SkreemR: Another online music source

Skreemr
Between iTunes, Pandora, lastfm and hosts of other sources for music online, today's online music “shopper” is given numerous opportunities to find music on the internet. Skreemr, though just another source for mp3s, boasts itself as “The World's Greatest Mp3 Search Site.” Whether this claim is valid or not, the site does provide mp3s ready for play for free along with the source of where it came from.

The navigation and layout of Skreemr could definitely use a touch-up. Though basic, Skreemr provides many opportunities for sharing music.After you type in whatever song or artist you would like to listen to, multiple results appear, including remixed versions of the song you may have been looking for.

The site gives users a chance to rate the song and also links users to twitter, flickr, gruvr, youtube, wikipedia and lyricwiki. Gruvr gives information about local shows and concert tours. Links to Amazon are also available, if the user wants to download the song and songs can be sent to the user's phone as a ringtone as well.

Skreemr uses the free pricing strategy. It also utilizes the advertising model, with banner ads on the homepage and on the search pages. Since Skreemr distributes digital content, there is zero marginal cost. However, there is no labor exchange.

It's hard to measure how successful Skreemr is, despite its claim. Skreemr doesn't host any of the music itself, rather, it indexes music already available online. I suppose since not many people (or at least not me) have heard of Skreemr, that speaks to its popularity and most likely its financial success. Though there aren't too many ads on the site, the basic layout draws the eye to the visuals in the ads.

One major flaw that I see in Skreemr's business model is that it has no social networking aspect. If it did incorporate some sort of either user-generated content or at least some sort of social community, it could have as much popularity as lastfm or Pandora. One portion that could be expanded is Skreemr's “AudioRank” feature, which makes the higher rated items show up at the top of the list when searched. This can easily be incorporated into a social community, with top rated songs of the day or week highlighted on the home page. This could give Skreemr more credibility and possibly more success in the online world.

The Superficial

One of my guilty pleasures is following The Superficial blog. It's trashy celebrity gossip (similar to Perez Hilton...but about 1,000 times better) with hi-res pics and snarky commentary. Mr. Fish- the nickname for The Superficial Writer, coined by his fans- is constantly blogging about celebutards and their fashion faux pas, their promiscuous and drug and/or alcohol-infused clubbing nights, or their ridiculous commentary. Some of his favorite celebs to cover are Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, any Victoria's Secret model, any of the Disney channel stars, the Girls from The Girls Next Door, fake stars Spencer and Heidi from The Hills, anyone having anything to do with the Kardashian family, and Cris Angel.
Though the web site is trashy and some of the photos are NSFW, it is set up phenomenally well. Newer posts are posted closer to the top and they are categorized according to what celebrity is involved. So if you want to find out the latest news with the Rihanna/Chris Brown mess, just click on Rihanna's name or search it. Also, his "So Freaking Hot" bar on the right hand side has his fave picks of great pics or stories at the time.
Geekologie and I Watch Stuff are two other blogs by the same writer (Mr. Fish as I'll refer to him as). Geekologie is about technology and gaming while I Watch Stuff is all movie news.
I suppose because it's a blog, that makes it easier to follow the layout, but it's still an understandable and efficient layout.
And the commentary is dirty, but hysterical.