Ask HN: MusicWalla - A Social Online Radio : Review my product concept

by vikasvadlapatla on 6/12/2011, 2:14 AM with 17 comments

Hi guys, I recently came up with a concept for a social online radio. It is just a half-baked idea as of now but the following presentation should give you a gist.

I'm a user experience researcher so all it's features are a result of different user data acquisition techniques. I am working on adding game dynamics to this model(foursquare style badges and user upvoting).

I would love to get some valuable inputs from you guys!

www.vikasvadlapatla.com/musicwalla

Direct link to presentation: http://www.slideshare.net/vgvikas/musicwalla-business-pitch-7864740

  • by pedalpete on 6/12/2011, 3:02 AM

    Interesting idea, though I think I like it more on a broad friend sharing stream than all listening together. There doesn't seem to me to be a benefit of only having people in the same room.

    You've also gone with a 'fair' way of playing users tracks, though as a group, you may have better luck with playing the tracks recommended by the most popular users.

    As a user experience researcher, you should know that you'll have the majority of the users just as listeners, and a much smaller percentage who are actively building the playlists, so you'll have to account for that.

  • by petervandijck on 6/12/2011, 3:08 PM

    You have WAY too many features for an initial product idea. It's not focused.

    Try to describe the value and differentiation of your service in 1 sentence.

    Don't add game mechanics, upvoting and the kitchen sink unless it is part of the core value/differentiation.

    The competitive advantage matrix you have at the end shows how unfocused you are: your competitor have few features, and you have checkboxes against ALL features.

    More features isn't good.

    More features is bad. It's less focused. You'll do them worse.

  • by niketdesai on 6/12/2011, 3:47 AM

    Uhhhh. I'd look at turntable.fm and see their "version" of what you're talking about. Their "rooms" are effectively channels, and they have heavy integration with music collections (and I think they'll make uploaded music available to a more general library soon).

    I think your idea is a good one, though and I get it.

  • by kodeshpa on 6/13/2011, 6:09 AM

    Try TuneIn radio by tunein.com. TuneIn is rediscovering radio and they have huge collections online stream.

  • by phektus on 6/12/2011, 4:04 AM
  • by revorad on 6/12/2011, 12:28 PM

    turntable.fm has built exactly that and has a very passionate set of early users. Unless you want to start your own startup, you should probably go work for them.

  • by rooshdi on 6/12/2011, 2:53 AM

    Sounds like a good idea, now build it!