YAB Youth Website Profile: Ping

Ed. Note: For this installment of our Ypulse Youth Website Profile series, I asked our resident audiophile Chase Straight to share his user experience with Ping, the music social network launched by Apple earlier this month with iTunes 10.

As you may have heard (and we basically predicted), for all the initial fanfare, the limited desktop app has left something to be desired by critics and users alike. Here’s what Chase had to say..

YAB Youth Website Profile: Ping

What it is…. Steve Jobs describes Ping as “It’s Facebook meets Twitter meets iTunes.” Apple launched Ping in September as a social network service integrated into its iTunes software that allows users to follow their favorite artists, or other users.

Who it’s for… Apple’s 160 million iTunes users who have never used a social network.

What works…. Offering a social network to a large, existing userbase. Apple didn’t have to take the time to advertise Ping or develop a following of people who weren’t familiar with the concept. They were able to throw their hat in the social networking ring and declare their presence, with the service a visible click away for all of their software’s existing users.

In theory, it makes sense. Apple obviously wants to make iTunes a complete music hub by adding a social component to it. They aren’t building a house, just adding another tower to the castle.

Challenges…. Well, the implementation is laughably bad. To start, users are only allowed to select three favorite genres, the offering of which is pretty limited. Where does a band like Yeasayer fall into? Rock? Not exactly. What if I like more than three extremely generic types of music? Too bad.

Secondly, the social aspect is ill-conceived. Ping is trying to be Facebook except you aren’t friending anyone and there is no wall to add comments if they aren’t directed to a particular activity.. such as another comment made or a user ‘liking’ a band. On its “Featured” page, Ping doesn’t feature music connoisseurs that would be interesting to follow - just generic top 40 groups that are billed as being authentic but obviously run by PR folks.

EVERYTHING links to the Apple store - the ‘network’ is a giant marketing effort being run under the guise of ‘social.’ Apple needs to find a way to record your music choices and recommendations outside of only what you’ve purchased through the Apple store.

Apple needs a re-do on this one. Instead of being “iTunes meets Facebook and Twitter” it should be “Last.fm integrated with Facebook hosted on iTunes.” With so many music discovery sites available and existing social networks focused on connection, Ping isn’t going to last long as a stand-alone network with the current offering.

About Chase

Chase works for a online community management and moderation company. He recently moved to Dallas, TX and serves as Head of Community for an online virtual world for kids. A former journalism major at the University of Utah, he wrote feature articles and album reviews for a music and art magazine. He is fascinated and constantly amazed with how children create and interact online. Aside from his work, Chase is an avid gamer, blogger, live music lover and audiophile who is obsessed with discovering new music and building his already extensive collection. Oh, and he really likes pandas.  (You can also find him blogging about virtual worlds on his company’s blog at metaversemodsquad.com/blog)