the case. Sure, they have a LOT of users, but other companies have pitched in just recently and it's too soon to say how things will go. Apple has a history of doing the right thing first and then screwing it up. And which is exactly what they are doing now, too.

Personally, I think several competitors is a good thing. If not anything, it will lead to competitive pricing and better service to the customers.
Re:blah by Tirinal · 2004-09-14 10:15 · Score: 1

Earlier on in the article with Real's CEO's interview, he compared Real's policies with Microsoft - and a poster commented that comparing something with turd does not make it smell like roses. Comparing Apple with MS does not make it any better. Ofcourse they're better. But that does not mean that their bad policies go away.

You're right, of course. Given that so few companies rise above shareholder nitpicking over stock value, however, even relative morality is at least a step forward. Apple isn't endorsed by God and the angels, but at least they generally have decent to good products whereas frequently hardware locking is used as a way to retain a consumer base with an inferior product.

Ease of use? The fact that it does not tie me down to any one player? They sell just a service, just the music - and leave the choice of the hardware to you (okay, this is arguable, but given Apple's attitude towards Real is quite detestable - interoperability is a good thing, and I can never understand why Apple acts that way).

But then again, like you said, it's about choice and opinions.

I'm only speaking for myself, but iTunes is easier and more streamlined for me to use than any other program. The layout and purchasing is as simple and efficient as anything else out there, though I think it does lack certain features.

On the tie-in issue: I think it depends on how you look at it. Apple has said numerous times that they make very little off iTunes and mainly intend for it to be used as a promotional device for the iPod. In that sense, you can effectively view the service as merely an extension of the actual music player. With that said, iTunes is hardly a lock-in. You can set it to download music in mp3 as well as AAC and then simply export the files to another program. Or alternatively, import files from another program.

Had you included that word - generally - in your previous post, I would not have beleagured on. However, the fact remains that Yahoo has innovated in the past. Yes, they stopped innovating after the dotcom boom. Why? Because when you are under pressure from investors to downsize and optimize your resources to show a bottomline, you do not really have much leeway for innovation. I know, this is not an excuse - but having been up and down in the dotcom era, I've seen it happen and it's sad.

In a marketplace playing field, "innovation" is a hard word to strictly define. Let's just let this one lie; I don't really feel like squabbling over decades of corporate history right now.

I understand, and my apologies if my post came across as inflammatory. But I'm just tired of Apple users who praise all of Apple's actions, when I find some of their actions just as despicable as anyone else's. I use Apple myself (right tool for the job and stuff like that) - but I do not approve of the way Apple handled the Real rights scenario.

I'm much the same actually. I have a PB because I love OSX and most of the software within it (macs themselves I'm actually rather impartial to), but I think the Real incident was a black mark. No company is perfect, but you just have to grit your teeth and balance the evils.

Your post merely sounded like Apple has complete control over the music market, which I do not quite think is the case. Sure, they have a LOT of users, but other companies have pitched in just recently and it's too soon to say how things will go. Apple has a history of doing the right thing first and then screwing it up. And which is exactly what they are doing now, too.

They don't have complete control, but they are pretty firmly entrenched. So much so, that I think it will take something very groundbreaking on the competitor's part or very stupid on Apple's part to change the percentages anytime soon.

Personally, I think several competitors is a good thing. If not anything, it will lead to competitive pricing and better service to the customers.

I'm pretty sure Walmart is se

--
~Tirinal

weighing in... by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 06:59 · Score: 0

Have a free music download, /.
BL7VTZ71C3ZM

-The Burger King

Re:crappy engine, crappy player by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:02 · Score: 0

A crappy seach engine and a crappy media player...what a match! iTunes whips its ass hands-down

If anyone's doing any whipping around here, it's Winamp.

News at 11 by WesG · 2004-09-14 07:02 · Score: 3, Funny

You ready for an awesome knock-knock joke?

Knock knock?
Who's there?
Goo
Goo who?
GOOOOOOOOOOOGLE

But seriously....

