Social networking site of the day: SingShot
WHERE’S IT AT?
www.singshot.com
WHO’S ON IT?
Singers. And I don’t mean famous singers like you’d find on MySpace. SingShot is a community for karaoke lovers, from the sublimely good to the ridiculously bad.
HOW DOES IT WORK?
You sign up, and can then choose to record your own masterpieces, or listen to other people’s. Recording involves browsing a list of accessible songs – they’re all officially licensed from the publishers, so it’s legal – and choosing one to sing to. Then, provided you have a microphone plugged into your computer, you wail along to a backing track, with the words displayed on-screen in true karaoke style.
COOL! I’LL CANCEL MY X-FACTOR AUDITION…
Well, there may be no Simon Cowell, but you’re still judged by your peers. SingShot includes a feedback system where other members can rate your efforts, and leave "positive messages" to encourage you. Don’t worry, you can delete them if you get hundreds saying "BELT UP!"…
WHAT ELSE IS GOOD ABOUT IT?
You can choose to receive regular updates when new songs are added, and there’s a tags system to make it easier to find recordings. Oh, and you can paste the URL of your best efforts into your profile on other social networking sites, to expose even more people to your warblings.
IS IT FREE?
Nope. Well, as a free member you can listen to other people’s recordings, rate them and post comments. You also get a two-week free trial period when you can record your own songs. But once that’s up, you’ll have to pay $9.95 a month, although if you pay every quarter it’s more like $7.95 a month. And currently, SingShot’s running a promotion where if you sign up for a year, you pay just $4.95 a month.
I’LL THINK ABOUT IT. CAN I LISTEN TO SOME TUNES NOW?
Of course. Try this lackadaisical rendition of Poison’s ‘Every Rose Has Its Thorn’, or this more impressive version of Patsy Cline’s ‘I Fall To Pieces’. Or click below (note the YouTube-esque embedding ability) to listen to an incomparable version of Radiohead’s ‘Fake Plastic Trees’ seemingly from under a beanbag.
