It turns out, reports that Twitter was launching their new music discovery service Twitter Music this weekend were true, and also not true.
Twitter Music is available – but only for a handful of top influencers. We noted earlier that Ryan Seacrest was already tweeting about it – and now it’s clear why. Twitter is only letting a small number of celebs and other big Twitter personalities “test” the new app for now. And of course “test” means “tweet about and generate buzz for,” as Mr. Seacrest’s involvement would indicate.
Peter Kafka at All Things D reports that us common folk aren’t going to be able to get a look at Twitter Music until sometime next week. Bummer.
What we know about Twitter Music so far is that it’s a music discovery app that suggests music based on a number of signals – including who you follow. Users of Twitter Music will be able to stream songs via Soundcloud and iTunes – but no full-streaming service partners like Spotify are expected at launch. Also included in the package is a global trend tracker, which allows Twitter Music users to know what’s popular and playing in real time.
For now, we just have a music.twitter.com site that teases the service, and has a Twitter sign-in button. But it doesn’t function yet.
playing with @twitter‘s new music app (yes it’s real!)…there’s a serious dance party happening at idol right now
— Ryan Seacrest (@RyanSeacrest) April 11, 2013
Expect more of this^ over the next few days.