Re:News at 11 by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:12 · Score: 0

guysm od parent<chuckle>up

Do the Math by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:02 · Score: 1, Insightful

I would be interested to see the numbers, but it would seem that even ten million songs, at a profit of maybe ten cents apiece (though it's probably closer to five), yields a profit of only a million dollars--small, small potatoes for a company like Yahoo! or Apple.

But it's the "hot thing" right now that is attracting investors. You've gotta have an online music store! But the people profiting are (1)the publishers (read: RIAA) who don't have to do anything but rake in the royalties while others pay for the distribution and (2)the companies manufacturing players for this stuff.

Yahoo! is jumping on a bandwagon. Maybe because people are starting to view them as last year's tech company? Who knows. All I know is, iTunes has got to be making a lot more money (for Apple) selling iPods than selling songs.

Free computers!

Re:Do the Math by VoxCombo · 2004-09-14 16:00 · Score: 1

the people profiting are (1)the publishers (read: RIAA) who don't have to do anything but rake in the royalties while others pay for the distribution

The RIAA represents record labels, not publishers. Many big record labels have in-house publishing, but still most artists publish their songs with third parties.

Publishers are making out alright with digital downloads, however record labels are jsut making out ok. While it is true that they do not pay for distribution for digital downloads, they still must pay for marketing, the cost of which dwarfs the cost of distribution. This marketing must be paid for with a profit margin much smaller than that of a CD.

Huttah for consitancy! by Lordcheez · 2004-09-14 07:03 · Score: 1

Here's the way this makes sense: Yahoo vs Google Musicmatch vs iTunes, Napster, any other seller Musicmatch vs WinAmp or dare I say Windows Media Player. Huttah for draggin your once millionare company in to the ground by purchasing software that most folks I know have uninstalled at least 5 times.

does this mean... by m2bord · 2004-09-14 07:03 · Score: 3, Funny

that we have to listen to the Yahoo! yodel after every 4 mp3's?

--
Is it 5:30 yet?

Musicmatch was good by helmespc · 2004-09-14 07:04 · Score: 0, Troll

Musicmatch was good... when it was free... They added CD burning and crap to it... and it became totally ruined... you just can't beat Winamp these days... and iTunes is bloated trash as well... if you don't want to use the music store and/or iPod functionality... its a little excessive and takes up a ton of memory...

Re:Musicmatch was good by Zorilla · 2004-09-14 07:25 · Score: 2, Interesting

Yeah, because a player with a minibrowser, video playback, and a 30 MB footprint is so much better. Nullsoft should really continue to develop Winamp 2 again.

--

It would be cool if it didn't suck.
Re:Musicmatch was good by helmespc · 2004-09-14 07:37 · Score: 1

I thought about this myself... but Winamp5's video playback and minibrowser are tastefully done and unless someone mentions them I typically forget they're even there... and as a whole the program still takes up less than 10 megs of ram... iTunes on the other hand had a memory footprint of quite a bit more than that, at least the version I had been using... I forget the exact number, but it felt pretty excessive... and I was fairly unimpressed with its library capabilities, although the search as you type feature is nice... iTunes didn't seem to like me putting songs where I wanted to...
Re:Musicmatch was good by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 08:12 · Score: 0

www.oldversion.com. Get winamp2.
Re:Musicmatch was good by toddestan · 2004-09-14 14:44 · Score: 1

Maybe you should try Winamp 5 Lite, which doesn't have the video player, media library, modern skin support, and a lot of the bloat?

Besides, to all those people that want Winamp 2 back because it was "less bloated": Winamp 2 also had things like the minibrowser, and video player. Maybe you want Winamp 1?
Re:Musicmatch was good by Zorilla · 2004-09-14 20:43 · Score: 1

I almost do want version 1. I remember being kinda disappointed back in 1997ish that the load time pretty much doubled for Winamp in the version 2 jump.

