Roostie – We’re Not MySpace, We Don’t Have Everything, But Here’s 3,000 Awesome Bands
Roostie is a new artist portal, but with a twist. They're only going to have 3,000 hand-picked and talented acts profiled on the site. The company has a music panel that decides who gets on the site and who stays on MySpace. The owners don't want to be the next MySpace nor can they afford to be. Behind the scenes, they want to help out the artists on the site out and gain them the support and connections they need.
Artists will be chosen by the number of Facebook "Likes" they can garner.
Certainly, Roostie isn't the only artist community that has limited-entry. Someone else has likely tried this before. But, with the decline of MySpace, it makes you wonder where artists will go. Facebook is obviously where the majority of people are, but they're still limited in their music capacity. In the meantime, a few of these new artist portals may be able to catch the user run-off from MySpace.
Right now, Roostie keeps the lights on by selling various ads on the website.
Since the company is located in London, they're predominately focused on the British music scene, but that could change if enough artist interest takes hold.
Roostie is not a MySpace killer, but it might a good fit for you.
Path is trying to be the limited version of Facebook (50 of your closest friends/family). I guess some companies’ strategies are not to compete with the big dogs but carve out a niche. If they just do ad revenue, I don’t think it will cut it as a business model.
I think Roostie is a great platform considering its been operating for such a short time. Remember 3-4 years ago when Facebook was quite primitive – now look where it is. If Roostie can continue to develop their service like they claim they will be, I really think it will become a valuable resource that actually “does” something for the artist. I take my hat off to them – well done!