Today’s article is a bit technical and abstract but nonetheless interesting. Read our interview with David Zhao from Zumo Drive.

S.N.: What prompted you to start ZumoDrive?

D.Z.: We started ZumoDrive because online storage wasn’t usable. Most of the storage services consist of a web page with a upload button. We saw the vision where online storage would be seamless integrated with the operating system so that all of the applications can connect to the cloud.

S.N.: What are the primary goals for your product in terms of user interaction?

Our primary goal is to provide transparent access to the cloud to the users. We want to free people from thinking about backup, syncing files across different machines, and running out of space on their devices. They should be able to install ZumoDrive and be able to take full benefit of the cloud right away.

S.N.: Could you give us some info on the back end tech/logistics/team of running ZumoDrive?

D.Z.: We’ve built our technology from the ground up. One of the key piece of it is a virtual file system that integrates directly with the OS. It handles caching, random access, and direct streaming from the cloud. The server side is built on top of Ruby and other open source technologies. We use Amazon as the backend cloud.

S.N.: The proportion of free/paid accounts?

D.Z.: We have a very healthy paying to free ratio.

S.N.: What effect did Techcrunch have on the service in terms of new accounts and user retention afterwards?

D.Z.: TechCrunch was great, it introduced ZumoDrive to a huge number of people. While I can’t disclose numbers, I can say that retention ratio for the service is very good.

S.N.: Plans you could share for future developments of the service?

D.Z.: Better web interface, better performance on the client, Linux, and more mobile devices soon.

S.N.: Who do you think are your primary competitors in this space? What’s Zumo’s advantage in your opinion?

D.Z.: There are a few players in the space, namely Dropbox and SugarSync. One of our main advantages is the ability to provide access to files without having to first download them onto the device. This creates a unique value proposition for devices that don’t have a lot of local storage. We also have a stronger focus around media and have unique capabilities for dealing with these type of files.

S.N.: Is the PaaS concept going to affect ZumoDrive or is it already implemented?

D.Z.: Yes, it definitely will be. It’s of great interest to us. More information about ZumoDrive is available here.

In this article we’re going to take a closer look at the service, deconstructing its features and weaknesses. Plus, for those not lucky enough to live in one of the officially accepted countries, we describe a simple way to circumvent the protection and gain immediate access.

The Selection: Is it enough?

The current music selection will not impress a hard-core audiophile, or fans of Britney Spears – but it certainly will satisfy the needs of most casual listeners and even the more pretentious ears of an indie-lover; Spotify features bands such as Decemberists, The National, Atlas Sound, CSS, The Shins, Feist and many others.

Nobody is arguing that the current song count is significantly lower than the catalogs of any major seller – the fact that it is completely free is what’s so compelling about this service.

Initially, I was deeply worried about bitrate quality, which thankfully is 192kbpps, and interruptions, but none happened. The team notes on the blog:

However, we want to make sure that everyone who uses Spotify gets the same fast, uninterrupted experience so providing a stable service is our priority. If growth happens too fast and it starts affecting quality we may have to re-instate the invitation system, hopefully this won’t happen. –UK launch of the service

It’s notable that for 9,99 pounds/month you can get the premium service – ad-free listening – and some cool extras such as pre-release songs and concert tickets:

Mikael Wiehe, sogwriter and driving force of Hoola Bandoola Band, has another solo album, Sånger från en inställd skiljsmässa, which is now available for pre-listen.

[…]and get to be one of the first to hear the new Morrissey album. –From Spotify blog

They’ve signed deals with all the major labels(EMI, Universal, AMG), and adding more music at a fast pace:

We’re currently adding about 10,000 tracks a day from our current deals. – from the Spotify blog

The application: Simplicity in its purest form

You’ll be impressed with the sheer simplicity of the Spotify desktop application – and its similarities to iTunes, Songbird or Banshee. It clocks in at a mere 2,4 MB download.

Although is incredibly small – it has all the basics covered: playlists as easy as drag and drop, an very easy to use Radio feature, saved searches, easy navigation and search.

