
Earbits will be shutting down June 16th - martinshen
http://blog.earbits.com/online_radio/earbits-will-be-shutting-down-june-16th/
======
md224
Sorry to hear the news. I interviewed with Earbits at one point and they
seemed like really good guys. If I may offer some gentle post-mortem
constructive criticism:

Earbits seemed very focused on their value proposition to musicians. Their
goal seemed to be "the Google AdWords of Music", but here's the thing: if you
want to become the Google AdWords of music, you first have to become the
Google of Music. The value proposition to the listeners is key.

To their credit, Earbits did have a value proposition for listeners: music
discovery. But this meant their competition was Pandora, music blogs,
Pitchfork.com, word of mouth, and all the other ways we find music in the 21st
century. Another commenter here says "music is a tough nut to crack," but the
real issue here is that music _discovery_ is a tough nut to crack.

You could counter that Earbits differentiated itself by focusing on
independent, unsigned artists; that's a noble mission, but if you're going to
commit to that as your value proposition, you have to ask yourself if there's
a market for it. Is finding unsigned artists really a pain point for most
music listeners? I'm not convinced.

Anyway, sorry it didn't work out. Wish you guys the best of luck in your
future endeavors.

~~~
earbitscom
You're spot on. Unfortunately, our approach was a double edged sword. No
company who licenses a big catalog of music first ever survives to tell the
tale. But building a two sided marketplace meant splitting half of our already
thin resources in half, switching back and forth between pleasing listeners
and pleasing bands, and we just weren't able to build the consumer experience
necessary. In retrospect, had we focused on mobile first, built mostly
listener features until that product was great, then focus on the artists, we
may have had a better shot. The problem with that is, had we not built enough
stuff to wow the bands and labels, we would have never gotten the kind of
artists we did. We had to prove two different concepts on 1/100th the budget
of our competitors, who only serve one side of the market.

------
andrewljohnson
Music is a tough nut to crack. The industry players feel burned by every
technological innovation, from the CD to Napster. The status quo rejects
technology because it undermines business models and threatens to put new
people in charge.

It helps to be Dr. Dre when starting up and trying to break into such a mess.
Or you can sell a big chunk to the labels (Spotify) so they can feel
comfortable that the latest disruption won't be the end of selling musical
bytes.

~~~
IgorPartola
Not knowing anything about the industry, why do we still need music labels in
2014? My understanding was that before digital, their primary role was to
provide distribution. The artists could not afford things like burning and
shipping CD's, etc. However, no anyone can set up a distribution channel on
the web for extremely cheap (probably cheaper than the equipment the music is
recorded on).

I suppose promotion is a part of it, but where is the meritocracy? Should we
all be just listening to "good music" and the artists get rewarded directly?

~~~
untog
_I suppose promotion is a part of it, but where is the meritocracy?_

Where is meritocracy anywhere? More importantly, how can you be meritocratic
about something that is deeply rooted in a person's individual taste?

Labels are still useful for promotion. We're a long way away from that being a
solved problem.

~~~
IgorPartola
Well, if meritocracy is the ideal, then sure, it's nowhere to be found.
However, imagine if you put together a kick ass SaaS product that is super
useful to thousands of companies small and large. Then suddenly you can't just
put it out in the wild and see how it does. First, some executive somewhere
has to look at it, use it for 10 minutes, then either approve or disapprove of
it. And if the exec disapproves, you have no choice but to start building
something brand new. Doesn't that sound like bullshit?

You can be meritocratic about music, the same way you can be meritocratic
about things like web browsers, or cars, or fine art. You know quality stuff
when you see it. You do still need an efficient way to discover good stuff,
but that's where services like Spotify, iTunes, etc. can really shine. Why do
we need a label as a middleman between the artist and iTunes? What value will
the label bring vs just throwing all music at iTunes and seeing what sticks?
What kind of a refined musical appreciation talent do the label execs have
that they can decide what I should or should not hear?

~~~
earbitscom
The truth is that labels aren't needed if you are a savvy business person as
well as a musician, but most musicians are not. They need help understanding
how to advertise, where to do so, and they need leverage in order to get
better deals. More importantly, whether they need these things is secondary to
the fact that most of them don't want to do these things themselves and it
would be a massive distraction from the main goal of making awesome music.

