Swiss roll over for mobile music service

Social networking service Phling has published usage figures from the first 30 days since the launch of its service on Swisscom's mobile network.

The Phling service allows mobile users to listen to music streamed from their home computer onto their mobile phone, but also embodies all the social-networking features which are so popular these days including profiles, lists of friends and comment boards. Users can also share their music, allowing a limited number of friends access to their collection, streamed from their home PC.

The legality of this last feature may be open to question, but given that the music streamed is quite well protected, Phling sees the service as encouraging music discovery rather than negating the need to purchase.

Phling users are listening to an average of 22 minutes of music every day, with even the most active user only averaging 15 tracks a day. A poll of Boston students found that just 27 per cent were prepared to actively create a play list, with the rest listening at random or selecting by artist.

Though Phling hasn't published figures of how many tracks have been shared or if anyone ended up adding a track to their own collection after sharing it from a mate, it will be interesting to see how the service develops and if the rights holders agree with Phling's interpretation of copyright law. ®