11 ms·

Social-Media App Musical.ly Is Acquired for as Much as $1B

101 points by uptown 9y ago

Jedd 9y ago
Is my maths right? It works out at $13+ per active user. (Ignoring the various, dubious definitions of active.) Seems high given that, as noted in the article, the sale implies the owners think growth has plateaued.
- nemothekid 9y ago
  By your same math, Snap currently works out to $90 per DAU. Whether the model is sound is up in the air, but IMO Musical.ly / Live.ly's product is very similar to snapchat.
  - Semaphor 9y ago
    To copy from thefreedictionary: Dümmster Anzunehmender User (German: Dumbest Assumable User; play on words, see GAU) How are you using DAU here?
    - speeq 9y ago
      Daily Active Users
    - ComputerGuru 9y ago
      Daily Active User, I imagine.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
rki9191 9y ago
$1Billion for Musical.ly? Did people even use the app?
- dusing 9y ago
  It was Snapchat for kids
  - icebraining 9y ago
    I thought Snapchat was the Snapchat for kids?
    - angus-prune 9y ago
      Snapchat was snapchat for kids, but then the kids grew up.
- Ravikiran 9y ago
  One of those few apps which cracked the teen and tween (as they call it) market
  - camillomiller 9y ago
    don’t underestimate how much investors value products that look like they’ve cracked the gen z riddle
- samschooler 9y ago
  Its currently #58 on the app store. They are getting at least 150,000 downloads a month [1]. [1] https://www.quora.com/How-many-downloads-do-I-need-in-the-App-Store-to-reach-the-top-50-and-top-10-of-the-most-downloaded-games-in-US-and-China https://www.quora.com/How-many-downloads-do-I-need-in-the-Ap...
  - throwappstore91 9y ago
    At least 150k a month is an understatement. My app ranks around ~ 150 in Photo & Video (musical.ly is #6 in that category) and get that many downloads a month. Musical.ly must have at least 1-2M download a month for that ranking.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
giacaglia 9y ago
Toutiao is a behemoth in the media space. Will see when it invades the US
- adventured 9y ago
  It certainly grew fast, no question. It's not a behemoth however. It has 1/5th the sales of CBS, which is just one of dozens of big US media companies. It's very unlikely they'll be able to invade the US in a meaningful sense. Toutiao's primary business is media content aggregation. They're going to be incapable of presenting non-censored news, content, media. The CPC will require that anything they allow in their publishing space globally, be controlled and censored strictly to present the views of the CPC. What China allows their domestic companies to do internationally when it comes to media, is not very different from what they allow domestically. That's why companies like Baidu and Tencent, which are drastically larger than Toutiao, have been entirely unable to crack the Western media markets. The restrictions Chinese companies face due to the strict authoritarian regime at home, is extremely different from what companies in eg Japan faced when they 'invaded' the US 30 years ago (such as Sony in music & movies). It's why there will never be a Chinese Reddit conceptually. Free expression is illegal for all Chinese media companies, it leaves them at an extreme disadvantage when competing globally.
  - Ravikiran 9y ago
    But it would be interesting to see how they use musical.ly. Toutiao has AI capabilities and I think they want to make use of the lip-syncing ability.
    - adventured 9y ago
      I agree and I actually would expect Toutiao to do plenty of innovative things within the space they can work in, within the confines of what's allowed. I would expect one of these companies will want to attempt what Sony did and accumulate a music business. The question will be how they can manage to align that with the media restrictions they have to live within. Maybe Toutiao is young enough to still dare to attempt it, I think the older, larger Chinese Internet companies long ago learned to avoid challenging the CPC's boundaries. In a less restricted atmosphere, companies like Snapchat or Twitter would be prime take-over targets for some of the Chinese giants looking for international expansion. I think a company like Tencent might have acquired Twitter by now if they could operate the platform without censorship trouble.
junkscience2017 9y ago
my kids haven't touched this app for a year, nor have any of their friends...it seemed to be intensely popular for two weeks
- econner 9y ago
  I can't imagine that no one uses the app if it was just acquired for a billion dollars. It's possible your experience is not representative.
- willvarfar 9y ago
  I will have to ask my kids and their cousins tonight :) I remember when it was everywhere, and I remember being a bit concerned really, and yet thinking about it I don't recall it being mentioned in the past 6 months or so at least... maybe everyone moved on. On to what?
- kerrsclyde 9y ago
  My youngest daughter, 11, uses it. In the school I work in it seems to be a cause of much disagreement within girl friend groups, 11 and under. Is the huge valuation because it attracts this type of user, no doubt extremely valuable to marketeers, which seems a bit cynical to me.
- tootie 9y ago
  Same with my kids. They did like 4 videos and lost interest.