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It would be cool if it didn't suck.

trendsetters by Doc+Ruby · 2004-09-14 07:04 · Score: 3, Interesting

When Yahoo bought Broadcast.com at the height of the dotcom equity inflation in 1998, the purchase price was divided by the number of songs in which Yahoo thereby owned the copyright. That was the basis for the RIAA agreement, now law, pricing online performances of each song at $0.000,7 each listen. Of course the performance fees are collected in cash, while the Yahoo/Broadcast.com deal was in inflated stock, so the cost of publishing is prohibitive for all but corporate "official" publishers.

The new deal for MusicMatch should provide a new calculus for the "market price per song". How many performances has Yahoo purchased, for how much money? After the math dust has settled, what's the price per listen?

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--
make install -not war

not in the paid email anymore by ChipMonk · 2004-09-14 07:06 · Score: 4, Informative

I have a paid Yahoo email account. I haven't seen a big obnoxious ad in my email interface since they re-vamped and upped their quotas earlier this year.

Not sure the summary makes sense... by inkdesign · 2004-09-14 07:06 · Score: 3, Insightful

How is this a "major narrowing of the online music market" when all the same players still exist, new stores open left and right, and one simply has a new owner?

Opening Chime by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:11 · Score: 1, Interesting

And it plays their little theeme when it launces. I use a thinkpad and have it mutted, but it will still play the chimes. this means I cannot have a shortcut to it anywhere I might accidently click during a meeting.

Re:Major Narrowing? [meta-OT] by kelnos · 2004-09-14 07:11 · Score: 0, Offtopic

C'mon mods, read the timestamps. The other post about this was sent in at the same time. Can't fault a guy for having a similar idea simultaneously. -1 Redundant is a bit much...

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Xfce: Lighter than some, heavier than others. Just right.

Re:Narrowing? Maybe... by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:15 · Score: 0

yeah...too many of the online music stores just sell the same stuff. however, MM isn't only an online music store...it's known for other innovative services (such as legal music sharing), library/portables management, etc. been using it for years as well as subscribed to their services...try using their radio service, then looking at the reccomendations it pushes out to you...if you listen to non-mainstream artists, you'll get like-minded reccomendations.

I can do all of those things by IshanCaspian · 2004-09-14 07:15 · Score: 1

And I can't say I've ever needed Yahoo to do any of those things. I've checked out a lot of Yahoo stuff, but I've never found any of their offerings to be very compelling or useful.

http://gameknot.com/
http://www.apple.com/trail ers/
http://www.suprnova.org/
http://www.froogle .com/
http://www.mozilla.org/
http://www.horde.o rg/kronolith/

And...uh...fantasy football? This is *slashdot*.... ...but I'm sure some meathead out there will help me out...

--

But there is another kind of evil that we must fear most... and that is the indifference of good men.

Re:I can do all of those things by smurf975 · 2004-09-14 07:46 · Score: 1

When he said portal that means that all of those things are at the same website.

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-- I don't buy it, I grow it.

Re:crappy engine, crappy player by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:16 · Score: 0

And this is a disadvantage how?

God Bless by g0bshiTe · 2004-09-14 07:17 · Score: 2, Insightful

./xmms

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I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!

Re:crappy engine, crappy player by Masami+Eiri · 2004-09-14 07:19 · Score: 2, Funny

Only if the whippees are llamas.

Integrating with instant messenger? by 192939495969798999 · 2004-09-14 07:20 · Score: 1

I have wondered for some time if one of these companies wouldn't integrate an instant messenger product with a music product. I would like to text friends from my iPod. Not that I have an iPod, or friends with text capability, but still, it seems plausible that Yahoo wants to make MusicMatch Jukebox a part of their IM client.

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stuff |

Re:Integrating with instant messenger? by metalpet · 2004-09-14 07:56 · Score: 3, Informative

You should check the latest yahoo messenger client, as it already integrates with launchast radio.
It also lets you put what song you're listening to in your online status, so your friends can appreciate how hip you are, or something.
As a bonus, if a friend clicks on your status, he gets to hear a bit of the song you're hearing.

Musicmatch.com history by Sabaki · 2004-09-14 07:21 · Score: 3, Interesting

Neat, it's almost like I've been bought by Yahoo.

