Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Prince's New Website...Sucks. Music Not So Bad.
Lotusflow3r.com officially launched last night. $77 membership fee for those who could solve the fill in the blank riddle at the start (1986 and Los Angeles - Thanks, Prince.org). Some would be members faced other riddles as well; browser incompatibility, username issues and credit card nonsense.
My experience wasn't soo bad.
Had to go to prince.org to figure out the ticket riddle mentioned above. The cryptic shit has to go. I know it's Prince, but if he's charging people 77 bucks to access a website, then some courtesy should be a given. Of course, I say this having paid the damn fee anyway. I'll have to keep relying on prince.org as a supplement to the official site, just so I know what's going on and what's been made available (I guess Housequake's not coming back?).
I signed in okay within an hour of the site's opening. During that process I saw a link to system requirements. Clicking on it brought me to an error page. Once on the site, I found a preview video which was slow and choppy as hell. I figured that was because the servers were being taxed by the high demand being the first night and everything, but I find that the videos are still slow and choppy.
The three albums are available to download in both mp3 and wav formats. I had trouble downloading the zipped wav files (first an error page, then incomplete downloads), but the mp3s were not a problem. I don't remember if I downloaded the mp3s before taking a break or if I took an hour away from the computer, and came back. I managed to download two albums in wav. Still having a problem with MPLSound.
Edit: An apology from the web designers to Prince.org:
We understand that several people have had issues with the site, and we're working diligently to address them all as quickly as possible. With the great amount of traffic that we've received there have been some issues getting the large amount of content in the site out to everyone simultaneously. We're currently doubling the size of our server farm in order to make sure that fans can get all of the albums and videos they desire. To accommodate our friends overseas we've relaxed some of the normal security checks put in place by American banks. Since the vault has 3D and video, which is pushing the boundary of the web and current technology, only newer machines can adequately handle it. If fans are experiencing choppy videos in the vault, they should click the fullscreen button on the video and it should improve their experience. Thanks to everyone for their patience while we scale up LotusFlow3r.com to accommodate the great response from Prince fans all over the world.
Thanks so much,
Scott
3/26/09 UPDATE: the MPSoUND zip was fixed last night, and they're working on optimizing video playback...
The fullscreen option does improve video playback considerably. Not great, yet, but watchable.
Haven't spent much time with the music, yet, but my first impression is that MPLSound is crap. Except for Dance 4 Me. And maybe No More Candy 4 U, which is... interesting.
Lotus Flow3r sounds pretty damn decent. Will require more investigation.
Elixer also sounds good, which I didn't expect.
I dunno if I should'a spent the 77 bucks though. I avoided one of his previous ventures, NPG Music Club when it was 100 bucks and was wise to do so. The three albums will be available in a single package at Target this Sunday for only twelve bucks.
Oh, yeah. Prince is on Jay Leno tonight, tomorrow and Friday. That should be pretty cool...
March 25th performance (Hulu.com)
March 26th performance
March 27th performance
Mo' edit (March 27th): efforts to improve the site continue. I was actually able to enter the site and view the Crimson and Clover video via the PS3's browser. The video played fine in fullscreen. The rest of the site was pretty slow, though, and eventually the browser ran out of memory (!!!??). That might be a PS3 issue, though. The PSP's browser does the same thing. Then again, the PS3 hasn't had that issue with Hulu. Not in my experience, anyway.
If Lotusflow3r is aspires to include more longform video (Sacrifice Of Victor is currently up), I would prefer to watch on my TV rather than PC. I have Yellow Dog Linux installed on the PS3 as well. I'll have to see how well the site works on that combination...
It dosen't. I haven't installed Flash on Firefox, yet.
My experience wasn't soo bad.
Had to go to prince.org to figure out the ticket riddle mentioned above. The cryptic shit has to go. I know it's Prince, but if he's charging people 77 bucks to access a website, then some courtesy should be a given. Of course, I say this having paid the damn fee anyway. I'll have to keep relying on prince.org as a supplement to the official site, just so I know what's going on and what's been made available (I guess Housequake's not coming back?).
I signed in okay within an hour of the site's opening. During that process I saw a link to system requirements. Clicking on it brought me to an error page. Once on the site, I found a preview video which was slow and choppy as hell. I figured that was because the servers were being taxed by the high demand being the first night and everything, but I find that the videos are still slow and choppy.
The three albums are available to download in both mp3 and wav formats. I had trouble downloading the zipped wav files (first an error page, then incomplete downloads), but the mp3s were not a problem. I don't remember if I downloaded the mp3s before taking a break or if I took an hour away from the computer, and came back. I managed to download two albums in wav. Still having a problem with MPLSound.
Edit: An apology from the web designers to Prince.org:
We understand that several people have had issues with the site, and we're working diligently to address them all as quickly as possible. With the great amount of traffic that we've received there have been some issues getting the large amount of content in the site out to everyone simultaneously. We're currently doubling the size of our server farm in order to make sure that fans can get all of the albums and videos they desire. To accommodate our friends overseas we've relaxed some of the normal security checks put in place by American banks. Since the vault has 3D and video, which is pushing the boundary of the web and current technology, only newer machines can adequately handle it. If fans are experiencing choppy videos in the vault, they should click the fullscreen button on the video and it should improve their experience. Thanks to everyone for their patience while we scale up LotusFlow3r.com to accommodate the great response from Prince fans all over the world.
Thanks so much,
Scott
3/26/09 UPDATE: the MPSoUND zip was fixed last night, and they're working on optimizing video playback...
The fullscreen option does improve video playback considerably. Not great, yet, but watchable.
Haven't spent much time with the music, yet, but my first impression is that MPLSound is crap. Except for Dance 4 Me. And maybe No More Candy 4 U, which is... interesting.
Lotus Flow3r sounds pretty damn decent. Will require more investigation.
Elixer also sounds good, which I didn't expect.
I dunno if I should'a spent the 77 bucks though. I avoided one of his previous ventures, NPG Music Club when it was 100 bucks and was wise to do so. The three albums will be available in a single package at Target this Sunday for only twelve bucks.
Oh, yeah. Prince is on Jay Leno tonight, tomorrow and Friday. That should be pretty cool...
March 25th performance (Hulu.com)
March 26th performance
March 27th performance
Mo' edit (March 27th): efforts to improve the site continue. I was actually able to enter the site and view the Crimson and Clover video via the PS3's browser. The video played fine in fullscreen. The rest of the site was pretty slow, though, and eventually the browser ran out of memory (!!!??). That might be a PS3 issue, though. The PSP's browser does the same thing. Then again, the PS3 hasn't had that issue with Hulu. Not in my experience, anyway.
If Lotusflow3r is aspires to include more longform video (Sacrifice Of Victor is currently up), I would prefer to watch on my TV rather than PC. I have Yellow Dog Linux installed on the PS3 as well. I'll have to see how well the site works on that combination...
It dosen't. I haven't installed Flash on Firefox, yet.
Labels: bullshit, downloads, music, online retailers, Prince, youtube and other video
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The Wash Post said that "Chocolate Box" was good. Im not paying $77 for a website, but I am going to the DC LoveSexy's debut party for this cd on Tues. Hopefully itll be interesting.
L
L
Chocolate Box is definitely not among my favorites. Sounds like he's trying to get on the radio with that and one or two others. And not by doing what comes naturally to him.
Enjoy the party.
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Enjoy the party.
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