MOG introduces the new MOG Music Network (announcement here). Bravo, MOG for not just redefining a music network online, but also showcasing CONTENT and writing. This is an important point many people forget in social media: it’s about content, comment and quality crowds. Better still if you can crowd-source, curate and promote great writing about your industry. A great lesson, writ large for MOG who has been doing interesting and relevant things for fans for years now.
For example, MOG began in June of 2005 but really hit its stride a year later as an actual social network built on fans and music. My first contact with it was a year later, at Bonnaroo, after which 
I started a profile and dutifully used the iTunes plug-in that took glimpses of my catalog of songs and my play counts and suggested people with similar interests, artists I didn’t have and critical and fan thought I might like. Instead of “follow” or “like” (now ubiquitous terms for socializing) MOG used a much more forceful and meaningful term for those you cared to read: “Trusted.” If someone visited my profile page, perhaps drawn by a blog post, my music list or any other number of custom lists I had created (at one point detailing all of the tour t-shirts I owned) than they would also see a list of the writer/music-blogger (“MOG’ers”) that I trusted. It was interesting to see how slavish our re-posting was between us. It really was about trust. I discovered more new music in my first year of using MOG than I had at nearly any other point in my life. And it was all music I would come to LOVE. I discovered Arcade Fire, NIN spinoff projects and more.
It was pretty incredible and way before it’s time. When I saw Twitter’s “Who To Follow” space debut earlier this month I thought it was a nice addition but part of me had to laugh– MOG had been doing that for four years and far more accurately.
So cheers to MOG, who may have lost me as a regular contributor (my profile is a bit of a misshapen ghost-town of 2007-8) but gained me as a fan of their other efforts such as their Pandora-like music service (app and all) and now their aggregation of the best music writing on the web.
We here at Feedback love music AND social media. It’s nice when we can get the chocolate in our peanut butter.
-Dean (@dbrowell)