Back in the day, my company (Creative Multimedia Corporation, long since gone the way of the dodo), created MusicMatch.com, MovieMatch.com, HealthExplorer.com, the original Dr. Ruth's website. Among others. I was webmaster for most of these. Oh, the glory days.

When CMC started to fold, we sold off MusicMatch.com and the logo to a little company then called Brava software. I remember transferring and renaming their entire library (20 songs or so) with a shell script. It didn't seem like a good business model, because who would buy these huge music files from them?

But I guess they made it work well enough to get bought.

Narrowing? by gamgee5273 · 2004-09-14 07:23 · Score: 1

How is this a narrowing? Yahoo! doesn't currently offer any music stores or MP3 players, does it?

So how in the world is this a "narrowing?"

Almost as bad as RealPlayer by British · 2004-09-14 07:23 · Score: 1

MusicMatch has as many bells and whistles of incentives for you to upgrade. Heaven forbid you accidentally click on an MP3 with it being associated to MM. You can't close it out cleanly without it reminding you(again) to upgrade to pro.

They seem to update the software every other week with it reminding you to upgrade to the latest version(not pro, just the latest free version).

Re:Almost as bad as RealPlayer by SeaFox · 2004-09-14 17:07 · Score: 1

They seem to update the software every other week with it reminding you to upgrade to the latest version(not pro, just the latest free version). The lousy part being the paid version come in two different licence forms, $20 for one version, $40 for lifetime upgrades. The "one version" licence covers any minor increment improvements they make. But on the next full version number upgrade, you have to pay again to upgrade if you don't have the lifetime license. But MusicMatch likes to upgrade version numbers the same way AOL does, jumping full version numbers for only minor improvements. The paid version has some nice features, the auto-tag feature is pretty much the only reason I keep MMJB around once iTunes came out for Windows, but the licence scheme just sucks. I hope the price goes down once Yahoo takes over.

Corner store and gas station music distro by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 07:24 · Score: 0

I am expecting to have corner store music distribution.

At your fav. corner store you can change your mind, ^&%$ that candy bar, hook up your mp3 device and treat yourself with a song.

The same goes at the gas station, you pull up to fill up your mp3 gear with that cool new song you just heard on the radio.

Or if you buy 50 liter gas, you get one song for free.

(Warning, all those ideas are considered to be the intellectual property of random.nick)

Narrowing the market? by xombo · 2004-09-14 07:26 · Score: 0, Redundant

How is Yahoo! aquiring MusicMatch narrowing the market? There are still just as many music services out there.

None the less, its just the first step in MusicMatch's failure.

Linux Port? by krgallagher · 2004-09-14 07:32 · Score: 3, Interesting

I used to subscribe to Musicmatch Platinum. I thought it was an incredible service! I especially liked the artist match and on demand services. I have a varied (some say warped) taste in music. Musicmatch did an incredible job of using my existing mp3 collection to target online music to my tastes.

During the two years I was a subscriber, my only complaint was that there was no Linux option. I filled out surveys and finally even complained to customer support. The response I recieved from customer support was that codec licensing agreements prevented them from releasing a Linux port.

Even so I continued to subscribe until I switched to my current job where they do not allow me to listen to online music at work (the main place I use windows as an OS.)

If Yahoo is able to bring out a Linux port of the online service, I will immediately become a subscriber again.

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Insert Generic Sig Here:

In other news, Braniff buys Buggytech by ellisDtrails · 2004-09-14 07:48 · Score: 0, Offtopic

... the number three horse-and-buggy provider in North Amaerica.

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GetTheJob.com : Nothing but Real Jobs.

The blind continue to lead the blind by inkswamp · 2004-09-14 07:54 · Score: 3, Interesting

I admit I'm an Apple fanatic, but the attempts I've seen thus far at competing with iTunes has been almost funny to watch (almost funny--except I know there are lots of people behind these efforts doing a sincere job.) I can't even begin to imagine how anyone is going to compete, even MS who lacks the iPod factor here. I just hope Apple doesn't get cocky about it because someone somewhere will figure out an angle on it at some point.