~~~
IgorPartola
Interesting. My understanding was that Maclemore et al actually challenged
this model by hiring parts of a label to do the parts they themselves could
not do and in that they ended up retaining more ownership. The analogy would
be that they got (paid) advisors instead of taking on VC money.

The way you put it does make more sense: marketing, distribution, finding gigs
is not what musicians do best, so they outsource that job and pay for it with
"equity"/creative control.

~~~
untog
_My understanding was that Maclemore et al actually challenged this model by
hiring parts of a label to do the parts they themselves could not do and in
that they ended up retaining more ownership._

...which makes it sound like they have a lot of business sense. Many don't.

------
jonathanjaeger
I listen to jazz on Earbits for a bit 4-5 times per week. Really enjoyed it,
but it seemed there were limits to what I could discover but was fine cycling
through a lot of the same stuff.

None of the social features or other genres really enticed me so I was
doubtful the model would scale. For example, I listen to a lot of electronic
music and there's no reason why I would go to Earbits over SoundCloud,
YouTube, TheFuture.fm, or other sites. Unfortunately since it was so listener-
centric without enticing social or discovery features, I didn't see how it
could be a differentiator (other than some quality music from artists you've
never heard of).

I'm sad to see it go though. Same with ex.fm.

~~~
earbitscom
Indeed, Jonathan. Our big problem was needing to satisfy two sides of a
marketplace with half the resources of most startups. I mean, we certainly had
other issues, but it was definitely this lack of expected features (due to low
tech resources) that made it hard to compete with larger services.

------
jacquesm
As the former builder of a music start-up that failed I am really sorry to see
them go. If you are going to go down this route make sure that you watch
[http://www.justin.tv/startupschool/b/272178844](http://www.justin.tv/startupschool/b/272178844)
Dalton Caldwell's excellent speech on the subject.

~~~
iamwil
I was there for Dalton's talk, and I remember Joey of Earbits asking Dalton
questions from the back.

------
jcr
I'm sad to see earbits go. It was a great idea and a great service. Joey, we
traded a few technical emails around when you started, and I wish you, Yottam
and the others the best in your next endeavor. Also, thanks for regularly
being the "voice of reason" on HN in regards to questions about the music
industry.

I'm still curious about one thing; two-sided market? Are you using this phrase
as the simple way to say it, or do you really think it's a two sided market.
I've always seen it as a multi-sided market.

When I think about all the specialized skills (and equipment) that goes into
music, both recorded and live performances, it always seems to have a mind
boggling number of sides. Worse yet, the various sides tend to be in
competition (labels versus artists, consumers versus distributors, sound and
instrument equipment manufacturers versus ...). Though some truces and
alliances exist, each of the many sides is vying against the others to get
paid.

I recall reading one of your very early blog posts where you mentioned the
vast amount of effort you put into advertising and marketing your own band,
and this gave you the idea for earbits. Essentially, the marketing and
advertising you did for your own band was in competition with the similar
efforts of labels/promoters for other bands.

Am I wrong in thinking of music as a highly complex, intertwined, multi-sided
market?

~~~
earbitscom
Nah, you're absolutely correct. And in fact, it's crazy because one single
song can have 3 writers, 8 performers, a record label, 2 publishers and two
different performance rights organizations all with a stake in that track.
But, we paid standard rates to publishers and only needed to convince the
owners of the master recording to license the music to us, which is usually a
label or band. Then we had listeners. We were mostly just trying to please
those two groups, but that's because we paid the publishers outright.

------
dropit_sphere
Rough stuff. Best to Joey and the team.

I have a very short conversation in my email archives in which I sent an
unsolicited feature request.

They were perfectly kind, and eventually implemented it.

That was my experience with earbits.

------
chanux
Sad to see earbits go :(

Really liked the service and even found a few artist I happened to like very
much.

