#techintuitions

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In an effort to scale an industry where video games sales have exceeded $10 billion in revenue, the average gamer spending 8 hours/per week and 67% of households playing video games, Microsoft will now allow game developers to host their own tournaments on Xbox Live. This move establishes a bold stance from Microsoft to further increase gamer engagement by allowing an open ecosystem for tournament gameplay.   

Statistical Reference: https://lnkd.in/e4dsn9m

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Tidal’s rise to the top of the App Store after the drop of Kanye’s album indicates the company’s desire to “win” through exclusive distribution of content which is a huge play in the music streaming space. While most of this content will be available on other streaming products within another week and YouTube has over a billion users which dominates online video usage, Tidal’s exclusive video content play will be difficult to convert trial users to actual subscribers given the level of access to free content. Time will tell how much value consumers place on being “first in line” for content thus disrupting the music streaming ecosystem and forcing companies to rethink their approach to provide engaging user experiences.

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As the internet of things continue to mature, screens go away and our interaction patterns change across device mediums, there's a pressing need for strong Zero UI design for the next wave of tech innovations incorporating human gestures.

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The Game of Music Streams

Music Culture

With the ever evolving nature of music business, society is seeing a huge explosion of investments in the music streaming business.  Record stores in the traditional sense is just about extinct and artists are looking at innovative ways to get music out to fans while monetizing the whole experience from discovery to ultimate fandom. Which the launch of Tidal and Apple Music the Game of Music Streams is ever so relevant now. Couple that with existing players like Pandora, Rdio, Spotify, Songza and SoundCloud you now have a power struggle for music streaming supremacy.  In this post we’ll focus on the music discovery aspect of streaming and how it can be a key differentiator when consumers are evaluating which service to choose.

Impact of Music streaming

In a September 2014 Pando Daily article, we noticed trends of music app usage far exceeding their social media counterparts. This article inspired me to understand the adoption of music streaming apps by conducting a survey around music discovery to help derive common themes that can help uncover the areas of emphasis for consumers.

Problems with the Music Discovery Experience

What has become apparent amongst music consumers is the desire for features on the following:

1.) The ability to have deep insights into the  musicians that inspire the artists they know and love.

2.) The ability to search through sub genres of music.  

Simply searching for hip hop groups or artists doesn’t quite suffice for your everyday consumer who views hip hop in many shades of gray.  With respect to hip hop, there’s conscious all the way to southern trunk poppin’ tunes thats considered hip hop. Now let’s shift our focus to rock. Like hip hop, there are many layers to this genre.  Rock can be classified as indie, pop and hard metal to name a few which appeals to different consumers.  

Opportunities for Streaming Services

In order for music streaming services to truly flourish the services need to provide distinction of sub-genres and the ability to search by artist preferences they follow to enable a rich discovery experience for consumers.  Whichever service figures out the key to consumer’s heart and ears with regards to music discovery will truly emerge a leader in this race.  With all things considered the question still remains, who will win the Game of Music Streams?

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Although still in its infancy, Bitcoin shows a lot of promise and could truly change the way we view payments globally.