But anyway, Yahoo, who has no track record in this regard is buying MusicMatch who has no substantial track record to really speak of. Here's my predictions:

Netscape will by this then they will be bought out by Real who will be bought out by SCO who will be bought out by Wal-Mart who will then dump the whole music thing because the RIAA won't sell tracks for 38 cents.

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--Rick "If it isn't broken, take it apart and find out why."

Re:The blind continue to lead the blind by LVWolfman · 2004-09-14 14:01 · Score: 1

>but the attempts I've seen thus far at competing with iTunes has been almost funny to watch>

I too own Macs (and use Windows, Linux, et al) but I have some news that just may shock you. MusicMatch was out and in use before Jobs ever got sucked back into Apple, much less Apple thinking up iTunes.

I was running MusicMatch back when it didn't support ID3 tags, Windows NT4, etc. (Windows 2000 was still coming "real soon now") So that was probably about 7 years ago. I registered/paid for it back then as well.

MusicMatch is probably still one of the best all-in-one music programs for the average Windows user and it certainly has the best streaming "radio" available.

I did try MusicMatch for Linux, but it didn't support MusicMatch Radio and they did a very poor job of using wine to make the linux port. It was a blessing when the canceled the project.
Re:The blind continue to lead the blind by Quarters · 2004-09-14 14:36 · Score: 1

Ditto, MMJB had everything that is in iTunes, except for the iPod and iTMS literally years before Apple ever bought up that small developer and turnd their MP3 player into iTunes. Why do you thing Apple parterned with MM to be the MP3 library of choice for iPod Windows before iTunes Windows was out? It was because MMJB was as powerful as iTunes, if not more, and could easily be adapted to manage the iPod.
People always crow when it looks like MS or a Linux developer does something that Apple implemented first. Yet, when the same is true of Apple it gets spun like the true inovator is a non-issue.
iTunes is ok, but my personal opinion is that on Windows MMJB is superior.
Re:The blind continue to lead the blind by inkswamp · 2004-09-15 07:27 · Score: 1

Yep, I'm aware of MM's history, which is why I wrote: "MusicMatch who has no substantial track record to really speak of..."
They've been around, but what they've managed to do compared to iTunes/iPod has really been nothing to brag about, especially when you consider the lead they had (similar in a sense to Real which is why Real's recent attempt to gang-hump iTunes is sort of embarrassing for them, IMO.) That was what I was getting at.

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--Rick "If it isn't broken, take it apart and find out why."

Re:crappy engine, crappy player by mfrnka · 2004-09-14 08:08 · Score: 2, Interesting

Because ITunes definitely does NOT whip its ass for those of use interested in a streaming music service. MusicMatch OnDemand service is one of the few (only?) viable alternatives to Real's Rhapsody.

3 words by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 08:31 · Score: 0

Pay for placement.
Yahoo! allows advertisers to pay for ads to be not only put in the ad spaces, but also pay extra money to up their positioning in the search results. Joe user just thinks it's a more relevant link, not knowing that it's just another ad. Any search engine powered by Overture (all the big ones except Google) allows for this. It's dishonest and polutes what should be a means for finding relevante information.

Re:3 words by joeljkp · 2004-09-14 09:23 · Score: 1

Source for this? A Yahoo search for "Linux" shows 3 "sponsor results" blocks, each clearly delineated from the rest of the results.

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WeRelate.org - wiki-based genealogy

how long until by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 08:43 · Score: 0

how long until musicmatch.com goes to musicmatchfreeaudioplayer.yahoo.com

Yahoo deserves (more than some) cred by jackDuhRipper · 2004-09-14 09:19 · Score: 1

Industry consolidation is somewhat healthy (for consumers) in this instance. Apple, MSFT and Real have some traction - it's good (for consumers) for those corps. to have competition. MusicMatch now has more muscle behind it -

w/r/t Yahoo, they've always considered themselves more "directory" than search engine. They're a portal play, and a good one at that. Perhaps they're no longer as in favor with the slashdot crowd as they might have been, but - through Fantasy Football, a great spam account, and other better-than-average offerings - mostly gratis - for broadband users (e.g. radio; financial info) they're nothing to sneeze at.