willmacdonald 9y ago
This was very popular over the summer in Sweden. Barely used anymore. The big game these days, that has a solid revenue model is Star Stable. A Huge virtual world, monthly subscription required, 12 languages and you can ONLY choose female characters.
- senatorobama 9y ago
  Star Stable is very sketchy.
  - willmacdonald 9y ago
    In what way, you mean for users of the game, or the business model?
ttoinou 9y ago
Didn't know the app. I can only see compilation videos on youtube. What does the app do exactly ? It remaps the time of the video to match/sync lips with the lyrics, that's it ? Does the user has any other control on the result ? Thanks.
- samschooler 9y ago
  Basically a user chooses an audio track (this can be a wide variety of things. YouTube video, song, or other pop culture track, or silence), then they click record. The track is played and they can either match their lips or actions or both to the track. This simple style of recording tends to create some pretty impressive videos. Musical.ly took this and made it into a platform similar to Instagram or Vine. Here are some examples: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njtMuGaSIGg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njtMuGaSIGg
  - ttoinou 9y ago
    Thx. How does the "action matching" happens ? is automatic ? I can't see any screen recording of the app so I don't know
    - samschooler 9y ago
      Nope, all of the movements and actions are up to the person recording. The app only plays the track, and records the video.
      - ttoinou 9y ago
        Wow that's weird because the movements of the persons in the video don't seem natural at all
        yedava 9y ago
        Looks like the app alters the playback speed and that may explain the unnaturalness of the videos: > Through the app, users can create 15-second to 1 minute videos and choose sound tracks to accompany them, use different speed options (time-lapse, slow, normal, fast, and epic) and add pre-set filters and effects. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical.ly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical.ly
trophycase 9y ago
Shows how valuable brainwashing children with advertising truly is.
roman_savchuk 9y ago
I don't get lip-syncing part of it. Their website says it's "musical.ly is a social media platform for creating and sharing short videos." I think this abstract "short" word explains a lot: Youtube videos lose a lot of views, because Youtube tells how long they are. Impatient kids are like "Nah, it's too long". But by promising the videos are short, you can probably make viewers to spend even more time with an app, watching many shorter videos instead of a long one. No data to prove it, just gut feeling.
- bhavyapruthi 9y ago
  I can relate that to my personal experience, I often choose not to watch a movie since I don't want to spend a couple of hours on entertainment but end up watching youtube videos for a longer time
uptown 9y ago
Mirror: https://archive.fo/JPCLG https://archive.fo/JPCLG
bryananderson 9y ago
I used to work in the social influencer space, and often attended conventions in which top influencers were treated like A-list movie stars by legions of (mostly young) fans. The last few years, the Musical.ly kids were the ones causing all the crowd control nightmares. One kid’s performance on a stage in the convention hall was canceled by security because the crowd was dangerously large and packed-in (as they all fought to get as close as possible). Another kid caused a major stampede by walking through the public lobby of the convention center (something they were very much not supposed to do). Literally hundreds of fans ran after them, to the woe of anyone trying to walk through the lobby. You and I have never heard of these kids, and we don’t understand the appeal, but this is a huge business. The engagement and brand loyalty that Musical.ly stars get is like nothing I’ve ever seen.
- noir_lord 9y ago
  I can believe it, my stepson is addicted to (what I think) are crappy YouTube channels. I guess I'm getting old.
  - stuffedBelly 9y ago
    Meanwhile they think nowadays TV channels are boring and crappy, generation gap at its working :)
    - stanleydrew 9y ago
      Not sure how much "traditional" TV you've watched recently, but they are very not wrong.
      - smacktoward 9y ago
        Are you kidding? Television over the last 10-15 years has been in a golden age of scripted drama. There's still a lot of crap on the tube, but there's also more good stuff than there's been at any time in history.
orliesaurus 9y ago
it's like the instagram of the new generation...no surprises here!
forthefuture 9y ago
Previous Discussion (11hrs ago): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15667753 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15667753
loxs 9y ago
WTF. Is 1B even a meaningful number any more. I literally hear about these guys for the first time.
- simmons 9y ago
  I think you need to be around the right age group to have heard about it. My 9-year-old niece is obsessed with Musical.ly. I often look at it, and think there's no way I would have ever thought to invent an app like that.
- tqkxzugoaupvwqr 9y ago
