Derek Slater (Harvard's Berkman's Center for Internet & Society) has co-authored a study with Mike McGuire (Gartner), focusing on the crucial role of "consumer taste sharing" in driving the online music business. One-tenth of their sample group of "online music users" claimed to make music purchases based on recommendations of other users. The study forecasts that by 2010, fully a quarter of purchases will be driven by recommendations. te paper acknowledges recommentdation technology, but is really about person-to-person taste-sharing, either in small private groups or in published playlists. The recommendation is that content owners accept the "strategic imperative" of enabling this type of community sharing, and sepcifically calls for easy licensing of music for podcasting. The PDF is here. Derek's summary is here.
