 "Twitter Music goes live with iOS app in tow")
After days of speculation, Twitter took to the popular Good Morning America show to announce the official launch of its music-discovery service. The service will launch on the web and there is an iOS app already out on the App Store. An Android app is in the works.
Twitter Music, as the service has been fashioned, is the brainchild of We Are Hunted, a startup that was acquired by the micro-blogging site last year. The app pulls music in from services like Rdio, Spotify and iTunes and uses the data from your Twitter follower graph to show you new music.
Those with an Rdio or Spotify account can sign into them from the iOS app and stream full tracks. Another option for listening to music is iTunes preview. However, at its essence, the service will be geared towards music discovery. The iOS app is rolling out across the US, Canada, the UK, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand, and users can sign up now at music.twitter.com.
Screenshots of the iOS app for Twitter Music
Twitter Music is broken into four sections: Popular, Emerging, Suggested and #NowPlaying. The first two tabs benefit from We Are Hunted’s work in music discovery to determine the trending artists, as well as indie musicians. The Suggested and Now Playing tabs work in conjunction with your Twitter feed.
When in the Suggested tab, you will see recommended songs and artists which are pulled in based on your Twitter follower data. So you are likely to see musicians that you follow on Twitter Music or on Twitter itself. It will also show artists that are being followed by others you follow. So if a friend signs up and starts following Gotye, you will get recommendations of new songs by the artist as well as any related artists.
The #NowPlaying tab, as is evident from the hashtag in its name, will bring in music that has been tweeted with the #NowPlaying hashtag on your Timeline. All in all, it seems like an interesting venture, but our attempts to fire up the service were met with failure. Perhaps, the heavy early demand could explain it.
Of course, since listening to tracks is only possible if you have an Rdio or Spotify account, Twitter Music isn’t going to draw in many more users to the platform. Apps and services like Pandora, Xbox music, Nokia Music, Deezer, Grooveshark already provide ways to listen to new music. However, the popularity of musicians on Twitter could help deliver a better discovery process.
We will be bringing you more in-depth coverage about Twitter Music. Watch this space.
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