Seems like Buy.com founder Scott Blum hasn’t learned from his BuyMusic.com blunder. The Barry Diller-wannabe has tried to mix media and commerce in his various ventures over the years, but has somehow never come up with the right mix.
Well, what do you know: he’s trying again. His incubator ThinkTank is working on a new company called Instant Media, at IM.com. IM.com will be a desktop application which will try to combine, what else, digital media and commerce. It will mix search, digital media commerce and delivery–ability to buy digital music, movies and games, among other things–and general web browsing. The client will also have media playback and management capabilities, with the ability to rip your own CDs and plug it into this desktop app…(Wonder if it will allow managing media bought from other sources, or even things like the ability to plug in RSS feeds?)
The venture is still in its infancy, and Instant Media has just started hiring programmers for the venture…
A bit of history: IM.com used to be the domain for Internet Motors, another Scott Blum-portfolio company which tried to develop “entertainment, information, and commerce services for wireless delivery to automobiles, with a focus on entertainment-driven services.” Internet Motors raised $2 million in 2001 from ThinkTank, but never really took off the ground.
I guess Blum figured that IM.com would be a good domain name to capitalize on, now that things in the Internet space are looking up again…
Neither Buy.com nor ThinkTank responded to queries…
Related:
— BuyMusic To Fold; Integrated Within Buy.com
— Rainy Days for Online-Music Start-Ups
— BuyMusic and Get Loaded? — Launch of the site in July 2003
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