Find and Share Music with TinySong
Written by Ernesto on August 23, 2008TinySong is an easy to use website where users can search for music and share tracks with friends via a direct link. The website is linked to Grooveshark, a P2P powered music service, that allows users to manage and store their entire music library “in the cloud”.
When you visit the TinySong website, all you will see is a large search box. When you enter a search term the site performs a search on one of the largest online music libraries, and returns direct links to playable versions of the tracks that match your search.
There is no need to register, everyone can search for, and play as many tracks as they like. There is even a queue feature in place for those who want to play more than one song. Registration is free, and offers several benefits, as it enables users to create playlists, add favorites, download tracks, and includes all of the other features Grooveshark offers. This is when it gets even more interesting.
TinySong is linked to Grooveshark, which is best defined as an online version of iTunes, including a store where you can buy songs and a social network where you can connect with other users. Grooveshark allows users to import their music library, which they can then access from any computer with an Internet connection. Users also have unlimited access to streaming music they don’t have in their own library – for free.
Perhaps one of the more interesting features of Grooveshark, for TorrentFreak at least, is that it is a P2P based service. Users who upload their local music library to the site will make it available to all other users. Users are rewarded for every song they share and receive “song credits”, which they can use to buy new tracks. The end result is one of the largest P2P music libraries around with millions of tracks in the collection.
There is also a commercial aspect to the site of course, as Grooveshark offers paid downloads. The downloads are available in different formats, high quality and DRM-free. Individual songs cost 99cents, and can be downloaded to a local computer once purchased. “FLAC, OGG, MP3, anything that’s available online will eventually be in our catalog,” Grooveshark’s Josh Bonnain told TorrentFreak. “We’re currently the only music company, or media company for that matter, that could easily one day offer a selection of over 50 million files.”
Grooveshark has potential, as it’s basically iTunes “in the cloud”, powered by P2P and with a social network on top of that (yes, a lot of buzzwords). All you need is an Internet connection, and you’re hooked up to one of the largest music libraries in the world. Josh told us that there are no deals with any of the major record labels yet, but they are working on it. They do pay royalties though.
“Due to the fact that all content which enters Grooveshark is monetized and made legal to purchase, we will in actuality be able to collect most every song in the world in due time,” Josh told us. “Many members like this, as they don’t need to store music locally, and can listen to all of the live, rare, unreleased, lossless and so forth content which there was no access to before.”
In sum I would say that TinySong is one of the easiest ways to share single tracks with your friends. The Grooveshark service is promising as well, and a great way to access your music library (and more) if you’re not at home. The paid downloads are still too expensive though, even though they offer high quality and DRM-free songs. Getting the labels behind it will be a challenging endeavor, as we already spotted some prerelease tracks (and the Beatles), that made their way from BitTorrent to Grooveshark.
TinySong Search (gotta love BuckCherry)
Previously: Noel Gallagher of Oasis Speaks Out on Piracy
Next: Uncovering The Dark Side of P4P
33 Responses
Nice, a good start for a legal P2P music service!
A big problem with the current copyright system is the need to get “agreements.” They shouldn’t need an agreement, only a royalty should be necessary.
@2: How do you decide to whom the royalities go? By deep packet inspecting? That’s what I call violation of privacy :)
@3
To the rights holder, of course.
Takedown notice in three… Two…
Good, now I wont have to go to YouTube just to check if the band is worth my bittorent traffic.
Although just now searching through Nine Inch Nails songs I found some songs that are not from Trent Reznor and I have no idea what they’re doing under it’s label…
humm… the beatles are on there, they’re truly fuct hehe
wow. i REALLY like this interface they have. SO streamlined! i hope this is staying put for a while..
Buckerry. Worst Band Ever.
Wow, this is very nice. You can create your own playlists (and even add onto them while they’re playing)
What would be even nicer are links to the bands website, place to purchase, and so on.
“@3
To the rights holder, of course.”