Their generosity with The Community shouldn't be overlooked, either: they employ a number of FreeBSD* committers and contribute back to FreeBSD. The volume of traffic they handle with an infrastructure based on open standards in enviable.

* - It's this other OS with an OSI-approved licensing scheme. You should give it a look sometime.

Re:Yahoo deserves (more than some) cred by angrykeyboarder · 2004-09-14 16:51 · Score: 1

"they've always considered themselves more "directory" than search engine"

Until about a year ago when they began heaviliy advertising "Yahoo Search".

Also thier directory has been reduced to about a quarter of the size it used to get on thier home page.

Most people only land in the directory there now when using the search engine which responds to the search with google-like entries, along with any applicable directory entries.

Speaking of FreeBSD, I've never gotten why they are such slaves to Microsoft if they run their site with FreeBSD. Their web mail and Messenger product are far more feature-laden when used in conjunction with IE than with say Firefox or Mozilla.

--
Scott

©20014 angrykeyboarder & Elmer Fudd. All Wights Wesewved

Yahoo still trumps Google by brunes69 · 2004-09-14 09:20 · Score: 4, Interesting

While I like Google better as a company, and I like their search, email, and news site sbetter, I sure do wish they had some of the portal features Yahoo has. I mean, with Yahoo! Calender, Yahoo! Addressbook, Yahoo! greetings, Yahoo! Messanger, and Yahoo! Mail, and the seamless integration between them all, Yahoo is basically an online groupware suite.

I also wish Google news was customizeable like my.yahoo.com - while Google news is more timely and more relevant, many of the topics have no interest to me, and I'd like to be able to insert stock tickers and whatnot. My Yahoo! even lets you plug your own RSS feeds in now.

Duh by IshanCaspian · 2004-09-14 09:24 · Score: 1

Welcome to the argument, let me recap exactly what happened here, since you seem to have missed it.

Aardwolf204 points out that there are services that beat the snot out of all of yahoo's offerings, and most /.'ers don't really care what yahoo does.

Chess_the_cat replies with the rather deranged notion that simply because yahoo does a very large number of things, it's somehow unfair to compare it to google.

I replied that portals are not compelling because there exists a large number of specialized sites that all perform their individual tasks with a greater efficiency and precision than Yahoo could ever hope to.

The argument regarding the usefulness of "portals" is already pretty strongly decided in favor of...well..portals being retarded gimmicks...we're five posts into an already rather obvious argument, and then you come in and point out...GUYS, WE"RE TALKING ABOUT PORTALS LOL OMG.

Thank you captain obvious.

--

But there is another kind of evil that we must fear most... and that is the indifference of good men.

I count 8 digits by IshanCaspian · 2004-09-14 09:26 · Score: 1

Looks like you've got 8 digits there, paco.

--

But there is another kind of evil that we must fear most... and that is the indifference of good men.

Re:I count 8 digits by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 09:50 · Score: 0

8???? I count five - 18322.

Where do you get eight?
Re:I count 8 digits by Quarters · 2004-09-14 12:32 · Score: 1

You're looking at the serial number of the post I made, Einstein. A person's registration number is the number directly after their name.
For instance, you are the 625325th person to register on Slashdot. That number will remain constant on every post you write. The post you made above was the 10,250,236th post made. The next time you post that number will be larger
Did you really think there were 10.25 million users on Slashdot??
Re:I count 8 digits by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 12:34 · Score: 0

learn

So does this mean that.... by shockingbluerose · 2004-09-14 09:30 · Score: 2, Interesting

I already love Launch cast because of the "my station" feature. Maybe this merger will mean that when I hear a song I can download it for a small fee. That'd be great!

