8tracks By Amanda on August 21, 2008 9:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)
So my beloved Muxtape is off line, whether by RIAA fiat or money troubles or both or whatever, I know not. That news kinda sucked although it was not unexpected, being and how the illegality of it was more or less blindingly obvious.
But a great idea and great for the music industry whether it knows it or not. But hark! In the dust of Muxtape, a new service launched called 8tracks which claims to do the same thing but -- gasp! -- legally. I've seen it called "Stracks" too, but I think the squiggly thing is offically an 8. I've signed up but haven't made a mux-er, a ... mix yet. There seem to be more restrictions that with muxtape -- you can't see the whole list before listening for instance -- which are presumably to keep it within the legal requirements. It does look like you can officially create multiple mixes and have them all up at the same time. Which is good, although I was kinda digging the zen-like process of destroying your mux before you could create a new one.
I'm encouraged that it looks uncluttered and simple, but also adds some functions muxtapes lacked -- I like the simplicity of "following" a user and also the ability to add comments to mixes. Will try and maybe get one up tonight.
Update: Did my first 8tracks mix. Painless process and one improvement on Muxtape is you can queue up all your songs to upload rather than have to do them one by one.
By Shaun
on August 21, 2008 9:08 PM
Ah, farewell muxy. We hardly knew ya.
But not a surprise as you mentioned.
As for 8tracks, the financials seem a little murky to me. THe old "it is too good to be true" syndrome.
But I'll give it ago. Thanks for the finding and alerting.
By Amanda
on August 22, 2008 8:25 AM
So it seems like some tracks play more than once and others not at all? And in random order each time? I don't know if that is deliberate. And one of my songs has disappeared!
But, minor quibbles.
By Richard Caetano
on August 22, 2008 5:51 PM
Being the lead developer I can clarify some of the issues from the comments.
To meet the legal requirements we can not publish the mix in the original order on subsequent listens. This is to prevent on demand listening.
However, after a certain amount of time since your last listen the mix will play in its original order.
I would like to investigate the issue regarding your missing track. We're still working on minor issues as they occur.
Thanks for the feed back... http://8tracks.com/arsy
By Amanda
on August 23, 2008 7:39 AM
Hi Richard thanks for stopping by.
The missing track might have been my fault, I'm not sure. I'll let you know if it happens again.
I'm all for those restrictions if it keeps you gys on air, just trying to find my way around. The interface is excellent and I'm loving it, so good job.