Who cares about the “rights holder”? It’s the artist I care about, along with everyone who worked to make the album, not some business person who thinks it is fine to make money from someone else’s work because they think they “own” the music.
the7erm @ stumbleupon wrote: “Read the user agreement before you think about signing up. The eula http://beta.grooveshark.com/eula.php states: 3. Copyrighted Content. You understand and agree to not share any content which is copyrighted, and not represented by a label on the list of labels that EMG currently has a licensing agreement with. Such a list of labels that currently have a licensing agreement with EMG can be located at http://www.grooveshark.com/labellist.php You acknowledge and agree to only share music via the SharkByte Client that is owned by a label on the list of labels that EMG currently has a with. Such a list of labels that currently have a with EMG can be located at http://alpha.grooveshark.com/labellist.html In other words …. you sign up, share music that’s not “approved” you could get sued by the RIAA. The FAQ is very misleading: “What type of music will be available? On Grooveshark you will be able to find any song you can dream of, from a classic Rolling Stones albums to Colombian folk music.” Faq also says this: “Are you licensed to fully stream our music? Grooveshark has licenses with ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC for the rights to fully stream all songs under their umbrella. These streams are used as a promotional vehicle to increase sales of songs in our system. All song streams are encrypted and are not accessible to the end user.” It leads you to believe you allowed to upload music that is registered with ASCAP/BMI and SESAC. This is not the case. If you do sign up, I hope you don’t get sued. I’m really bummed about it. I honestly thought cool finally a DRM free linux compatible music service. Just what I want. Misleading, very misleading.”
maybe torrentfreaks needs to do some better research and less schmoosing?
Thanks for the heads up Ernesto! I’m bloody loving tinysong.com
Doesn’t tinysong.com just take you to Grooveshark.com to play the song?
If so why not just go to Grooveshark?
It looks like there is the url for the song there.
Also I did the same search in tinysong.com then in Grooveshark. And saw that there are way more results in the later
It looks & sounds good although would be much better if a certain
firefox add on would work on it.
The large flash player takes up the whole screen. After you click to play songs. Where the add on was spining before on the main page. Maybe if you reg. the add on will work. I almost let quantserve with no script to get it to work. But glad I didn’t
http://www.last.fm/forum/21713/_/426375
Info on Java Script of quantserve.com
Nice find though Ty
I just was able to log in to Grooveshark. And its the same for not useing the add on.
Oh well.. It is a good site to find/play songs sound is good.
Oh Funkadelics Maggot Brain is listed as hip hop they should fix this.
The song is a rock anthem.
tinysong.com is cool
@14
I think it’s just meant for sharing a certain song with friends. You just search the song you want to share and it gives you a “tiny” URL to pass along. Nothing more.
Seems not to work in Firefox Oo
This service on paper sounds good but ultimately they need a system where they charge subscription for limited or unlimited number of downloads, not this pay by the track rubbish, I don’t see the music as having only the service through which I get it.
HAHA , oh god i laughed.
that is so n00bish. pls go kill urself
tinysong.com is just a spin-off tinyurl.cc, yet it works for them :)
I would much prefer something like this over the crapware that is iTunes.
It uses p2p
It’s not illegal
It gives me an OPTION to pay for the songs
It allows me to checkout and play any song I want with no strings attached
“This service on paper sounds good but ultimately they need a system where they charge subscription for limited or unlimited number of downloads, not this pay by the track rubbish, I don’t see the music as having only the service through which I get it.”
Find how much you think is a fair price to pay for unlimited downloads each much. Buy enough music on this site to pay for that each month and then download as much as you want :)
This is fucking AWESOME. Wow. It won’t last long thou being website based (unless it’s in Afghanistan or Russia)
LISTEN TO AUSTRIAN DEATH MACHINE. GET TO THE CHOPPA!!!!
Thanks for the great write, Ernesto! You nailed so much of what Grooveshark is all about–p2p, music sharing, and fair accessibility–and it means so much to us (Grooveshark).
@17 You got it exactly right ;)
@19 What problems have you been having with Firefox? A really hefty portion of our traffic is FF, so I’m wondering what’s going on!
Thanks, everyone. <3
It works for me with firefox after I disable the addon Adblock in the addons menu (which requires a restart of firefox). However It doesn’t work if I disable Adblock on the fly from the Adblock menu (which doesn’t require a restart of firefox). Not sure if it’s the same with Adblock Plus. Maybe the grooveshark dev team should look into it.
Thanks hyperlite, I almost started sharing all my music, too.
lol, time get Goldwave install and start recording :)..no need pay…lol
http://www.sourcepirate.com is another good site, has more results too.
http://deano-baby-g13.co.uk Check it out …
How did TF miss the point illustrated by #13:
“Read the user agreement before you think about signing up…..You acknowledge and agree to only share music via the SharkByte Client that is owned by a label on the list of labels that EMG currently has a with…….”
TF, this is a weak, weak story… The perspective is skewed… Honestly, it looks like a trap.
Is there a good reason TF and Ernesto thought people would want to go sign up for this rubbish?
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