Mxit ‘dipping its toes’ into music distribution
INSTANT messaging platform Mxit, which is 30% owned by media company Naspers, will begin marketing and distributing local music artists at the end of this month, with the view of taking on the industry with its own label soon.
In a bid to keep its 5,8-million users entertained for longer, Mxit will host a platform in which unsigned local artists can upload their music for other users to download for free, similar to the global phenomenon MySpace.
“The entire platform is free — it is intended to be used as a platform for potential new artists to promote themselves to our local users as well as internationally,” said Mxit Lifestyle GM Paul Stemmet.
The move follows news that cellphone operator Vodacom will soon make its own music platform, MusicStation, available to its subscribers, by agreement with UK company Omnifone. A monthly fee of R25 will give Vodacom users unlimited access to download songs by local and international artists.
While Mxit Music, as it will be called, is not a retail offering as yet, Stemmet has confirmed that the company is in talks with “major international labels” to launch its own version, in which users would be able to download their favourite songs for a small fee.
Since joining Naspers, the company has focused more on advertising as a revenue stream, as opposed to the credit-based retail system (Mxit Moola) through which entertainment products can be bought.
Social network offerings such as MySpace, YouTube and Facebook have shown that the youth are willing to accept amateur quality content as entertainment.
But Stemmet said Mxit Music would use a filtering system to draw out better quality recordings of talent and rank them above poorer, amateur quality ones.
He said a voting poll would determine the top bands and every three months the winners would be offered a recording contract through Mxit’s associated partners, under Mxit’s own label.
He said the company planned to launch its own TV station “early next year” called Mxit.tv on its sister company MultiChoice’s DStv platform. He said the “signed” new performers would be punted further on this medium.
When asked whether Mxit saw itself as aggressively taking on larger record labels, Stemmet said that “at this point we are dipping our toes in the water to get a feel”.
“We are motivated by what users want and users want to be entertained,” he said.
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