MediaMaster: Use it While it’s Free
MediaMaster is another social networking service that lets users stream music to any Internet aware device, and share it with their friends. The capability to stream to some wireless devices was just recently announced.
Though it is still in beta stage, the user interface is mature and fun and easy to use. MediaMaster is just like Ezmo which I blogged about here, though Ezmo does not at this time support streaming to mobile devices. The service is advertised as free, and indeed it is free - for now, but going through the MediaMaster F.A.Q gives a hint of things to come.
It appears, from the F.A.Q, that MediaMaster will at some point become a fee-based service. There is nothing wrong with that, and I’m not against being asked to pay for a service, or of anybody paying for a service they use, but I just wonder how or whether MediaMaster will survive if it becomes a fee-based service. I wrote a similar post about Sharpcast in which I cited a recent report which showed that only a small percentage of online users will pay for such services.
The findings of that report I find to be very accurate especially when there are similar services available for free. Like Ezmo, for example. I think that the best route to monetization for social networking services is via the ad-based model. A fee-based model can very, very hard to sell. Whatever route it chooses, I hope MediaMaster succeeds.
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You make a good point. I think at some point we are going to witness a dotcom-like in the social networking arena. How long will some of these site continue to offer free service if they are not making money.
I agree that an ad-supported formular is the way to go.