SongZilla - The Online Music Repository

DarkLight's picture

He has: 287 posts

Joined: Oct 2007

Hey guys. So it's been a while since I posted at TWF, and I owe a great deal to the community. In this post, not only do I hope to get some good feedback, but I also hope to make some of you aware of what I hope is a valuable tool for music-lovers.

I set out to start a project which delivers true music-on-demand, without the annoying ads or subscription fees. I succeeded, and although it was originally just a personal project, it gained so much interest with the public that I decided to launch it as a website. Many updates later and 5 months down the line here it is.

SongZilla is basically an online music repository which allows you to search for music and listen without any complications. It is capable of delivering almost any song you want, as well as the download, lyrics and a video. I have spent a great deal of time getting it to this stage, and I hope you all enjoy what it offers.

Please head over to http://www.songzilla.co.uk/ and give it a try. If you are a fan of Facebook, it also caters for you in terms of social-sharing and connecting. If you go to http://www.songzilla.co.uk/login.php you will be able to connect your Facebook account to SongZilla in 2 clicks, after which you will be sharing your favourite music with your friends instantly as you listen.

Let me know your thoughts and ideas on this project. As always, I am glad to hear any feedback or suggestions.

Thanks for reading, and have a great visit Smiling

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They have: 23 posts

Joined: Oct 2009

Nice and simple design. Not too much eye candy but the site is precise and to the point.

May I suggest that you spice up the inner pages a little bit once you do a search. You can maybe put a navigation bar on the left or right and then some banners or widgets which could make the site more appealing.

Best of luck with the site ! Smiling

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DarkLight's picture

He has: 287 posts

Joined: Oct 2007

Hey, thanks for replying...
I intend to keep the design as simple as possible so I'd rather not use unnecessary widgets. I aim to keep distractions to a minimum. Why fill up the page with pointless elements which not only distract the user from what they're looking for, but also impact on page speed and performance?

Thanks Smiling

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He has: 698 posts

Joined: Jul 2005

Hey there! I love the idea of this website. Now, I'm a big music lover but I've never really tried any of these online music websites, except for Pandora. I've heard a lot of mention of Spotify recently, and I've heard that it's great, but my point isn't to advertise for your competitors; it's just that I'm not sure your service quite adds up to something as useful just yet.

I love the simplicity. It looks a lot like Google, and a lot of people will enjoy the familiarity, and I find that keeping the interface simple, especially in the beginning, allows for pretty easy expansion (as an extension of this comparison, consider how Google added the toolbar to the top, which adds a lot of functionality but doesn't impose on the design). I don't think the logo helps you out at all. There's something to be said for simplicity, but I think your logo is a touch simpler than it could be, and it even seems to have a touch of grunge or edge which not everyone will appreciate. It actually might be a turn-off if anyone's paying that much attention.

I love the search functionality; again, you're drawing people in with a utility they're familiar with, and the results loaded very quickly. One thing I can think of is to perhaps enhance the search functionality a little bit more. For instance, if you accidentally have it set to "Title" but you type in an artist's name, it seems to do fine, but if you do just the opposite (for instance, selecting "Artist" but typing in "Don't Stop Believin'"), you get few or no results (for this example you get just one, and it is the original version which is nice). It seems like whatever your search algorithm is could be expanded so that if there aren't many results, below those results, display a group of new results from the set which produces the highest number of results. There surely is some way to make that decision during the searching process without hindering the original results.

The next way I think you could expand the usability is to add more search categories (year or genre for example), but those would produce A LOT of results, so maybe that plays in better with my next suggestion. These other online listening services that you will compete with allow you to set up playlists. Now, your service could work well against something like Pandora, which really (as far as I know) plays songs based off of one choice and then subsequent decisions you make about THEIR choices. It would be nice to be able to line up a sequence of songs to listen to, and maybe do more with that playlist (save it, share it, etc).

One last thing I want to mention is the Facebook connect option, and I want to emphasize the word option. As popular as Facebook is, I for one don't want to have to connect via Facebook to utilize some of the services of your website. I don't want it connected to my Facebook; I would much rather have the option of at least creating an account specific to that website. You are limiting the users in two ways there: those that don't have a Facebook account can't use it, and those that do but don't want to connect that way will be turned off.

With all that said, I think this is a pretty interesting and exciting website. I have it bookmarked for my own use already! Also, I don't know how development is set up, but I would be very interesting in possibly working with you if you have any interest in collaborating at all. I think there are many ways this service could be expanded and my passion for music has drawn me to this immensely. Private message me here if at all interested.

Kurtis

DarkLight's picture

He has: 287 posts

Joined: Oct 2007

Very good post here, thank you very much for the info... Lots of good suggestions, not sure where to begin Smiling

I agree with what you said about Facebook, and I do thankfully have plans to remove this limitation in the future, but not quite yet. Also, when this happens I will be transferring all connected Facebook users to a local version of their account which is SongZilla-Specific.

The logo, was kinda kept from very early in development. It was more of a placeholder than a permanent logo, but as time passed people became accustomed to the design so I saw no reason to change it.

The search functionality suggestions you mentioned were a very good idea... Although right now I can't do much about the genre, as I don't have that information available to me at this time. I will, however, look into the "Did you mean" feature for search, or some kind of AI for suggestions/recommendations.

As for collaboration, I will be sending you a PM right after posting this.

Thanks for a great review, very much appreciated Smiling

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They have: 112 posts

Joined: Aug 2001

Very Google-ish in its simplicity and that's a good thing. Everything seems to work cleanly and quickly. Does it have a mobile friendly template? That would be cool, or even a mobile app.

They have: 5 posts

Joined: Jan 2012

It makes my think to much about Google, but maybe that's just me. The overall design is very clean and light, I like that. Only the gray bar in the top has a little to "hard" shadow under it I think.

Good luck Smiling

DarkLight's picture

He has: 287 posts

Joined: Oct 2007

This site is now dead. You need to visit the new site: http://www.songrepo.com/

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