Okay Geek Farm
MOG - Is it an iTunes killer?
Connor Scalleat
We have heard the business model before: pay about 10 dollars a month and get to listen to all the music you want, whenever you want. Many services have come and gone in this market, which seems to be a very tough cookie to crack. MOG however, offers a streaming platform and community that basically allows you to interact with your music on nearly every popular device imaginable.
MOG
App type: Music Store and Player
Price: $4.99(Web/Roku) - $9.99 (Web/Roku/Mobile) per Month
Compatible: iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad (Enlarged Pixel Size), Chrome Web App, Roku, Android, Flash Web App
Developer: MOG
MOG first originated from a blogging platform where you could read and discover new music, but now you can also listen to it. What it truly ends up being is a community network, known as the MOG Music Network, where you’re able to talk, read, and listen to any song at anytime as many times as you want. But this is a subscription-based service, something that most people aren’t too comfortable with.
Unique Features
MOG does quite a few things that other subscription-based music services just don’t offer. To begin with, you get an application which can be accessed on your TV via a Roku box, so you can free your music from those puny, little computer speakers you got.
The mobile experience is also certainly not lacking. MOG offers an amazing Android and iPhone application with a very helpful and shocking feature - you’re allowed to download as much music as you want from their service straight onto your device. So if you know, you’re going somewhere where internet connectivity will be slow or just not available, you can download an entire album while on a Wi-Fi network then listen to it whenever you want, where ever you are.
MOG considers themselves a music network first and foremost, so if you’re looking to stay on top of what’s popular on the charts, music news, and artist info, it isn’t that difficult. Along with music discovery through knowledge, they also feature a Pandora-like radio feature, which allows you to type in an artist and click play and then via a sliding bar you can decide how much of that artist will play versus other similar artists. Unlike Pandora however, you can skip as many times as you want and even put a song on repeat if you would like.
Organization
Now when I first signed up for MOG, organization of my music was definitely something I was concerned about. Like most listeners, I listen to one artist or album so much that I kill them. So when compared to my purchased playlist on iTunes (which by the way is fantastic), MOG — with its over 10 million songs in my library — is quite difficult to manage. Though MOG does offer a social playlist feature where you can search and use other people’s playlists, or make your own and share it with the entire MOG community!
iPhone Experience
Despite the mobile experience being another five dollars a month it is completely worth it. As soon as you open the MOG application you are greeted with a very simple but sexy homescreen. The homescreen allows you to search, see new releases, open your favorites, view your previously downloaded music, and play the music that is in your queue. And with iOS 4.0 featuring multitasking you can even control the application outside of the application!
The ability to download is something that is very interesting for a streaming company to have in their application. This feature allows you to download as much music as you want and are able to keep it on your device until you cancel MOG, which is nothing short of amazing. From a DRM standpoint this is very fascinating and I personally am very curious as to how legally they are able to do this — though I am aware that Spotify has something similar, yet we’re still waiting on it to come out in the states.
The mobile application is something that really completes the MOG experience unless you fall madly in love with MOG simply just being on your computer, which case I don’t suggest paying the extra five dollars a month if you’re not going to use it. Personally, I’m on it very sparingly, so take that as you will. Frankly, it’s pretty hard to replace my iTunes fix, since it’s so much easier to buy and just manage my music from inside Apple’s media player.
Chrome Web App Experience
Let’s start off by saying that this is the first Chrome Web App that I am excited for; it turns the MOG experience on your computer into heaven. Putting the pop-up player to shame, it also allows you to interact with the online library like never before. It’s simple, snappy, and it feels like a full-on application but within your browser! I would go so far as to say as that MOG’s Web App might just put the new iTunes music store to shame. The experience is exactly like the late Lala’s but even better! I have trouble putting into words how rewarding the experience of using it is and almost makes MOG the music library of choice on your computer.
Roku Experience
Something that most services don’t have is a Roku application which definitely makes this music experience unique. Although the Roku application isn’t all that amazing, it works. Audio comes at you at 320 kbps MP3 web stream, which is nothing fantastic but unless you’re an audio freak or a self-imposed audiophile, you won t notice.
The interface is exactly the same as every other Roku application, so nothing much to talk about there. Although it is important to mention that the application certainly doesn’t lack any features throughout the experience, and it is included in the minimum five dollars a month payment. It’s definitely something that puts MOG over the edge of other services if you have a Roku box, and if you have access to it why not go ahead and give it a try? There’s nothing quite like listening to your favorite tunes being streamed over your home theater’s speakers.
Web Experience
MOG’s own website is very easy to use and gives you about everything you need on the homepage. Unlike the old service Lala, it uses a pop-out player instead of actually keeping it within the frame of the main website. The pop-out player works perfectly, is extremely reliable, and it has all the play controls and features you’d ever need in one small window. Although everything is there in a very confined format, for someone without Expose (Mac OSX feature which allows you to view all your windows at once) I can’t imagine using this and enjoying it. Hopefully MOG will eventually move onto a downloadable desktop client or just build it into their webpage so it can be accessed in a tab. For me, this is the one feature that I feel is holding MOG back.
Overall
MOG is by far one of the best music applications and services on the market currently. MOG allows you to have an entire library of music to listen to anytime you want for an extremely reasonable price and provides you with centralized music news you can’t get anywhere else in one spot.
When looked at all together, MOG’s applications are clean and easy to use without lacking any features. The experience ends up becoming memorable and really allows you to focus on the music and not so much the managing of your library, which sad to say is also one of its downfalls. That and its web application certainly show that there’s room for improvement.
MOG / Download NOW
For iTunes, Roku, and your Desktop
Although MOG’s service is on basically every platform imaginable, it’s just not for everyone. MOG in my mind is a must try though, at least once. After your first month you should definitely be able to tell if you’re going to really use it in the future or not. They offer an amazing experience and have incomparable content — currently they have over 10 million songs and I have only been able to run across one band of which they, nor iTunes, carry, *cough cough Tool.*