  Musical.ly is popular with children and young teenagers that perform dances to their favorite songs and share them with others.
- jpalomaki 9y ago
  60M monthly users according to article (and probably growing). $16 per current monthly user. No idea about the running costs for the service, but does not sound too unreasonable. Wikipedia writes: "Musical.ly's structure allows the viral dissemination of trends throughout the platform. The hashtags that are popular on this social network usually make reference to bits of pop culture and trends among the internet world. Because of its massive usage, a lot of events launched within the app can become viral global events, especially among teenagers"
- dsjoerg 9y ago
  Your world is narrower than you realized.
- spmurrayzzz 9y ago
  This has turned into a very well-curated A&R scouting platform. The valuation isn't surprising to me at all.
  - coryl 9y ago
    Do music/entertainment companies even scout anymore? Seems like a redundant role, given music publishing is largely dying out as well.
etareduce 9y ago
I wonder how many people would feel surprised as I did the first time I learned that Musical.ly was built by a Chinese team based in Shanghai.
indescions_2017 9y ago
HN has a nice blog on acquirer Toutiao here: https://blog.ycombinator.com/the-hidden-forces-behind-toutiao-chinas-content-king/ https://blog.ycombinator.com/the-hidden-forces-behind-toutia... Strategically, its a good way for a Chinese consumer internet firm to enter into Western markets. As well as short form, digestible, interactive video optimized for mobile.
pc256 9y ago
One billion dollars, well perhaps they will have a little spare change to invest in protecting their users ... https://www.channel4.com/news/children-bombarded-with-sexually-explicit-chat-on-musical-ly-and-live-ly https://www.channel4.com/news/children-bombarded-with-sexual...
wyc 9y ago
I think more and more the trend is for aggregators to buy networks and strengthen themselves. Facebook did so with WhatsApp, Instagram, and TBH. Amazon did so with Whole Foods. Google bought DoubleClick. Software can be easily replicated, but not ecosystems because of the difficult cold start problem. If Toutiao wants to play in US markets, then this acquisition could make a lot of sense as the first defensible foothold.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
ilikeamerica 9y ago
so trump goes to China. 12% snap bought , 1b for Musical.ly. Is there some mutual future success deals going on more than usual. Im reaching hard here but I smell something in the air. Maybe its fire (a good kind) or maybe Trump just farted. 1)US economics/job sec says man it would be nice if we could get some investment in companies that are hiring internally 2)Trump gives list of companies to China for favourable deals and profit/tech sharing 3)America and China both see a profitable future. Is there any other deals Im not seeing. Is there some general stat to suggest that GNP of China is being focused on the US more than usual. Isnt Foxconn opening a factory in Michigan? Sorry for the lack of research and vague ideas but this could be a spark that lights flames and cooks food for millions/billions. Is the CEO of McDonald's talking out of his ass[0] or is Trump the bussiness man president we needed to get us through a tough economy? Not a kind conservative but a practical one, the Chinese like practical. [0]https://www.cnbc.com/2017/11/08/ex-mcdonalds-ceo-praises-trump-on-trade-strategy.html https://www.cnbc.com/2017/11/08/ex-mcdonalds-ceo-praises-tru...
philfrasty 9y ago
While $1B is certainly a lot of money this is the first time (in a long time) I would have rather seen the founder not sell. Musically has a very unique approach to encourage and enable users to create content that I have not seen on any other platform (challenges, smooth video creation process, etc). While I am certainly not in the target demographic I am sure we will see this approach in future (video)content platforms.
- gkanai 9y ago
  > I would have rather seen the founder not sell. You're not in his shoes. He has investors that probably pushed him to sell when they all saw that growth had plateaued. Selling gives the founders and investors all 'wins.' Once they took VC money, their future was either sale, IPO or bankruptcy, so the sale was the logical choice.
- KaoruAoiShiho 9y ago
  Musically seems very very hard to monetize to me.
samschooler 9y ago
To understand why they have such a large valuation you need to understand that: 1. This is massive with the tween/teen market. That is why not many people understand its popularity; you either need to know a tween, or have one as a kid. 2. Musical.ly became Vine after Vine shutdown. The content moved from lip-synced videos to more of a mixure of vine-like videos and lip sync. 3. They currently have 60M monthly users, and as of now Musical.ly is still #58 on the App Store (they have been in the top charts for the past 2 years at least). Its hard to say people aren't using it when its above some large companies on the charts (Linkedin, Shazam, Dropbox). 4. Their influencer network is huge as well. Nearly every popular musical.ly star has some sort of swag from the company. Think about that in the tween's mind: you're just a normal kid going to your normal middle school with your normal friends, then a national company wants YOU to be a spokesman for the company. That is quite literally getting famous for these kids. At popular industry conferences like Vidcon, they literally are celebrities.