--
My name is a variety of floral rose, and no, it's not blue :)

Re:Second rate! - Borg! by aacool · 2004-09-14 09:35 · Score: 1

Yahoo is doing what Interactive (IACI) is trying to achieve - be the one-size-fits all gorilla in the marketplace - Oh did I mention Oracle? Of course, we should remember that the P/E ratios of all these companies, and the granddaddy of inorganic growth, Cisco, are over the norm for the market as a whole. That's a growth stock portfolio for you!

The objective is to control a slice of many pies that adds up to a tutti-frutti whole (poor taste?) The secondary objective is to be in on the game not through innovation, but through absorption - I wonder of course, what happens when one of these Borg assimilates another Borg?

media distribution by tofu2go · 2004-09-14 09:51 · Score: 3, Insightful

Yahoo isn't just a portal/search engine company. their intent is to become an internet media distribution company (Launch and its recent integration with Messenger comes to mind). Semel's background and talent was in Media Distribution, so buying up musicmatch and adding music distribution to their stable of products is an obvious move.

Musicmatch may not be a big player on the lines of iTunes, but they certainly have an established brand name that Yahoo could take advantage of. and their jukebox player is quite popular, so if they can figure out how to lure more users into the integrated store, that's only a click away in the jukebox player, it could be a success.

Yahoo a good 'second opinion' by Todd+H.+Sals · 2004-09-14 09:53 · Score: 1

I often try a search in Yahoo after I have given Google a shot and don't find what I want right away. It's definitely a good back up. Remember when we were young and carefree and Infoseek was cool?

What a waste.. by Gentlewhisper · 2004-09-14 11:06 · Score: 3, Interesting

Roland: It's a waste. A goddamn waste.

I really think Yahoo should concentrate on what they have now instead of trying to expend effort into YET more areas.

Lets see what 'good' yahoo has.
-yahoo auctions? who cares?
-yahoo mail? with gmail now?
-yahoo groups? well, that's good to some extent..
-yahoo's search engine? bleigh, that sucks without google's backend.
-yahoo's portal? you really like that shebang?

Maybe 160mil is spare change to yahoo now, but if they don't establish a core competency, they will probably become irrelevant very soon!

--
Online backup with Mozy, sounds like Ozzie, but more!

Re:What a waste.. by Carmody · 2004-09-14 14:40 · Score: 1

yahoo groups? The interface sucks very badly.
But you forgot yahoo games.

Literati! Euchre! and all sort of other fun games... and it is all linked to your yahoo profile.

Also, Yahoo IM and Yahoo Chat are nice, and all linked up.

--
God is real unless declared integer
Re:What a waste.. by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 14:47 · Score: 0

So, you're saying that Yahoo should not expand into new areas, and concentrate on what they have. Then you say what they have now basically sucks. So what do you suggest they do again?
Re:What a waste.. by Gentlewhisper · 2004-09-14 19:54 · Score: 1

"So, you're saying that Yahoo should not expand into new areas, and concentrate on what they have. Then you say what they have now basically sucks. So what do you suggest they do again?"

Well, google has no more than what they have, I don't see google selling music?

Nor do I see googlebay.com?

Yet google is da-bomb today. Like, who cares about yahoo mail, google just mentions gmail and people actually sell invites on ebay.

I'd say they should know how to do things properly before expanding into yet other areas (and having more things to fumble up).

As they go on to more and more areas, the name 'yahoo' will inadvertently just get modded down as being associated with more and more failures and screwups.. and eventually, they'd end up like lycos, which got sold to some korean company.

--
Online backup with Mozy, sounds like Ozzie, but more!

got to battle the G man by mabhatter654 · 2004-09-14 11:16 · Score: 1

got to battle Billy G...who also has a search engine, on line service, video games, all sort of software interests, etc... oh, and that monopoly on store-bought OSes! They do this to stay alive!!! That was the whole point of the AOL-TW merger as well. AOL has sucky dial-up service, but great marketing and packaging...as well as the user base to MAKE the entertainment industry pay attention. Yahoo needs to do the same thing to stay in the game.

Re:crappy engine, crappy player by Anonymous Coward · 2004-09-14 14:34 · Score: 0

Wow, I didn't know iTunes had a search engine in it. No wonder it's so bloated!

194 comments