Getting started - here are some initial concepts for you to react to

 jetherealz wrote:

 katedidnot wrote:

I do like the idea of the desert island album, but I don't see that as viral or sticky as the other ideas.  Nor do I see it building any real lasting friends.

The idea of a who am I game is intriguing in that it fits all the initial criteria that you had put up. It would be sticky (curiousity killed the cat), it would be viral (inquiring minds want to know), fun (duh), and it could leverage our strengths by allowing an option to have our tunes used as clues...for example I was born in Tokyo, one of my hints would be "My Woman from Tokyo" by Deep Purple, that would showcase the Zune Market place and introduce folks to new music.  This one also offers us a chance to change the subject to  "what do I do for a living" ( "Bus Rider" by the Guess Who), what is my favorite hobby ("Surfin' USA" by the Beach Boys, "Dancing fool" by Frank Zappa) etc.  That really needs to be expanded on. If we throw it all out at once I belive that it will be confusing for the social zuner that would have to read pages and pages on the weekend to catch up.  So the more specific it is, the better, then add to it as the numbers start waxing and wanning. 

May I blither on? For example if the game was where am I located?  Just the off the top of my head I have:

Asleep in the Desert by ZZ Top

Key Largo by Bertie Higgins

18 Miles to Memphis by The Stray Cats

Moon Over Bourbon Street by Sting

Lousiana Rain by Tom Petty

Under the Bridge by RHCP

As for MySpace, many peeps shy away from meeting places.  Younger zuners (some of them) are not allowed on those sites and I would want them to feel as include as the rest.  I would think that keeping it Zune site specific would allow all of us a chance without restriction. 

 

Ooh, I love this! It could be a set series of questions you can pick from, and then you choose the answers. For example, we would have say 50  questions, something like this:

Which of the following best describes my school days:

-- Hot for Teacher - Van Halen

-- Smokin' in the Boys Room - Motley Crue

-- Be True to Your School - Beach Boys

 -- School's Out - Alice Cooper

We could create the questions and suggest answers, but then allow users to put in their own answers. Does that make sense? We'd have a set list of questions, and users could choose some or all of them, and then edit the answers for each question to make them their own, or just use our defaults.

Or something else? Should users be able to create their own questions, too? (That would require a higher degree of policing, of course, because of our code of conduct and the potential for bad language/themes/etc - but we do have processes in place for that, anyway.)

I like this idea, especially with the ability to allow users to add their own answers by selecting tunes from the Marketplace. Maybe questions could be submitted by users and thrown into a pool from which the editorial staff would pick the gems for a given week. The question and answer format opens up lots of possibilities.

 jetherealz wrote:

I like the scavenger hunt idea, for sure. That's totally fun and engaging. (And hard - I would have had to look up every one of your clues!) How would we devise the clues - our editorial team internally, user-submitted, something else?

It would have to be kept to the editorial team for confidentiality, unfortunate, but fact.  The clues in a scavanger hunt ususally run from last to first, so I would assume that the team would come up with a song that someone would actually WANT to win or download and work backward.   It would need to be extensive research, not like my "War Pig by Black Sabbath" example that was done on the fly with the help of the marketplace,but I did convey the concept. 

Maybe even running two scavenger hunts concurrently with different genres.  Like a Jack Johnson song and an Avenged Sevenfold song both running at the same time so that you are hitting more than one sect of the community at once. 

Ideas:

Announce the song and then give a link of how to win a free download of it -- This is where the rules of the game would be, start and end dates, clue updates, etc.

Allowing out a certain number of clues a day for a set amount of days to an end date -- That gives the folks time to run around in the marketplace looking for ideas that will tie into the next set of clues.

Make an icon (if that functionality is built) on the players zune card with a running talley of downloads or points(how will that work?)-- That would generate interest and a competative spirit amongs the community.  It will also showcase the marketplace and it's variety of songs.

You know, this could win an educational award! 

Questions for the all of us if we use the scavenger hunt idea:

How many clues per day?  How many days of clues?  How long do we want to have per hunt? How many questions?  How would the game be scored? What would the icon for the zune card look like?  How would you know if you won?

