

Mixwit (YC W08) shuts down - ALee
http://blog.mixwit.com/2008/12/10/all-good-things/

======
patio11
On another software making discussion forum I participate in, we have a
saying: don't write software for people who don't pay money for software. I
hope I'm not being totally uncouth in suggesting that variants of this remain
good advice.

~~~
sown
Devil's Advocate: iTunes made it compelling to buy a 99 cent track instead of
downloading it for free. Surely there must be something to it?

~~~
andr
It wouldn't have worked if iTunes also let you download the music for free.

~~~
sown
True but a bit torrent client + google means that song is just a few clicks
away.

~~~
aaronblohowiak
what are these pop-ups? where do i get a bitter rent client ? i type in the
google my songs, but i get all these pages.. how do i download from google
with the bitter rent client? okay, okay, i did what you told me. now, it says
downloaded. where did it go? i have a downloads folder? i dont want it on my
desktop so i deleted it. how do i get it on my ipod?

also, it is _much_ faster / more convenient and reliable.

~~~
sown
OK, torrent client + thepiratebay/mininova/etc. I've never really had any
problems with finding what I need, assuming it existed. It would seem some
people do, though.

------
bootload
_"... We’re very sorry that this has to end. We’re going to try to figure out
some way to archive the artwork and playlists, if for nothing at least
historic value ..."_

Try IA ~ <http://www.archive.org/donate> who are always interested in
archiving interesting stuff.

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matt1
"Until then, enjoy the holidays and please take good care of yourselves, your
families, and your friends =)"

Is that last part about taking care of your friends a hint at what caused them
to shut down? The wording and strange order seems to suggest it, no?

~~~
ivankirigin
It's not about that.

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brandonkm
They started out "between a rock and a hard place". I'd say thats probably the
primary reason.

This is unfortunate as I hadn't heard of mixwit until just now.

~~~
ojbyrne
Actually it says "between _rock_ and a hard place." I think the missing a is
significant. Especially because they italicized "rock."

~~~
rrival
_starts inserting random grammar errors and italics in posts and comments to
invite intrigue_

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turbod
Will be interesting to see what the founders will come up with next... "We’ll
return early next year with a new company and new toys."

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paul9290
So would the creators advise against creating a music service that uses
Seeqpod (or something similar), which operates in a grey legal area?

~~~
radley
Seeqpod is a really great service, but it's high on the music labels' neg
radar. It really depends on your long term goals. It was one of many factors
in our decision.

------
ALee
Correction: Mixwit was Spring 08. [correction again, I was right initially-
stupid techcrunch post threw me]

~~~
mhartl
Nope, they were winter. (I was in the same round with them.)

------
Mistone
there are lots of vague statements here. Would have like to know what their
"rock and a hard place" looked like? what the primary challenges where? and
what they've learned for next time? never easy to talk about failures but
hugely valuable for the founder and this community.

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zack
Bummer. The music industry is a tough nut to crack. I don't know anyone who's
really ever made tons of money on a startup there; tons of legal bullshit.
Anyone know if Napster ever did well? I think Shawn Fanning only ever made
money on Snocap.

~~~
marketer
Don't you think companies that do face the legal bullshit are already
successful?

The music market is simply huge, and there have been many successes. There are
plenty for music marketplaces, for instance, and while the largest ones are
part of big companies who have more leverage to negotiate with the record
industry, there are lots of smaller ones out there that seem to be doing fine,
like amie street.

The original Napster wasn't successful as a business, but it completely
changed the way people thought about music distribution on the internet. Some
of the core napster employees went on to create imeem, which seems to be doing
great.

There have been a few great exits - last.fm, broadcast.com, and winamp come to
mind, and I'm sure there are plenty of less publicized ones.

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zack
Hopefully they'll give away the source code.

~~~
henning
IANAL and I am not a founder but I thought the source code basically
disappears into a black hole, from a reuse/release perspective. You can't use
it. That's what happened with a friend's startup that didn't work out.