- mistermann 9y ago
  > This is massive with the tween/teen market. That is why not many people understand its popularity; you either need to know a tween, or have one as a kid. So, so true. And as a result, some of these kids are not just "internet famous", but literally multi-millionaires.
- NDizzle 9y ago
  I have a tween/teen, but I don't let her use apps like this. Have you taken a look at it? Maybe I'm turning into an uptight old man, but it's not a good idea, knowing what I do about the internet.
  - Innotek 9y ago
    I have a teen daughter as well. My wife and I go back and forth on this, but my take is that she's learning how to communicate with her peers in ways that I will never understand. I don't have to live in the world she will inherit, I'll have my furrowed brow and my 401k and she'll be deciding what being an adult means for her. At the end of the day, I can only coach her on how to conduct herself online, she's going to be the one out there.
dajohnson89 9y ago
what happened to the bubble burst?
RIMR 9y ago
I think it ought to be noted that Musical.ly videos are frequently passed around pedophile communities online. It worries me that an app designed for preteens to film themselves dancing can swell to such a size. Parents have completely stopped being accountable for what their children do online, and the consequences thereof...
- cisanti 9y ago
  Do you gave some kind of source or story about it? I don't doubt because pedos sure do move where the kids are and if there are a lot young dancers there as you say...
- hbosch 9y ago
  First off, the criticism of this app being used for kids to sexualize themselves was what early doomsayers shouted down about both Vine and Snapchat, among almost all other video-social startups. I don't think it's a valid or reasonably realistic concern. Secondly, you definitely need to source some evidence for the claim about pedophile communities.
  - RIMR 9y ago
    I am writing an article right now (to be published soon) about this, and I can tell you that there are lots of underground communities that just share YouTube, Musical.ly, Snapchat, etc. links for sexual reasons, with no attempt to hide the pedophilic nature of their viewing. I am not about to post links to these places, for obvious reasons, but perhaps I'll post my article once it is finished. If HN had a PM system, I would bookmark your name and send you a link. Maybe just keep a look out in a month or so, or check back on my page for submissions. Lots of fact-checking and analysis to do before I publish this, not to mention protecting some of the children I am documenting. There's also a large community of teens on these networks that consume pseudosexual content of kids their own age, and you obviously have to factor out of any statistics about pedophilia. I myself consumed a lot of preteen/teen model stuff when I was 13-15, but that content has only gotten more disturbing to me with age. There are some disturbing trends out there, and it's clear to see the cause-and-effect in many cases. Kids are figuring out that if you dance on camera, you get a lot of views - but if you dance on camera in your underwear, you get A LOT MORE views. These sites are putting forth little to no effort to curb this kind of content, and there is little public oversight. It's not illegal, but there are people profiting off of the ad revenue associated with this content, and there are children sexualizing themselves online, often without their parent's knowledge. It's not something we should ignore, because this is just going to keep getting further normalized as people try to downplay what is actually happening. And there are people out there who become fixated on online personas, and this can lead to some very dark scenarios. The last thing we need is adults preying on children in environments that children frequent, and parents are ignorant of. These places are candy shops for pedophiles, and kids often don't notice that their peers on these sites aren't always fellow kids...
rossboss 9y ago
For everyone talking about kids under 13 read this: Eligibility . THE SERVICE IS NOT FOR PERSONS UNDER THE AGE OF 13 OR FOR ANY USERS PREVIOUSLY SUSPENDED OR REMOVED FROM THE SERVICE BY MUSICAL.LY. IF YOU ARE UNDER 13 YEARS OF AGE, YOU MUST NOT USE OR ACCESS THE SERVICE AT ANY TIME OR IN ANY MANNER. Furthermore, by using the Service, you affirm that either you are at least 18 years of age or have been authorized to use the Service by your parent or guardian who is at least 18 years of age. [1] My question, can you use the app without an account? [1] https://musical.ly/en-US/term https://musical.ly/en-US/term
- robinduckett 9y ago
  I tried to report someone who was clearly under 13 but the process involved giving musical.ly a huge amount of my personal information (above and beyond Name / email address) so I decided not to bother. They know their target audience is young children.
jgalt212 9y ago
The girl in the spandex on the landing page is mesmerizing.
googlechrome 9y ago
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101 points by uptown 9y ago

