A couple of days ago, the audio/video search engine SingingFish stopped existing. Its owner, AOL, simply redirected the site to video.aol.com, which offers some functionality of SingingFish, but not all of it. There is no explanation on AOL’s site about what happened. Just a bland catchphrase that rings with irony: “If it’s out there, you’ll find it here”.
I’ve found this behaviour by AOL quite obnoxious, and I wrote a short post about it, although I usually leave posts about dying services to TechCrunch’s deadpool, which is getting quite full.
However, in one week after I first wrote the post, I’ve noticed a considerable amount of search engine traffic containing a single phrase: “What happened to SingingFish“. As I’ve said in my first post, I’ve never used SingingFish, but I find it quite unbelievable that poor users of this service can’t find any relevant info about it anywhere on the web, so they come to my short article which, basically, just says that SingingFish is gone, most probably forever. So, here’s a couple more lines on the subject.
First, if anyone ever wants to write a business case on how to make your users hate you, go to AOL. They seem to be the experts in the field. To kill off a service and not give one word to the costumers about it: not on the AOL video search site, not in the help section, not on their (semi-related, but anyway) official search blog, well, that’s the perfect way to surprise your users, whose astonishment will very soon become hatred. If I were a SingingFish user, I’d never, ever, EVER, trust AOL about anything again. I wouldn’t give them my e-mail. I wouldn’t use their services. I wouldn’t visit their page. And I sure as hell wouldn’t give money to them. Yet, ironically, on the very page that SingingFish redirects to now, there’s a lot of for-pay content. Guess who won’t be buying any of it?
Secondly, AOL managed to screw up. They only redirected the front page for the first couple of days, so users were able to access SingingFish through the numerical IP or through this address: http://singingfish.com/sfw/home.jsp, as reported on Jason Blogs. This has probably given some hope to the users, but then in a couple of days AOL killed off that, too. Would you like some salt with your wound, Sir?
Finally, as a comment in my original article points out, former SingingFish employees were laid off by AOL. Normally, this wouldn’t be all that interesting to the users, but given that they don’t have they favorite service anymore, they did some digging, and come up with the dirt. The AOL business strategy with SingingFish seems to have been this: let’s buy off these guys, scrape what we can use for our own search algorithms, then dump the whole thing and kick them out when their contracts end.
I don’t know how big SingingFish’s user base were. Maybe it was very small. Maybe it was so small that AOL decided that statistically, it’s meaningless. Well, with this article I’m doing what I can to make them suffer the consequences. They should learn that every user counts.
To stray a little from the topic of SingingFish, I’d like to remind you what happened with CrispyNews. Recently, this service, which enabled the users to create their own mini Digg-like site, had closed its doors. The important thing to note here is that CrispyNews had a revenue sharing model with their users. This means that some of the users put some time and effort thinking they might earn a buck or too from the service. Of course, CrispyNews wasn’t as abrupt or indecent as AOL about their closing: they sent out a letter of apology to all their users. But this, too, is a good example of an emerging problem on the internet. Service today are cheap and easy to start, but they are also easy to kill. The users are stuck in the middle, and many will have trouble accepting the fact that their favorite web site or service - perhaps one that they’ve invested many hours into - can disappear tomorrow. Maybe this leads to higher adoption of paid services, or to increased suspicion (and therefore slower adoption rate) of new services.
In any case, when some of the Web 2.0 sites start dying out - and it’s bound to happen, as there’s simply too many of them in every niche - the attitude of users will change, and business will have to adapt - some may even profit - from this change.
*sigh* Singingfish was the best media search engine. I used it for my MyFlashFetish multiple mp3 player for my Myspace profile. I think I can still play the songs, but the search engine that I used to find them is now abolished. What am I to do now? Now, when I click the button on MyFlashFetish.com to search for mp3s, I link to a site that totally sucks. When I search for Singingfish and click links, I get redirected to AOL Video, no explanation, no answer. AOL seems to have simply destroyed Singingfish like a nuclear fission bomb to a small helpless mountain village. THANK YOU AOL.