 

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There are more love songs than anything else. If songs could make you do something we'd all love one another. Frank Zappa

Throwing out another idea, how about some kind of listening challenge, partly to introduce Zune listeners to new music? Like listen to 10 pieces of world music, classical, jazz, etc. in the next week. Minimal integration with the Zune software could enable tracking, like add your challenge songs to a playlist with some defined title like "Challenge1" and your profile could have a separate tracking list for the challenge by simply monitoring what was played from that playlist and whether it fits the requirement of the challenge. If it's a genre challenge, users could pick whatever they want within that genre as defined by the marketplace, or it could be music from a certain era, artist, etc. It could even be as simple as "make a playlist with 10 songs you've never heard." Tracking the number of plays from the challenge playlist could indicate that a particular genre/artist/era either just got a new convert, or conversely it's just not for that person. For example, if I listen to Shamus-Ud-Doha Bader-Ud-Doja 50 times in a week, I've apparently been bitten by the world music bug, but if I listen to Artie Shaw only once then maybe swing is not my thing.

A discussion forum and/or poll could be set up for each challenge, where users could comment on what they liked or didn't like about their new music.

I feel like there is an element still needed to make this really viral, and it's right on the tip of my tongue, but it hasn't hit me yet and I wanted to throw the idea out to the group.

 Mr Weather B wrote:

Throwing out another idea, how about some kind of listening challenge, partly to introduce Zune listeners to new music? Like listen to 10 pieces of world music, classical, jazz, etc. in the next week. Minimal integration with the Zune software could enable tracking, like add your challenge songs to a playlist with some defined title like "Challenge1" and your profile could have a separate tracking list for the challenge by simply monitoring what was played from that playlist and whether it fits the requirement of the challenge. If it's a genre challenge, users could pick whatever they want within that genre as defined by the marketplace, or it could be music from a certain era, artist, etc. It could even be as simple as "make a playlist with 10 songs you've never heard." Tracking the number of plays from the challenge playlist could indicate that a particular genre/artist/era either just got a new convert, or conversely it's just not for that person. For example, if I listen to Shamus-Ud-Doha Bader-Ud-Doja 50 times in a week, I've apparently been bitten by the world music bug, but if I listen to Artie Shaw only once then maybe swing is not my thing.

A discussion forum and/or poll could be set up for each challenge, where users could comment on what they liked or didn't like about their new music.

I feel like there is an element still needed to make this really viral, and it's right on the tip of my tongue, but it hasn't hit me yet and I wanted to throw the idea out to the group.

I LOVE what I think you just said, I am going to pseudo-paraphrase it and you tell me if I am on track with this:

I sign into the software and am greeted with a "Zune Challenge" button.  I click on to it and find...

A listing of challenges I can take (for simplicity I will take genre)  I go past Classic Rock and Heavy Metal and I find World Music.  That sounds like fun so I click on there...

Now I am looking at a mini-marketplace of ten pre-selected songs that I can listen to clips off and buy if I want...

I listen to a few, buy one...but one just doesn't seem to fit my idea of the world music genre.  At that point I would click on a discussion button...

That would take me to a forum to discuss the entire 10 songs and mesh with a group that share the same music intrests. 

Did I get that right?

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There are more love songs than anything else. If songs could make you do something we'd all love one another. Frank Zappa

 katedidnot wrote:

I LOVE what I think you just said, I am going to pseudo-paraphrase it and you tell me if I am on track with this:

I sign into the software and am greeted with a "Zune Challenge" button.  I click on to it and find...

A listing of challenges I can take (for simplicity I will take genre)  I go past Classic Rock and Heavy Metal and I find World Music.  That sounds like fun so I click on there...

Now I am looking at a mini-marketplace of ten pre-selected songs that I can listen to clips off and buy if I want...

I listen to a few, buy one...but one just doesn't seem to fit my idea of the world music genre.  At that point I would click on a discussion button...

That would take me to a forum to discuss the entire 10 songs and mesh with a group that share the same music intrests. 

Did I get that right?