Jedd 9y ago

Is my maths right? It works out at $13+ per active user. (Ignoring the various, dubious definitions of active.) Seems high given that, as noted in the article, the sale implies the owners think growth has plateaued.

nemothekid 9y ago
By your same math, Snap currently works out to $90 per DAU. Whether the model is sound is up in the air, but IMO Musical.ly / Live.ly's product is very similar to snapchat.
- Semaphor 9y ago
  To copy from thefreedictionary: Dümmster Anzunehmender User (German: Dumbest Assumable User; play on words, see GAU) How are you using DAU here?
  - speeq 9y ago
    Daily Active Users
  - ComputerGuru 9y ago
    Daily Active User, I imagine.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]

rki9191 9y ago

$1Billion for Musical.ly? Did people even use the app?

dusing 9y ago
It was Snapchat for kids
- icebraining 9y ago
  I thought Snapchat was the Snapchat for kids?
  - angus-prune 9y ago
    Snapchat was snapchat for kids, but then the kids grew up.
Ravikiran 9y ago
One of those few apps which cracked the teen and tween (as they call it) market
- camillomiller 9y ago
  don’t underestimate how much investors value products that look like they’ve cracked the gen z riddle
samschooler 9y ago
Its currently #58 on the app store. They are getting at least 150,000 downloads a month [1]. [1] https://www.quora.com/How-many-downloads-do-I-need-in-the-App-Store-to-reach-the-top-50-and-top-10-of-the-most-downloaded-games-in-US-and-China https://www.quora.com/How-many-downloads-do-I-need-in-the-Ap...
- throwappstore91 9y ago
  At least 150k a month is an understatement. My app ranks around ~ 150 in Photo & Video (musical.ly is #6 in that category) and get that many downloads a month. Musical.ly must have at least 1-2M download a month for that ranking.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

giacaglia 9y ago

Toutiao is a behemoth in the media space. Will see when it invades the US

adventured 9y ago
It certainly grew fast, no question. It's not a behemoth however. It has 1/5th the sales of CBS, which is just one of dozens of big US media companies. It's very unlikely they'll be able to invade the US in a meaningful sense. Toutiao's primary business is media content aggregation. They're going to be incapable of presenting non-censored news, content, media. The CPC will require that anything they allow in their publishing space globally, be controlled and censored strictly to present the views of the CPC. What China allows their domestic companies to do internationally when it comes to media, is not very different from what they allow domestically. That's why companies like Baidu and Tencent, which are drastically larger than Toutiao, have been entirely unable to crack the Western media markets. The restrictions Chinese companies face due to the strict authoritarian regime at home, is extremely different from what companies in eg Japan faced when they 'invaded' the US 30 years ago (such as Sony in music & movies). It's why there will never be a Chinese Reddit conceptually. Free expression is illegal for all Chinese media companies, it leaves them at an extreme disadvantage when competing globally.
- Ravikiran 9y ago
  But it would be interesting to see how they use musical.ly. Toutiao has AI capabilities and I think they want to make use of the lip-syncing ability.
  - adventured 9y ago
    I agree and I actually would expect Toutiao to do plenty of innovative things within the space they can work in, within the confines of what's allowed. I would expect one of these companies will want to attempt what Sony did and accumulate a music business. The question will be how they can manage to align that with the media restrictions they have to live within. Maybe Toutiao is young enough to still dare to attempt it, I think the older, larger Chinese Internet companies long ago learned to avoid challenging the CPC's boundaries. In a less restricted atmosphere, companies like Snapchat or Twitter would be prime take-over targets for some of the Chinese giants looking for international expansion. I think a company like Tencent might have acquired Twitter by now if they could operate the platform without censorship trouble.

junkscience2017 9y ago

my kids haven't touched this app for a year, nor have any of their friends...it seemed to be intensely popular for two weeks

econner 9y ago
I can't imagine that no one uses the app if it was just acquired for a billion dollars. It's possible your experience is not representative.
willvarfar 9y ago
I will have to ask my kids and their cousins tonight :) I remember when it was everywhere, and I remember being a bit concerned really, and yet thinking about it I don't recall it being mentioned in the past 6 months or so at least... maybe everyone moved on. On to what?
kerrsclyde 9y ago
My youngest daughter, 11, uses it. In the school I work in it seems to be a cause of much disagreement within girl friend groups, 11 and under. Is the huge valuation because it attracts this type of user, no doubt extremely valuable to marketeers, which seems a bit cynical to me.
tootie 9y ago
Same with my kids. They did like 4 videos and lost interest.

