Live data from Hacker News

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

wsj.com

61–70 of 98 posts

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

#61
post #57

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,…

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.

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.

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

#62

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,…

Would you please not repost the same (or substantially the same) comments into different threads? We're trying to avoid repetitiveness, plus it makes it harder to merge the threads.

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

#64

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 f…

I can believe it, my stepson is addicted to (what I think) are crappy YouTube channels.

I guess I'm getting old.

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

#65
post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope, all of the movements and actions are up to the person recording. The app only plays the track, and records the video.

Wow that's weird because the movements of the persons in the video don't seem natural at all

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

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

#66

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 f…

I can believe it, my stepson is addicted to (what I think) are crappy YouTube channels. I guess I'm getting old.

Meanwhile they think nowadays TV channels are boring and crappy, generation gap at its working :)

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

#67
post #62

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,…

Would you please not repost the same (or substantially the same) comments into different threads? We're trying to avoid repetitiveness, plus it makes it harder to merge the threads.

Will do, sorry I didn’t realize you merge threads.

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

#68
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...

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

#69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Ok clicked this and a truly shocking amount of young girls in very little clothing. Don't know what this app does other than to get teens to pose sexy for youtube. Which is of course very nice, nothing wrong with that. "Women" need to "own" their sexuality as I learned on HN when the Maker-person was up for debate. Edit: check the talent on these videos, wow! Hopefully I can see these in adult videos when they come o…

$1B seems like a lot to pay for videos of half-naked teenage girls, but I haven't tried to launch a child porn start-up, so what do I know?

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

#70

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 f…

But kids this age have always been crazy fans of pop stars. Now they're choosing their content and engaging more directly rather than having (often skeezy) middlemen such as agents, producers, music labels, etc manufacture and force stars onto them (and then keep most of the money for themselves)
Post reply on HN