If Joey is reading, I was waiting for the day I could buy Groovies. We shared
a few emails regarding some things about the site but I never wrote to you
about this.

Wish you guys all the best in your future endeavors.

~~~
earbitscom
Thanks, Chanux. If you want to buy $3M worth of Groovies, we should talk. ;)
haha

------
USNetizen
"our concept does work...but...we simply needed a lot more capital"

This sounds like the old dot-com boom excuses of the early 00's. Popular
service or not, if after almost 5 years you're still relying heavily on
recurring investor capital for day-to-day operations and not bringing in
sufficient revenue to at least cover basic expenses, unless it's high-tech
biomed or pharma, it typically isn't a viable business model for a startup.
Maybe this would have worked out for them 10 or so years ago, but not so much
any more.

~~~
robryan
I would actually put music in a similar class to biomed/ pharma. I think music
is probably worse though, even with another 5 to 10 years to capital it is
entirely possible that it could still be to early and fail.

Music services right now don't make good returns and at the same time short
change artists. The issue is that in general people just won't pay the same
amount for music as they used to. While we have that and entrenched labels it
is going to be very hard. Over time hopefully the labels influence is broken
down an we end up with something more sustainable.

~~~
USNetizen
I agree. That was my point that music is too entrenched of an industry for a
startup to change it overnight. They took on more than they could handle which
is a flawed business model, yet they still call it validated and proven in
their parting blog post. This is not exactly accurate seeing as they are
shutting down - it's like calling a rocket that blew up a few seconds after
launch a "proven, viable" design.

At least biomed and pharma startups have arguably the potential for a
beneficial impact on society at large to justify the long-term capital
infusions, whereas a service like this is more of a convenience or
recreational product at best.

------
poub
After this _sad_ announcement, I've revisited Earbits. I love the listening
experience as I did before.

Sure some technical details where a show stopper for me, i.e. no email
account, gamification/social currency had no effect on me and the lack of a
proper mobile app.

But I overcame those obstacles: I’ve created a Facebook account for Earbits
and I was automatically recording the playlists during the day so I could
listen to them during my commute.

I think that the loneliness was far more important. I never met or connected
with other users that were listening Earbits too (I’m in London, UK). Maybe
the traditional listening radio experience was missing; with a DJ, a voice, a
brand (Earbits) we can stick on. It’s one thing asking people to connect with
an artist, but clearly it’s another to create an Earbits community.

That said I’ve discovered :

\- extraordinary artists

It’s one thing to help listeners to discover new artists, it’s another to help
them to discover _good_ new artists! To me that’s the curation miracle :-)

\- extraordinary founders

I’ve been inspired by your journey like no other. I really wish you the best
for the aftermath of 16 June. :-)

Thanks again for all the work you’ve done.

~~~
earbitscom
What a thoughtful comment, poub. Indeed, we wanted to get to having user
profiles, playlists and other ways to interact with the community. That was
the problem. We knew what we needed to build for our experience to be more
sticky, we just didn't have the resources to do enough of it fast enough. The
good news is, whatever we decide to do next can only be about 10x easier than
what we just attempted. ;)

------
skyfaller
One thing that was special about Earbits was the quality control. My band
submitted our music to Earbits and was rejected, but I have aspired since then
to record something objectively good enough they would have to accept it :)
I'm sad that that chance will never come now. What other music sites do
quality control with humans screening the music? Does Pandora count? Magnatune
also comes to mind, but they're a label, however unconventional.

~~~
earbitscom
Thanks for saying that, skyfaller. My co-founder was incredibly focused on
curation at a high level. We often got notes from bands who were turned away
that, upon listening, I thought...I would listen to this! So we tried to be
flexible but we had to make sure people knew Earbits was a place of quality.
Anyway, you have an incredible attitude about it. I'm glad you're able to take
that feedback and do something positive with it. That is the sign of a great
artist in the making.

------
OoTheNigerian
I remember contacting Joey in the early days via Quora. And although I was
also doing a music statup, he was nothing but really helpful. Sorry it did not
turn out too good.

I still believe that music can be cracked i.e made profitable, in other non US
markets (like Africa - South Africa) where almost 100% of the artistes are
indie and you do not need to deal with strong and evil supplier power.

Best of luck homie and I look forward to seeing what you are up to next.