willmacdonald 9y ago

This was very popular over the summer in Sweden. Barely used anymore. The big game these days, that has a solid revenue model is Star Stable. A Huge virtual world, monthly subscription required, 12 languages and you can ONLY choose female characters.

senatorobama 9y ago
Star Stable is very sketchy.
- willmacdonald 9y ago
  In what way, you mean for users of the game, or the business model?

ttoinou 9y ago

Didn't know the app. I can only see compilation videos on youtube. What does the app do exactly ? It remaps the time of the video to match/sync lips with the lyrics, that's it ? Does the user has any other control on the result ? Thanks.

samschooler 9y ago
Basically a user chooses an audio track (this can be a wide variety of things. YouTube video, song, or other pop culture track, or silence), then they click record. The track is played and they can either match their lips or actions or both to the track. This simple style of recording tends to create some pretty impressive videos. Musical.ly took this and made it into a platform similar to Instagram or Vine. Here are some examples: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njtMuGaSIGg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njtMuGaSIGg
- ttoinou 9y ago
  Thx. How does the "action matching" happens ? is automatic ? I can't see any screen recording of the app so I don't know
  - samschooler 9y ago
    Nope, all of the movements and actions are up to the person recording. The app only plays the track, and records the video.
    - ttoinou 9y ago
      Wow that's weird because the movements of the persons in the video don't seem natural at all
      - yedava 9y ago
        Looks like the app alters the playback speed and that may explain the unnaturalness of the videos: > Through the app, users can create 15-second to 1 minute videos and choose sound tracks to accompany them, use different speed options (time-lapse, slow, normal, fast, and epic) and add pre-set filters and effects. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical.ly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical.ly

trophycase 9y ago

Shows how valuable brainwashing children with advertising truly is.

roman_savchuk 9y ago

I don't get lip-syncing part of it. Their website says it's "musical.ly is a social media platform for creating and sharing short videos." I think this abstract "short" word explains a lot: Youtube videos lose a lot of views, because Youtube tells how long they are. Impatient kids are like "Nah, it's too long". But by promising the videos are short, you can probably make viewers to spend even more time with an app, watching many shorter videos instead of a long one. No data to prove it, just gut feeling.

bhavyapruthi 9y ago
I can relate that to my personal experience, I often choose not to watch a movie since I don't want to spend a couple of hours on entertainment but end up watching youtube videos for a longer time

uptown 9y ago

Mirror: https://archive.fo/JPCLG https://archive.fo/JPCLG

bryananderson 9y ago

I used to work in the social influencer space, and often attended conventions in which top influencers were treated like A-list movie stars by legions of (mostly young) fans. The last few years, the Musical.ly kids were the ones causing all the crowd control nightmares. One kid’s performance on a stage in the convention hall was canceled by security because the crowd was dangerously large and packed-in (as they all fought to get as close as possible). Another kid caused a major stampede by walking through the public lobby of the convention center (something they were very much not supposed to do). Literally hundreds of fans ran after them, to the woe of anyone trying to walk through the lobby. You and I have never heard of these kids, and we don’t understand the appeal, but this is a huge business. The engagement and brand loyalty that Musical.ly stars get is like nothing I’ve ever seen.

noir_lord 9y ago
I can believe it, my stepson is addicted to (what I think) are crappy YouTube channels. I guess I'm getting old.
- stuffedBelly 9y ago
  Meanwhile they think nowadays TV channels are boring and crappy, generation gap at its working :)
  - stanleydrew 9y ago
    Not sure how much "traditional" TV you've watched recently, but they are very not wrong.
    - smacktoward 9y ago
      Are you kidding? Television over the last 10-15 years has been in a golden age of scripted drama. There's still a lot of crap on the tube, but there's also more good stuff than there's been at any time in history.

orliesaurus 9y ago

it's like the instagram of the new generation...no surprises here!

forthefuture 9y ago

Previous Discussion (11hrs ago): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15667753 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15667753

loxs 9y ago

WTF. Is 1B even a meaningful number any more. I literally hear about these guys for the first time.