Anyway, I’ve also heard that AOL laid off nearly all of the people who ran Singingfish, just four years after AOL acquired the search engine. What a huge waste. I hope that all the people at Singingfish regroup and soon and create a new media search engine which pwns AOL’s Audio and Video Search. And if they do, I hope that they NEVER let any big company get it’s grubby little hands on it.
Is there at least some way to send an eMail to the guy in charge of AOL and protest about this great annoyance? So many people who used Singingfish now have to result to other cra*** mp3 searchers that aren’t as the least bit effective as Singingfish was.
So, to ALL the people who originally created Singingfish, get back together! Create a new site! Beat the c*ap out of AOL’s search engines!
We will be depending on you!
“The AOL business strategy with SingingFish seems to have been this: let’s buy off these guys, scrape what we can use for our own search algorithms, then dump the whole thing and kick them out when their contracts end.”
This is not exactly accurate. Software developers don’t get employment contracts, let alone ones that last for 3 years. I don’t think you’ll find the Singingfish search algorithms in use at AOL (or anywhere else for that matter). In fact AOL pretty much stopped doing it’s own R&D on search. Last summer, after the high profile release of search end user search queries, heads rolled and not much is left.
“I don’t know how big SingingFish’s user base were. Maybe it was very small. Maybe it was so small that AOL decided that statistically, it’s meaningless.”
I suspect this is more accurate. Eyeballs are important, but probably more important is revenue, which is always tough for small, niche search engines.
I am a former Singingfish employee, but I didn’t spend too much time there after the AOL acquisition. So I am still speculating.
Austin
i am so sad that singing fish is gone ! i used it all the time. i think i do hate aol. . .and that is who my family has used for e-mail for years.
they should have at least given us an explanation.
what they have replaced it with doesn’t even begin to compare.
if somebody knows who at aol i can complaine to, that might actually listen let me know.
~emily jo
I am extremely disappointed with the switch to AOL video. I have searched for, what I can honestly say, over 30 things on AOL video, and i have found none. This is for one reason, and one reason only. Because singingfish accepted music and media from just regular sites submitted by people. This was so ingenious and brought such variety and functionality to the site, because most of the submitted sites were mp3s that were easily accessible. I have no source of sampling music other than if someone made an AMV on youtube.
-lindsay
The oligarchy hates the people. Why do people not see this? they ol;igarchy think that they’r wiser and more fit to lead than us. Gues what? WRONG. I have the freedom to make my own choices. No man or edict can take that right away from me. They can, however, make this life a living hell and/or kill me. I don’t care.
There are things in this universe that all the rituals and lies will never change. Chiefly the distinct difference between right and wrong.
Make AOL pay.
aol is known as america off line, they have always treated users badly befor. there HQ, or main building is right by me in loudoun county VA, and they treat alot of there employers well, then fire unexpectedly. If anyone knows of another web site that can compare to singingfish, please post it, or let me know if there will be a new singingfish, because i searched for about a month for a site that can give me songs, and i have found nothing.
I went back to singingfish.com for the first time in a while, just like the rest of you, and discovered I had lost a friend. There doesn’t seem to be way to let AOL Video know how much I despise them. It would have been better to just kill the site than to insult me by sending me to a much inferior site. Never have been an AOL fan, apparently never will be.
I was shocked when AOL’s site came up, and retyped www.singingfish.com into my browser multiple times before accepted the sad fact. How tacky to redirect like that. AOL, burn in hell.
Why is it that seemingly no one likes AOL, or their customer service, yet they still thrive? Someone recreate singingfish, please.
I was confused when I clicked on the bookmark I had for singingfish, and it sent me to AOL.
I typed in “singingfish” on the google search engine, and it sent me to AOL. Then I looked up the Wikipedia article on it, and it said it was shut down in February. (by the way, referring on your question to how many people worked in singingfish, on the Wikipedia article it said that it was as big as 50 people)
It’s horrible that AOL just magically made it dissapear. I loved singingfish. I mainly looked for beatles bootlegs and covers, and a lot came up. =(
-Monica
still mad mad mad
that singing fish is gone…aol…you suck.