Facebook Debuts 'Music Stories' on iOS for Better Album & Song Discovery

[MacRumors]

Facebook today announced a new feature for its iOS app called "Music Stories" that will allow users to sample 30-second clips of songs that their friends and family post to the social network from services like Apple Music, iTunes, and Spotify. Users will be able to stream the clip directly from their feed and even follow a link to purchase or add the music directly into their Apple Music or Spotify playlists.

There are few things people love more than music. People find out about it from artists and friends alike, and they love to share their discoveries. Today we are enabling better music discovery and sharing on Facebook.

We hope by making this experience better, artists will share more, friends will share and engage more, and music will become a better part of the Facebook experience overall.

The company promises that support for other streaming music services will be coming soon, and that it sees Music Stories as a way to further mold Facebook into a one-stop experience where users can get updates on friends, family, entertainment and political news, and now new song and album recommendations. Facebook didn't give any word on when the new music-centric feature would be making its way to other platforms like Android or the web.

(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.3"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));https://www.facebook.com/Musicians/videos/10153038615461548/We're introducing "Music Stories" today to enable better music discovery and sharing on Facebook. The new post format allows people to listen to previews on Facebook from Apple Music and Spotify. You can read more about it on Facebook for Media: http://media.fb.com/blogPosted by Music on Facebook on Thursday, November 5, 2015​

Recently, the social network company faced a widespread issue of users reporting dramatic battery drain while the Facebook iOS ran in the background, even with background app refresh switched off. It has since repaired the issue, but left some Facebook users unsure of the company's intentions, like MacStories' Federico Vittici, who said the company had "a deep lack of respect for iOS users" when his hypothesis of silent background audio running to produce a snappier experience was proved to be correct.

Article Link: Facebook Debuts 'Music Stories' on iOS for Better Album & Song Discovery

 

[ProwlingTiger]

Sweet. Another useless feature to bloat up the app. I don't want to spend time listening to 30 second samples of music. If I did, I'd just peruse the iTunes Store.

 

[jpgr15]

The company promises that support for other streaming music services will be coming soon, and that it sees Music Stories as a way to further mold Facebook into a one-stop experience where users can get updates on friends, family, entertainment and political news, and now new song and album recommendations.

This anecdotal, I know, but this is a futile attempt. I'm using Facebook less and less and have no intention of reversing that trend.

Seems like everyone wants to do everything and forgets what they're good at.

Facebook in music. Snapchat facilitating cash transactions. Apple rumored to be interested in creating content.

I prefer to keep my digital life neatly compartmentalized and don't need 6 different giant corporations telling me which music to like.

Sorry - /rant /tangent

 

[SpamJunkie]

Tried to use this with a song from Apple Music but didn't see the music stories UI. I'm in Canada, is this US-only?

 

[javaGuru]

I updated the Facebook iOS app and gave this a try to no avail. My results were no where close to the results in the video showing how it is supposed to work.

 

[mdridwan47]

All these facebook app has failed except the actual facebook app and the messenger app, which is basically the other half of the original facebook. This app will fail too. All these useless apps makes facebook look desperate.

 

[Chuck Kostalnick]

Even as horrible as this is, it's still infinitely more useful than Connect.

 

[Manatlt]

All these facebook app has failed except the actual facebook app and the messenger app, which is basically the other half of the original facebook. This app will fail too. All these useless apps makes facebook look desperate.

Music Stories is in the main FB app. There's no separate app for this.

 

[peglegjack]

I honestly don't get this. Why not just share a YouTube video and hear the whole song?

 

[TruthWatcher412]

Didn't work for me. When I shared the link to a song from Apple Music then click on it in Facebook it just opens the iTunes Store on my iPhone.

 

[C64]

Which headphones are in that image?

 

[Pakaku]

Obligatory data-mining comment!

 

[MyMacintosh]

yeah...except my facebook wall isn't as hipster as this one. It consists of pregnant baby mamas, trap music and the likes, which is why I stay off facebook entirely

 

[Gerry Segal]

I wish they could play this song...

 

[mrgraff]

Okay, the spinning album art record animation is kind of cool, but that's about it.

 

[LordBeelzebub]

This feature seems like a diversion to distract you from the fact that it's really more data mining of all its users.

 

[2457282]

Which headphones are in that image?

Yes this is the only reason I came into this story. Facebook, Meh... Headphones, however, look interesting. Anyone know what brand they are?

 

[teslo]

Yes this is the only reason I came into this story. Facebook, Meh... Headphones, however, look interesting. Anyone know what brand they are?

Chinese™.

 

[damartin1]

I am using iOS 9.2 Public Beta 2 and I was able to share my song right from Apple Music by hitting share then Facebook. I tried copying the link and pasting but that didn't do anything like the video, but sharing and hitting Facebook made it look exactly like the video

 

[Fatboy71]

Didn't work for me. When I shared the link to a song from Apple Music then click on it in Facebook it just opens the iTunes Store on my iPhone.

Exactly the same for me. I've seen it mentioned that the feature is rolling out today, so perhaps it might take a day or two before everyone sees the feature working.

 

[Fatboy71]

I am using iOS 9.2 Public Beta 2 and I was able to share my song right from Apple Music by hitting share then Facebook. I tried copying the link and pasting but that didn't do anything like the video, but sharing and hitting Facebook made it look exactly like the video

I'm only on 9.1, but when I try this, I just have the link posted and clicking on it puts me onto iTunes.

 

[Sleaka J]

Still won't get me to use your FB app FB.

 

[mdridwan47]

Music Stories is in the main FB app. There's no separate app for this.

Ow. I thought it was another app. My bad.

 

[joueboy]

Another useless things to clutter the timeline. Do I really need to know what music people are listening!? Some people are just shameless to show what kind of music they're listening. And you know what I'm talking about.

 

[farawaybrothers]

I dig this and don't think it's useless