simmons 9y ago
I think you need to be around the right age group to have heard about it. My 9-year-old niece is obsessed with Musical.ly. I often look at it, and think there's no way I would have ever thought to invent an app like that.
tqkxzugoaupvwqr 9y ago
Musical.ly is popular with children and young teenagers that perform dances to their favorite songs and share them with others.
jpalomaki 9y ago
60M monthly users according to article (and probably growing). $16 per current monthly user. No idea about the running costs for the service, but does not sound too unreasonable. Wikipedia writes: "Musical.ly's structure allows the viral dissemination of trends throughout the platform. The hashtags that are popular on this social network usually make reference to bits of pop culture and trends among the internet world. Because of its massive usage, a lot of events launched within the app can become viral global events, especially among teenagers"
dsjoerg 9y ago
Your world is narrower than you realized.
spmurrayzzz 9y ago
This has turned into a very well-curated A&R scouting platform. The valuation isn't surprising to me at all.
- coryl 9y ago
  Do music/entertainment companies even scout anymore? Seems like a redundant role, given music publishing is largely dying out as well.

etareduce 9y ago

I wonder how many people would feel surprised as I did the first time I learned that Musical.ly was built by a Chinese team based in Shanghai.

indescions_2017 9y ago

HN has a nice blog on acquirer Toutiao here: https://blog.ycombinator.com/the-hidden-forces-behind-toutiao-chinas-content-king/ https://blog.ycombinator.com/the-hidden-forces-behind-toutia... Strategically, its a good way for a Chinese consumer internet firm to enter into Western markets. As well as short form, digestible, interactive video optimized for mobile.

pc256 9y ago

One billion dollars, well perhaps they will have a little spare change to invest in protecting their users ... https://www.channel4.com/news/children-bombarded-with-sexually-explicit-chat-on-musical-ly-and-live-ly https://www.channel4.com/news/children-bombarded-with-sexual...

wyc 9y ago

I think more and more the trend is for aggregators to buy networks and strengthen themselves. Facebook did so with WhatsApp, Instagram, and TBH. Amazon did so with Whole Foods. Google bought DoubleClick. Software can be easily replicated, but not ecosystems because of the difficult cold start problem. If Toutiao wants to play in US markets, then this acquisition could make a lot of sense as the first defensible foothold.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

ilikeamerica 9y ago

so trump goes to China. 12% snap bought , 1b for Musical.ly. Is there some mutual future success deals going on more than usual. Im reaching hard here but I smell something in the air. Maybe its fire (a good kind) or maybe Trump just farted. 1)US economics/job sec says man it would be nice if we could get some investment in companies that are hiring internally 2)Trump gives list of companies to China for favourable deals and profit/tech sharing 3)America and China both see a profitable future. Is there any other deals Im not seeing. Is there some general stat to suggest that GNP of China is being focused on the US more than usual. Isnt Foxconn opening a factory in Michigan? Sorry for the lack of research and vague ideas but this could be a spark that lights flames and cooks food for millions/billions. Is the CEO of McDonald's talking out of his ass[0] or is Trump the bussiness man president we needed to get us through a tough economy? Not a kind conservative but a practical one, the Chinese like practical. [0]https://www.cnbc.com/2017/11/08/ex-mcdonalds-ceo-praises-trump-on-trade-strategy.html https://www.cnbc.com/2017/11/08/ex-mcdonalds-ceo-praises-tru...

philfrasty 9y ago

While $1B is certainly a lot of money this is the first time (in a long time) I would have rather seen the founder not sell. Musically has a very unique approach to encourage and enable users to create content that I have not seen on any other platform (challenges, smooth video creation process, etc). While I am certainly not in the target demographic I am sure we will see this approach in future (video)content platforms.

gkanai 9y ago
> I would have rather seen the founder not sell. You're not in his shoes. He has investors that probably pushed him to sell when they all saw that growth had plateaued. Selling gives the founders and investors all 'wins.' Once they took VC money, their future was either sale, IPO or bankruptcy, so the sale was the logical choice.
KaoruAoiShiho 9y ago
Musically seems very very hard to monetize to me.

samschooler 9y ago

To understand why they have such a large valuation you need to understand that: 1. This is massive with the tween/teen market. That is why not many people understand its popularity; you either need to know a tween, or have one as a kid. 2. Musical.ly became Vine after Vine shutdown. The content moved from lip-synced videos to more of a mixure of vine-like videos and lip sync. 3. They currently have 60M monthly users, and as of now Musical.ly is still #58 on the App Store (they have been in the top charts for the past 2 years at least). Its hard to say people aren't using it when its above some large companies on the charts (Linkedin, Shazam, Dropbox). 4. Their influencer network is huge as well. Nearly every popular musical.ly star has some sort of swag from the company. Think about that in the tween's mind: you're just a normal kid going to your normal middle school with your normal friends, then a national company wants YOU to be a spokesman for the company. That is quite literally getting famous for these kids. At popular industry conferences like Vidcon, they literally are celebrities.

