Company Review: Indaba makes jamming global

Aylon Steinhart · September 22, 2008 · Short URL: https://vator.tv/n/425

A different kind of studio session

The music recording process is constantly evolving. No longer is music production and distribution in the hands of big name studios. Rather, thousands of musicians in their basements can record their works and deliver it directly to an audience. With advances in recoding software and equipment, essentially anyone passionate enough about recording music can set up home-studios. With more convenient and affordable ways to record, suddenly every aspiring artist can show off that new CD.

But most musicians know that making music is not so easy. Making music involves dealing with many people of different backgrounds and mindsets. Getting an entire band together can be hard. And,meeting up with that perfect jazz flute player for your next track can mean flying halfway across the world.

Indaba Music, an online social network and production application for musicians, attempts to solve these problems that most musicians know all too well.

Indaba Music, which has an email subscriber list of some 75,000 and works with artists such as Third Eye Blind and Mariah Carey, integrates two necessary aspects of recording in order to create an online community for musicians interested in producing and recording music. The first feature that Indaba offers is a way to find and communicate with other musicians worldwide through the social network.

The Indaba network aims to provide musicians with the ability to show who they are to other musicians in order to promote relationships based on common musical interests and mindsets.

Each user has a personal profile on which he or she can upload songs, show off the session currently in progress, share photos, blog, and get feedback from the community. Through the profile, other users can add you as a contact, rate your music, and even invite you to their recording session.

But how is this practical? If a user from Florida connects with a user from California and wants him/her to play on a track, how exactly can they coordinate a recording session when they are 3,000 miles apart?

The solution: the Indaba Music community. The second feature that Indaba offers to its users is the online production application, which enables musicians to record sessions, mix the tracks, and publish the results.

The Indaba sessions are similar to traditional recording sessions: musicians can communicate about the recordings, exchange session tracks, and figure out compensation for involvement in the project. Because the entire process is done online, it offers convenience and flexibility for the members. Also, sessions can be set as public in the Indaba community, allowing for musician to audition to play the parts needed.

After the recording is complete, the Indaba Session Console is used as an online digital mixer. This feature allows collaborators to mix and edit the tracks on their computers at any time. The mixer includes standard digital audio workstation features such as looping, panning, cropping, and mixing down.

Lastly, the Indaba Community hosts competitions for the users. By entering their original music into the Indaba competitions, users increase exposure and get the chance to be recognized. With prizes, publicity, and chances to record with major artists, the Indaba competitions help to reward users and promote their music.

Although the profound connection one gets from playing with other musicians cannot be so readily substituted through online communities, the Indaba Music objective is both practical and innovative. Indaba does not try to replace face-to-face interactions between musicians, but instead to enable music to thrive even when personal interaction is nearly impossible. The convenience and organization of the Indaba Music community promises to offer a great opportunity to many musicians across the world.

By enabling musical interactions through social networking and online recording, Indaba Music may soon be changing the way we think of the title “studio musician”.

Aylon Steinhart

All author posts

Related Companies, Investors, and Entrepreneurs

Indaba Music

Startup/Business

Joined Vator on September 12, 2008

Indaba Music is an international community of musicians, music professionals, and fans exploring the creative possibilities of making music with people in different places.It is the premier social network for musicians and web application for online music production and collaboration.

With recording hardware and software now available on almost any budget, it's easier than ever for artists of all levels and backgrounds to record and produce professional quality music. Artists are also harnessing the internet to get their music heard by more people than ever before. We think this is a big deal for the future of music, and we built Indaba to be an environment for artists to harness these trends and create music in new ways.

We don't believe that Indaba Music will ever recreate or replace the experience of working with someone else in the same room, but we do believe we can foster a community that offers new opportunities for artists at all levels to connect and work creatively together, regardless of location.

The site is more than just a tool, it's a community of real people connecting and collaborating in new and exciting ways. As we grow, we plan to add even more exciting features, including more advanced collaborative functionality and ways for fans to experience music creation.

Indaba is a Zulu word that invokes the spirit of collaboration and community. It refers to a gathering or a forum for sharing ideas, and it embodies concepts that are central to the mission of Indaba Music.

Social Media

Startup/Business

Joined Vator on April 30, 2008

SocialMedia Networks is the leading provider of social platform services. It fuses together three core features – management, marketing, and monetization – into a comprehensive package that advertisers and developers can use to grow awareness, and grow their applications on social platforms.

Socialmedia.com was registered in November of 1999. It has since sat idle, waiting patiently for the right time to emerge. Nearly eight years later, that time has come.

Moreso than ever before, people all over the world are being entertained by interacting with others online. What was once simple communication has truly evolved into social media. Until recently, however, the environments in which these increasingly rich interactions took place were controlled by a few, closed entities. This changed on May 24th when facebook welcomed thousands of developers to immerse themselves within their platform.

Internet Media Partners Inc.

Startup/Business

Joined Vator on April 9, 2008

When it comes to paying for music downloads, major record labels have always found themselves trying to compete with illegal downloads and younger fans with limited credit card access. According to the 2009 IFPI digital music report, 95% of music downloads are illegal with no royalties going to artists or producers. As a result, worldwide spending on recorded music is expected to decline 18% from $31.8 billion in 2006 to $26.2 billion in 2011. The music industry is starting offering consumers additional services with leading technology partners, but these services are not helping to replace this decline in revenues and major labels are still scrambling to find additional revenue streams.

In addition, credit card issuers are going through their most turbulent times since the introduction of credit cards and potential new legislation and a continued assault from merchants lobbying to cap or reduce interchange rates threatens to reshape their reward program business model. Nearly identical loyalty rewards programs in the marketplace has also diminished the ability for credit card issuers to differentiate themselves using these programs. The reason is most rewards programs lack excitement, personalization and do not appeal to a consumer's aspirations, passions or dreams making them less effective in helping to retain customers and influence their purchasing behavior.

Internet Media Partners Inc. has develop a disruptive business model that will dramatically change the way music content is distributed, consumed and monetized online while providing businesses and brands with valuable data and insight into their customers buying habits which will help them improve retention and increase revenues.