Bandcamp Fan Pages

http://bandcamp.com/fans

Somehow Bandcamp have come up with another great idea for the site. It's a thing called Bandcamp Fan Page. It's just in private beta at the moment but I reckon it's really good. Really hope it takes off when it's fully available.

It adds a dash of 'social networking'. Basically, it shows the things you've bought on bandcamp. You can follow your friends and see what they've been getting. Plus you can follow artists and labels you're interested in so you know when they've released something new.

It's not pretending to be Facebook or Twitter and become you're default social networking site. Or Myspace for that matter (apparently they're trying to relaunch - good luck with that......). No, it just adds a small dash of social networking stuff. A bit like last.fm or IMDB or even Discogs.

One nice feature is a thing called a Wishlist. Handy for easily bookmarking things you might like to get. How many times have you listened to a previously unheard band on bandcamp, thought it was good but then kind of just forgot about them? Well, personally, not often enough that I'd lose sleep over it but enough that I appreciate the option is there to kind of bookmark stuff.

I think one really good thing is that it subtly encourages you to pay for music. Peer-to-peer pressure as a friend quipped. If you can see your friends buying music you feel compelled to join in. I know that sounds like I just read Nudge by R Thaler but, well, I did.

If you want to have a look at it then here's my page and here's Kevin's