mistermann 9y ago
> This is massive with the tween/teen market. That is why not many people understand its popularity; you either need to know a tween, or have one as a kid. So, so true. And as a result, some of these kids are not just "internet famous", but literally multi-millionaires.
NDizzle 9y ago
I have a tween/teen, but I don't let her use apps like this. Have you taken a look at it? Maybe I'm turning into an uptight old man, but it's not a good idea, knowing what I do about the internet.
- Innotek 9y ago
  I have a teen daughter as well. My wife and I go back and forth on this, but my take is that she's learning how to communicate with her peers in ways that I will never understand. I don't have to live in the world she will inherit, I'll have my furrowed brow and my 401k and she'll be deciding what being an adult means for her. At the end of the day, I can only coach her on how to conduct herself online, she's going to be the one out there.

dajohnson89 9y ago

what happened to the bubble burst?

RIMR 9y ago

I think it ought to be noted that Musical.ly videos are frequently passed around pedophile communities online. It worries me that an app designed for preteens to film themselves dancing can swell to such a size. Parents have completely stopped being accountable for what their children do online, and the consequences thereof...

cisanti 9y ago
Do you gave some kind of source or story about it? I don't doubt because pedos sure do move where the kids are and if there are a lot young dancers there as you say...
hbosch 9y ago
First off, the criticism of this app being used for kids to sexualize themselves was what early doomsayers shouted down about both Vine and Snapchat, among almost all other video-social startups. I don't think it's a valid or reasonably realistic concern. Secondly, you definitely need to source some evidence for the claim about pedophile communities.
- RIMR 9y ago
  I am writing an article right now (to be published soon) about this, and I can tell you that there are lots of underground communities that just share YouTube, Musical.ly, Snapchat, etc. links for sexual reasons, with no attempt to hide the pedophilic nature of their viewing. I am not about to post links to these places, for obvious reasons, but perhaps I'll post my article once it is finished. If HN had a PM system, I would bookmark your name and send you a link. Maybe just keep a look out in a month or so, or check back on my page for submissions. Lots of fact-checking and analysis to do before I publish this, not to mention protecting some of the children I am documenting. There's also a large community of teens on these networks that consume pseudosexual content of kids their own age, and you obviously have to factor out of any statistics about pedophilia. I myself consumed a lot of preteen/teen model stuff when I was 13-15, but that content has only gotten more disturbing to me with age. There are some disturbing trends out there, and it's clear to see the cause-and-effect in many cases. Kids are figuring out that if you dance on camera, you get a lot of views - but if you dance on camera in your underwear, you get A LOT MORE views. These sites are putting forth little to no effort to curb this kind of content, and there is little public oversight. It's not illegal, but there are people profiting off of the ad revenue associated with this content, and there are children sexualizing themselves online, often without their parent's knowledge. It's not something we should ignore, because this is just going to keep getting further normalized as people try to downplay what is actually happening. And there are people out there who become fixated on online personas, and this can lead to some very dark scenarios. The last thing we need is adults preying on children in environments that children frequent, and parents are ignorant of. These places are candy shops for pedophiles, and kids often don't notice that their peers on these sites aren't always fellow kids...

rossboss 9y ago

For everyone talking about kids under 13 read this: Eligibility . THE SERVICE IS NOT FOR PERSONS UNDER THE AGE OF 13 OR FOR ANY USERS PREVIOUSLY SUSPENDED OR REMOVED FROM THE SERVICE BY MUSICAL.LY. IF YOU ARE UNDER 13 YEARS OF AGE, YOU MUST NOT USE OR ACCESS THE SERVICE AT ANY TIME OR IN ANY MANNER. Furthermore, by using the Service, you affirm that either you are at least 18 years of age or have been authorized to use the Service by your parent or guardian who is at least 18 years of age. [1] My question, can you use the app without an account? [1] https://musical.ly/en-US/term https://musical.ly/en-US/term

robinduckett 9y ago
I tried to report someone who was clearly under 13 but the process involved giving musical.ly a huge amount of my personal information (above and beyond Name / email address) so I decided not to bother. They know their target audience is young children.

jgalt212 9y ago

The girl in the spandex on the landing page is mesmerizing.

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