~~~
earbitscom
Thanks, Oo! Those were the good old days. ;)

------
lwhalen
I really liked the concept, but I could never get past the "you must use
Facebook to sign in" part. Listening without signing in was easy enough, but
there were several artists/songs I would've liked to have saved for later, but
was turned off when I found that an account required Facebook.

Best of luck in your future endeavors, guys!

~~~
earbitscom
If you're referring to mobile, yeah, we took too long to get email login
setup. Chock it up to our cash-strappedness.

------
jcampbell1
Earbits was always an interesting company. The central idea seemed to be "pay
to promote", which initially sounded like a crazy idea to me. In hindsight, it
was a good idea, as virool, another YC startup, is doing very well with that
model for videos (including a huge number of music videos).

~~~
earbitscom
That's right, J. Truth is, with our results, we'd have had the funding we
needed in any other space. Music startups are held to a higher standard.

------
goblin89
Anyone knows what's going on at thesixtyone? The site seems to be up and
running (including pre-redesign version at old.thesixtyone.com), but I wonder
how healthy is their ecosystem.

I wonder if there're any other similar projects that are still active.

------
neduma
I guess online music industry getting too crowded. Yesterday, Amazon announced
music streaming service as part of Amazon Prime bundle.

I liked earbits though especially the people. Now a days, Rdio is my go to
place for music. I like UI and the whole experience.

~~~
earbitscom
Thanks, Neduma. Indeed, it's crowded, but that's not the reason these services
don't succeed. Pandora, Spotify, Rdio, etc, all have plenty of users. They
just don't have a sustainable model or approach.

------
arram
Really sorry to see the flag go down. Joey, Ben, and Yottam are great guys.
I've got nothing but respect for how long they kept fighting to make it
happen. Music is a tough space and they were brave to enter that arena.

~~~
earbitscom
Thanks, Arram. We need to find our wave to ride. ;)

~~~
jacquesm
I don't doubt you guys will. If you stick together through the wrapping up and
put half as much energy into a market that is more new-entrant friendly you
will go places. Best of luck and really really sorry to see you guys throw in
the towel.

------
Zolomon
I just found this site, and it seems great!

Feels shameless to ask, but I wish I could get a list of all songs in each
genre from the Electronic section.

Feel free to send me a mail at zolomon@gmail.com in case it would be possible.

I am in dire need of new music to listen to!

------
stuaxo
I'd never heard of it, looks like it wasn't too bad!

~~~
nnnnni
I know! I would have used it if I would have known about it!

This is _yet another_ "X is closing" post where X is something that could have
been successful if they would have advertised a little better. =-(

~~~
earbitscom
Mmmm...we had 3 million people hit our website in the past few years. It
wasn't a problem of getting customers, we needed to keep them better.

~~~
nnnnni
That's also a good point...

------
aw3c2
How many tracks are there and is there a chance to release them to the public
for free before shutting down? Would be sad to see indie music get lost in the
storm. :(

~~~
earbitscom
We have 140,000 songs but we're not in a position to give them away like that.

------
erohead
I still remember the awesome pop-up chatroom that happened when you
implemented what would become firebase.

~~~
earbitscom
Totally. Those were fun times.

------
staunch
Congrats on having tried. I'm sure you learned a lot that will help you
succeed later. Good luck!

------
pbreit
What kind of usage is Earbits getting? No buyers (or takeover-ers)?

~~~
earbitscom
About 80k monthly uniques, streaming 2.7 million songs this month.

------
lurkinggrue
OMG! ... who?

------
dueprocess
Sad news. I liked the site, and discovered some good artists there.

They should be proud of what they accomplished. I'll bet they did a lot of
good for indy music.

~~~
earbitscom
Thanks, Dueprocess. We most certainly did, which is abundantly clear by the
massive number of emails in my inbox from our artists right now. Heart
wrenching.

