Apple’s Ping social music service and Twitter have joined forces in a move that may have Facebook pinged off and hip-hopping with rage. On Ping, you can now link to your Twitter account to instantly find Ping users among the people you already follow on Twitter.
This was exactly the kind of alliance that had been anticipated when Apple first unveiled Ping in October and even Apple, it seemed, had assumed a deal with Facebook would be a breeze.
Unfortunately, Facebook’s terms were “too onerous”, according to Apple CEO Steve Jobs.
And so, in steps the fastest-growing social medium on the planet – Twitter – which has more than 175 million users and is on track to have 200 million users by year’s end. While still some distance behind Facebook’s community of 500 million people, Twitter’s user base is growing at a rate of 370,000 a day.
“Twitter users now send over 95 million Tweets a day, many of which are about the music they’re listening to,” said Twitter’s Kevin Thau.
Pinging in iTunes
“Starting today, Ping, iTunes’ new social network for music, and Twitter are making it even easier for people to share music discoveries with their friends by putting Ping activity, song previews and links to purchase and download music from the iTunes Store right in their Tweets on Twitter.com.
“On Ping, you can easily link to your Twitter account to instantly find Ping users among the people you already follow on Twitter.
“Once you’ve linked the accounts, whenever you Post, Like, Review, or tell your friends why you purchased a song or album on Ping, this activity will also be tweeted to your Twitter followers – complete with playable song previews and links to purchase and download music from iTunes.
“When you click on a Tweet that’s sent via Ping or that contains an iTunes link, you’ll see the song or album in Twitter’s details pane, with the ability to listen to song previews from iTunes, making the experience even richer,” Thau said.
Even by Twitter standards this seems like a massive leap forward in terms of functionality on the Twitter pane and could be a right “house of pain” for Twitter platforms like TweetDeck and Tweetie if they can’t integrate.
“iTunes song previews are available on Twitter.com in the 23 countries where the iTunes Store offers music,” Thau said last night.
