Back when Ping launched, we wrote that there seemed to be no directives on the site as to how bands could get in on the action. At that time, only big acts like the ever-popular Lady Gaga were featured on the site, which was launched as a way for music fans to interact with both other fans and artists. Indie bands were noticeably absent, and, in fact, couldn't even figure out how to get on the site (there were no tangible directions to be seen).
Since then, we spoke with Jeff Price, founder of music distributor TuneCore, who told us a little bit about how the vetting process works when it comes to getting bands on Ping.
Basically, Apple has to go through distributors like TuneCore and CDBaby, who broker the process of getting Apple info on bands and the necessary URL to set up an account. Sound like an arduous process to you? It is. But as we said a few months ago, Apple has a responsibility to make sure that every artist page belongs to the actual artist — or someone representing the artist. Hence the vigorous quality control.
Apple even published a band's guide to Ping about a month ago to help musicians along with the signup process, but the guide focused more on aesthetics -- which doesn't help much if you're still waiting on approval.
Frankly, the fact that only around 2,000 artists have since been added to the service makes us question how successful Ping will be in the long-run. Yes, again, it may have millions of users, but who are these users going to interact with (aside from each other)?
Since the launch of the service -- and the on-again, off-again integration with Facebook -- many have been saying that Ping needs to hook up with Mark Zuckerberg's baby in order to survive. That would certainly help when it comes to accruing fans, but when it comes to bands, Facebook integration isn't going to do much.