Currently MySpace is ranked #6 by Alexa.  This one idea could increase their reach by a significant %.  A huge portion of myspace users (I dont know how many) browse in order to find new music to listen to.  Each artist on MySpace can upload 4 songs into their MySpace Player, and visitors can listen to a person’s music.

Here is the idea:  MySpace should create a downloadable player.  Each time I arrive at a musician’s MySpace page and I like their music, I can “add this song to my playlist.”  In this way, I could build up a library of music specifically from MySpace.  It would be like a MySpace radio of sorts.

From a user perspective, this is super, because it would allow users to listen to their “new-found favorites” even when not directly engaged with MySpace.com.  I could, for example, be listening to my MySpace Library right now while writing this blog entry.

From a musician perspective, this is duper, because it would allow them to become ‘regulars’ in people’s ears, instead of just being sampled while on the actual MySpace.com.

From MySpace’s perspective, this is both super and duper, because they would immediately increase their reach and their potential influence.  First of all, by having thousands upon thousands of MySpace Players downloaded onto people’s computers, they have a hugely increased reach for advertising, while the associated hosting/server costs would be a small percentage increase (i.e. the MySpace Player can download encrypted music files so the songs are not streamed from MySpace’s servers).

Second, by having exact statistical data on which musicians users like, they can build up a recommendation system, by which users who opt-in to ‘new recommendations’ can be given offerings of new musicians who match the user’s implicit musical preferences.  Ok, I think that was wordy.  I’ll say it again:  “I can tell what you like by what you’ve chosen to listen to, so I can give you more music based on what I can tell you like.”  (You get my point, I’m sure).

Well, that’s it.

If I was in charge of MySpace, I would implement this immediately, I would make it my primary objective, and if all current programmers were busy with other stuff, I’d hire new ones tomorrow.  So if you work for MySpace, get this idea done.  If you know someone who works for MySpace, show em this link, and tell him/her to get this idea done.