The Best Music Services Part 5

This is the fifth article in a 5 part series on the Best Music Services on the Internet. See the rest of the series:

1. The Most Reliable Online Music Services
2. Online Music Services with the Best Suggestion Quality
3. The Best Music Discovery Service
4. Best Community Driven Online Music Services
5. BBest Third Party Integration among Online Music Services

Even though you can do a lot from the home page of most internet music services, you need to be able to take the show on the road. When you can integrate your favorite music service into other third party sites and devices they become more powerful and useful.

 

I have a few standard ways that I will judge each service’s third party integration:

• Plug-ins for your desktop music player (iTunes, Windows Media Player, etc.)
• Integration with popular Social Networks (Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, etc.)
• Standalone Application for your phone (iPhone, Blackberry, Windows Mobile, etc.)
• Embeddable player for your web page

 

A service will need at least one check for each category for a “perfect” score.

 

Third Party Integration Comparison

iLike.com – Integrates at an acceptable level, but nothing special. (3 Stars)

Desktop music player support – iTunes only

Social Networks – Facebook, Bebo, hi5

Mobile Phone Application(s) – iPhone only

Embeddable player for your web page – yes

Rating:

 

Jango.com – You can embed their player on a web page and that’s about it. It’s sit down in front of your browser or nothing. (1 Stars)

Desktop music player support – none

Social Networks – none

Mobile Phone Application(s) – none

Embeddable player for your web page – yes

Rating:

 

Last.FM – The undisputed king of third party integration. Last.FM connects to everyone and everything you can imagine. If there is no connection available, you can use their open API to build your own connection. (5 Stars)

Desktop music player support – iTunes, Windows Media Player, WinAmp, Songbird, and more.

Social Networks – Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, and every other network know to man.

Mobile Phone Application(s) – iPhone, Google Android, Sonos Player, and more.

Embeddable player for your web page – Yes (plus blog widgets for every popular blogging tool.)

Rating:

MusicStrands.com – They do a decent job of connecting with the outside world. Too bad that they don’t have much of a good service to offer the outside world in the first place. (4 Stars)

Desktop music player support – iTunes, Windows Media Player, Amorak, Linux Support too.

Social Networks – MySpace, Blogger, Live Journal, (No Facebook)

Mobile Phone Application(s) – Windows Mobile and Symbian

Embeddable player for your web page – Yes

Rating:

Pandora.com – They have gotten much better recently. The do integrate fairly well, but that’s still not why most people use them. (4 Stars)

Desktop music player support – No

Social Networks – Facebook, MySpace, Blog Widgets

Mobile Phone Application(s) – iPhone (My favorite iPhone App.), Blackberry, Windows Mobile, Palm Pre

Embeddable player for your web page -

Rating:

 

Shoutcast.com – Shoutcast does a very good job of integrating with third party services. If they would add integration with iTunes and the like they would score a perfect 5. (4 Stars)

Desktop music player support – WinAmp (they own Slacker.com),

Social Networks – Facebook, MySpace, etc.

Mobile Phone Application(s) – iPhone, Windows Mobile, PSP, and more

Embeddable player for your web page – Yes

Rating:

 

Slacker.com – They have a GREAT iPhone application and they do integrate with some social networks, but they still have some work to do. (3 Stars)

Desktop music player support – They have their own standalone player (not my favorite)

Social Networks – Facebook, MySpace, and more

Mobile Phone Application(s) – iPhone, Blackberry, Google Android, and more

Embeddable player for your web page – No

Rating:

 

Have Your Say

Well, you know what I think, let’s hear what you think. You can select more than one choice below if you have a tie for most Tightly Integrated Music Service.

iPhone, last.fm, music services, music streaming, pandora, social networking, third party integration