PluggedIn Falls Out
It’s no surprise to me that PluggedIn is in dire straights. I tried my hardest to use the service when it launched, regularly posting my favorite videos to facebook and checking the site whenever a classic video from the past came to mind, but the responsiveness of the interface was simply too slow. It seems ridiculuos to me that it has taken YouTube so long to create the right environment for a similar offering. Had PluggedIn got their stuff together sooner, they may have been able to offer a truly competitive offering in the market. However, it’s reasonable to assume that any first mover advantage PluggedIn had was never a match for YouTube’s dominance. That being said, I hope that whatever offering YouTube comes up with allows for a view that only displays official music videos– and more importantly, that doesnt separate content and recommendations by publisher. No one knows what labels (yes, that’s plural) their favorite artists are on, and such distinctions or limitations will kill the user experience.