Webdoc: A New Level Of Social Content Creation

Webdoc is an interesting new service that takes the Storify concept of mixing and matching web content to another level. It was the winner of the recent MUSIC techpitch 4.5 event in London. Though not limited to music, it's clearly useful for musicians, marketers and fans who want to quickly create content that has a more social element than Storify.

Webdoc in Action

Webdoc's win at MUSIC techpitch 4.5 gave an additional boost to a new service that's already attracting a lot of attention in both the music world and beyond. For example, SF Intercom's CEO Stefan Aronsen, who's helping promote Webdoc in the States, said that already 3 out of the 4 major labels are using it.

The big music example has been a Webdoc page for Nirvana that illustrates its potential. As you can also see in the above video, Webdocs are composed of content uploaded to the site, widgets available on the site and text that's entered in like a blog post. Widgets include such options as a countdown feature for events as seen at the top of the Nirvana Webdoc.

Scrolling down one finds the option to post a reply which can be done as a simple statement or by creating your own Webdoc with relevant content. The Nirvana page shows how fans can express themselves in digital scrapbook mode and help create a much more complex document.

Webdoc offers more options and flexibility than does Storify and, though Storify does have social elements, Webdoc is designed to help you connect with friends from other networks while also including a social element in the document itself. It's a very strong combination of features, especially given that you can then embed your document on your blog or Facebook page and update it from Webdoc.

Webdoc also seems to be focusing outreach on Education and Music though primarily with information about how Webdoc can be used. As mentioned in the Music section, Webdoc can also function as a solution for creating digital flyers and posters.

A #music hashtag search offers more examples of how musicians are using the service. Given that Webdoc offers an easy to use content creation tool with social elements that can be embedded elsewhere while also building a social platform, it has a potentially big upside both as a business and as a music marketing tool.

Hypebot contributor Clyde Smith maintains his freelance writing hub at Flux Research and blogs at All World Dance and This Business of Blogging. To suggest topics for Hypebot, contact: clyde(at)fluxresearch(dot)com.