 

Pretty close!... I like the idea of a pre-selected list, but for choice maybe a pre-selected list of 20 (or 50 or whatever) from which you choose the 10 you will run with since a budding fan of world music (or hip hop or country or whatever) might find a few songs they've already heard in the pre-selected list. This allows users to really embrace the "music you've never heard" concept. Maybe the Zune editorial staff throws out the first pre-selected list, but users familiar with the genre/artist/era can also recommend tunes they like.

I'm not sure if we're on the same page regarding the discussion aspect. It sounds like you interpret that as commenting on whether you think a particular song actually fits in the genre? My thinking was that I listen to a tune, and if I feel strongly I go to discussion and tell people "I can't stand Youssou N'dour" or "I am in love with Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan!", sort of a way to give your opinion on how the challenge went for you. If users are able to recommend tunes for the challenge, like I suggest above, they can get some satisfaction when they see how many new Ralph Stanley fans they helped create by seeing up/down votes or positive comments in discussion. Maybe this can somehow be captured in a ranking on your profile about how successful your recommendations are in terms of how many people voted thumbs up for your recommendations in the challenges. This might be the viral aspect I was missing before, the urge to have people agree with your ideas is a pretty strong one! I think you would get good turnout for people wanting the "trusted recommender" icon on their Zune Card.

The one downside (or upside, depending on your perspective) is that I see this idea as having the longest legs for those who are Zune Pass subscribers. Taking the challenge doesn't take any more $$ if you go the subscription route, it just takes an open mind and a commitment to take the time to listen to something new. For those who go the a la carte route of buying individual songs, the risk taking starts to impact the wallet at about 10 bucks per challenge. There doesn't seem to be much middle ground on this, since it's unlikely I have 10 songs in my existing collection that I have never heard. I'm a firm believer in the subscription concept, precisely for the reasons I like this idea... exposure to tons of new music with no risk of regret when I listen to a tune that I don't like.

Oh kewl!  I see where that is going now.  The addition of the icon (sa-weet) and implied status would not be instant gratification, but the vote would be!  I do hope someone else chimes in on this.  The more feedback the better the product!

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There are more love songs than anything else. If songs could make you do something we'd all love one another. Frank Zappa

Here's an extension to the trivia idea:  have some software for the Zune so that you can directly use the Zune to interact with the social while it is connected to the computer and join a triva game.  The interface could be on the Zune itself.  Maybe other Zune social games could be made in this fashion.

One easy add might be to put some meaning around Community User Level. Posts could be rated like in many discussion board sites (low, high, neutral), with consistently high post ratings earning a higher User Level for a given poster. All the user level indicates to me now is that someone has been a member for a long time, or they have a LOT of free time on their hands.

Just a "marketing" note, or maybe a question.  If you have a "pass" are you more likely to be here looking for music then someone who does not?  Are there two groups of "clients" for zune.net? What % of zune owners are pass owners? 

I'd in the process of puting almost 1,000 CDs on the Zune.  But I come here for the songs and albums I don't have and for help in tuning up the zune experience.

 

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Be nice now - 

 HiAlan wrote:

Here's an extension to the trivia idea:  have some software for the Zune so that you can directly use the Zune to interact with the social while it is connected to the computer and join a triva game.  The interface could be on the Zune itself.  Maybe other Zune social games could be made in this fashion.

I like the idea, but I think it is out of the "scope" of this project.  We are to focus on the website only from my understanding.  Where is that jetherealz when ya need her?

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There are more love songs than anything else. If songs could make you do something we'd all love one another. Frank Zappa

Right here, enjoying the conversation.

The thing is, yeah, it's out of scope for what we're doing RIGHT NOW - we're doing a web game/activity/thing. But who's to say it won't get to the software and device eventually? I think it's incredibly valuable to have ideas of what the V2, V3, whatever, could be - even if you know the V1 is only going to be a smallish thing.

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Jessica Zahn, Zune Social Program Manager ~ This posting is provided as-is with no warranties, and confers no rights.

At least for the front page of zune.net I'd like to see a mashup of locations of recently played songs, it would be cool to see exactly how many are using their zunes at any given time.

If there was a Zune Popfly block this would be simple to do but I don't see where the Zune team has created a block yet.

 

Ping me for more info.