The Radio feature is a killer one: with two clicks you can find the right music for a romantic evening, peaceful reading, or just going back in time to rediscover old classics.

Another utility I found for Spotify is quickly previewing songs – recommended from friends or iTunes’ Genius – full length quality preview of the whole album before deciding if I want it or not.

Conclusion

If you’re going to ask, I’m going to tell you that I hate not having control over my data, be it music, photos or documents, but you can’t help noticing that everything is slowly moving away to the cloud – which ultimately might be better, or worse.

If there’s something I’m not quite sure about it’s this bit of information posted on their website:

We ’ve got a far greater range of targeting than you’ll find in offline or even most digital media – starting with demographic, location and mood. Of course, detailed tracking and reporting comes as a given.

I don’t like being tracked – unless it’s Last.fm – and I certainly don’t like that they don’t mention it prominently during signup.

Spotify is a must-have in my book and definitely worth watching in the future. That being said, you should visit spotify.com/en/get-started/ and sign up. If you’re not living in one of the accepted countries, use a proxy that supports SSL and maps your location to the UK or Sweden. It’s easy to set up a proxy in Firefox using the Options menu:

Don’t forget to share in the comments your take on Spotify and other cool services(and music) you’ve discovered in this space.

Stay Relevant

Times are changing as we rapidly move to an increasingly connected world. Companies everywhere are doing their best to stay relevant. But not all succeed.

I can imagine a whiteboard – and the three core people standing around it in the meeting room. The question popped:

How can we stay relevant? It’s no longer about physical access to media – everything is connected to the internet.

It was a good question to ask because CD swapping wasn’t going to work forever. CD sales are going down quarter after quarter, as the RIAA keeps telling us. They blame piracy, we say it’s evolution. People are buying music online and that’s nothing new.

We need a music store. With a large catalog, about 6 million songs. And a social network.

But that was already done: iTunes, Amazon, eMusic, Rhapsody, and the list goes on. The same goes for social networks, with Last.fm leading the pack. The only way to bring in people to your service is to provide a better experience, for less money.

Another trend widely discussed by tech pundits are netbooks, are selling like there’s no tomorrow: Most of the time people are on the internet, checking mail, reading, chatting even doing work on the road.

Can you notice what’s missing from that list? That’s when Lala was born:

Your music library online, available from any computer.

Moving to the Cloud

The Lala Music Mover comes as a free download once you sign up. It’s a small application that sits quietly in your taskbar and uploads your songs to Lala:

• Fast song matching reads the metadata from your songs, and matches it to Lala’s catalog. If Lala has the song it is automatically added to your online library, no questions asked. It doesn’t even matter if you downloaded the songs via P2P. It matched 1,947 songs in 53 minutes, with processor usage never jumping the 30% limit.
• Brute-Force uploads the songs it can’t find in Lala’s catalog to the server. This takes some time depending on the server load and your bandwidth.

Lala Music Mover works both on Mac and Windows – never crashed or sucked up all the CPU cycles. Settings like default download folder, downloading/uploading are clearly laid out.

Once you uploaded your library you can access it online and play it through the flash player. A nice touch, you also have access to your playlists.

You’ll notice however that ratings – which are stored in the proprietary .itl file in iTunes – are not imported.

Music Store and Social Network

• Clean interface, easy to navigate and find artists, songs.
• Recommendations based on what you and your friends are listening.
• Listen to whole albums/songs for free once. 10 cents for unlimited web-plays, 99 cents for DRM-free MP3 download. The web-play counts toward the mp3 purchase.
• Songs are encoded at 256 kbps VBR or 320 kbps CBR.

Conclusion

The only caveat I find to this service as a whole, is that it’s not available outside of the United States. Yes, the geo-ip tracking can be tricked, but I’m not sure how legal that is. We contacted John Kuch, but unfortunately he was out of the office and could only be available via phone. Hopefully we’ll get him on an interview after the holidays.

Considering the large 6 million song catalog, integration with media players, the high quality encoding and cloud availability, I would strongly recommend this service. Visit Lala.com.