In what can only be described as Web 2.0 silly season with LinkedIn and their brethren being given crazy valuations, one potential deal stands out from the crowed – and it won’t cost either party a penny.
If Forbes‘ sources are correct, social giant Facebook is about to do a deal with Swedish music streaming company Spotify – a deal which will see no money changing hands but will benefit both parties immensely with Spotify seeing its exposure grow exponentially and Facebook keeping users on its pages for longer.
As the Forbes story goes, Facebook has been on the look out for a music company to get its claws into since Last.fm were courted way back in 2008. If claims they have managed to woo Spotify are correct, they may just have hit the jackpot.
It’s believed the partnership will see a Spotify icon added to our Facebook pages which, when clicked, will allow users to stream their Spotify playlists straight through their Facebook accounts as well as bringing subscribers the opportunity to listen to music simultaneously with their Facebook friends. Presumably suitably social features such as playlist sharing and collaboration will also be included considering similar functionality is already available via the Spotify applications – applications which already plug into Facebook using the company’s ‘Connect’ feature.
Clicking on the Spotify icon will install the service on their desktop in the background, and also allow users play from Spotify’s library of millions of songs through Facebook. The service will include a function that lets Facebook users listen to music simultaneously with their friends over the social network, one of the sources said.
While nobody is claiming to know the name of the new Spotify feature, both ‘Spotify on Facebook’ and ‘Facebook Music’ have been banded around though we’re not quite sure which name is worse.
Neither company would confirm the deal when approached, but it is believed that we could see Spotify gracing our Facebook pages as soon as the next couple of weeks in the countries which can currently take advantage of the streaming service. That counts out the United States. Still.
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