Facebook Music Needs to Pick a Direction

Facebook Music may have taken yet another setback. According to TechCrunch, more details may have arisen regarding the deal (or lack thereof) that Facebook was trying to work out with a number of music companies as options for offering a Facebook Music app direct to its users.
We covered the rumor that Lala may be the runner-up for landing a music partnership with Facebook, and I then noted that its smaller size may be a benefit for teaming with the large social network. It benefits Facebook and could be a more economic route for both parties involved. But maybe not so beneficial for the music companies, which includes lone hold-out Warner.

So far, the gist of Facebook’s quandary includes the following:
- a deal with Universal & Sony BMG project Total Music may have fallen through, leaving Facebook to need to build its own music application or team up with another music company
- partnering with an established music company may mean that Facebook needs to pay out a lot of money to the music company or the labels
- building its own native app could mean that Facebook needs to pay out a great deal of money (upwards of $100 million) to music labels
- anything less than what MySpace Music (recently revamped to include playlists, streaming, sharing, etc.) already offers would be a dismal set of features to end users
What’s Facebook to do? While I wouldn’t say that Facebook Music is imperative to the success of the social network, it is a great potential for creating some revenue for the company and it’s clear that Facebook needs to make sure it’s still competing with the likes of MySpace on as many fronts as possible. If that means going ahead and investing in an application it builds for itself or bending to Warner’s will a little bit, it may be worth it.
Whatever the case may be, Facebook should probably pick a route and stick to it. In Facebook’s particular case, however, another major concern is the way in which third party applications will be treated and viewed should Facebook launch its own music application. We’ve already seen with the forced banning of the Playlist app that Facebook isn’t the only force at work when it comes to regulating music applications.
But we’ve also seen that Facebook’s launching of a particular native app can essentially wipe out a third party application that provided similar functions. And creating a native app for something as large and permeating as music could really mean that Facebook ends up changing some of its policies regarding third party applications.
These changes could ultimately have an effect on third party apps from a policy standpoint–not just for traction and traffic. And these are all things that Facebook will have to consider, especially if they have to make concessions that will affect the way in which third party apps access users and potentially work with any Facebook Music app the company comes out with in the future.