iTunes Ping, Apple’s Social Network Experiment

iTunes have just released their new musical social network Ping, set to be a competitor to Facebook, Twitter and Last.fm.

So if you weren’t already socially exhausted by your growing lists of networks, Ping provides users with a unique way to interact by allowing them to follow their favourite artists and friends, finding out what they’re listening to and downloading, prompting you to do the same.

Like the new kid at school, iTunes are eager to please, and it seems they’ve brought some of the right toys to the sand pit. Apple have taken cues from Facebook and Twitter, allowing you to friend another music lover, or follow an artist you like. They’ve also introduced easy to understand and use privacy controls, something Facebook is yet to master.

However Ping suffers from some serious setbacks. Firstly as it’s tied to the iTunes store it’s only available to people in 23 countries. If Apple wants to get anywhere near close to the user base of Twitter and Facebook that’s an obstacle they’re going to have to overcome.

Secondly the only music you can list in your profile for others to connect with, or for iTunes to use to make artist suggestions; is music you have bought from the iTunes store itself. How much of your music library did you purchase from the iTunes store? If you’re like most than it will only be a scratch on the surface of your music collection.

Apple have made a bold move, and have managed secure enough media attention that the 16 million iTunes users are sure to try out Ping over the coming weeks. But it seems that Ping is still very half-baked, more of an idea than a full on execution.

Where was the iTunes cloud, or web version of iTunes we were gagging for? That web version is looking even more tantalising now that Ping is around. Watch this space.

To take Ping for a spin download iTunes 10 from Apple.