TMW Ideas

The UK Mobile Report
Wednesday 15 August 2007

With the annual Digital Music Survey reminding us that most people are apprehensive about buying mobile music, whilst social networking sites are encouraging downloading, it wasn’t going to be long before someone put the two together.

So enters Oxy Systems’s Phling! a service that seemingly addresses the problem of flagging mobile music sales by providing a social network service that harmonises peer-to-peer streaming and legal downloads.

The service organises existing music formats on a PC, whilst a Java application downloaded over the air onto a 3G mobile allows the user to browse and stream that library of music.

As well as keeping in contact with friends through a profile, the user will have (legal) access to the music libraries of six other people (that's the social part), whilst being encouraged to buy songs from the operator’s music service.

Phling!is looking to spread the profit of data charges with operators, so streaming the music should cost significantly less, and there won’t be fees per message as the service uses the phone’s 3G internet connection.

A spokeman for phling! said:

• “Mobile music lovers want to be able to listen to music they already own. Waiting to get home and plug a mobile phone into a PC with a USB cable sort of negates the advantage of having a wireless device”.

But how will they convince operators to back a low-profit P2P service?

“We give mobile music listeners the chance to see what others are listening to, what songs have been rated, what songs are the most played, and to find others with similar tastes. The result of these discovery scenarios, we expect, will be music purchases and downloads from the integrated music store.” (Beren Neale)

This will be one to watch as it seals a gap in the market for those using their mobile phones for portable music rather than an MP3 player.

InBabble.com interviewed Phling! and the transcript of the interview with Graeme W. Smith, V.P. Marketing, is available here, they talk about product plans, competitors and challenges for the new service.