AOL Targets Developers with Winamp Makeover

America Online’s Nullsoft has completely rebuilt its Winamp
MP3 player on the ‘Wasabi’ coding platform, targeting developers looking to
personalize and customize the popular digital media program.

And there is word AOL Music is finalizing plans for a premium version of the
Winamp3 upgrade that targets the developer community.

AOL’s announcement of the Winamp3 rollout made no
mention of the premium plans but internetnews.com understands
Nullsoft plans to include extras like MP3Pro decoders, MP3 encoders, CD
burning engines, DVD and MPEG-2 support into a Winamp3 version for
developers.

“There will be a free and paid version of Winamp3 eventually. The free
version won’t be stripped down in any way but the paid version will include
some extras that cost us licensing money that we cannot absorb,” a company
source explained under condition of anonymity.

AOL Music officials could not be reached to discuss the premium plans but
Friday’s announcement hyped the inclusion of the ‘Wasabi’ platform, which
lets Winamp users tinker with components in the player. With ‘Wasabi’, any
component of Winamp can be removed or replaced, allowing third party
developers freedom to customize and add new features to the player.

AOL Music, which runs the Nullsoft subsidiary, said an advanced platform for
developers would introduce a new component-based architecture that provides
easy access to a range of interoperable plug-ins.

The advanced Winamp3 features an XML-based skinning and UI engine that
allows for advanced designs including animations, alpha transparency, color
themes and smooth scaling of components.

For Winamp fans, the ability to tweak and tinker with the player is a big
hit and, by building the new version on ‘Wasabi’, the plan is to do away
with the old plug-in system.

Winamp, which competes with Microsoft’s Windows Media
Player (WMP) and RealNetworks’ RealPlayer software,
hyped the upgrade as a “freeform skinable player” that supports designs that
completely change the look, shape and functionality of the player.

It allows player skins to be scaled from 25 percent up to full screen and
promotional skins that can help with AOL’s marketing efforts. Media
playback capabilities add support for video playback, seamless song
transitions via cross-fading and gapless playback for CDs and other digital
media.

Winamp3 also introduces a new media library that lets users organize, browse
and search music and video files through a new interface. Files played on
the Winamp3 are stored in a media library database allowing the entire media
collection to be sorted by year, genre, artist, year, and type.

The new build includes a new playlist editor that adds support for playlist
management including multiple playlists and multiple playlist editors as
well as additional ways of sorting files. Additionally, a new utility
called “Thinger” has been added to provide access to key features and can be
personalized when new functionality is added (via a plug-in).

The Winamp makeover comes just weeks after AOL Music announced it would scrap
the Spinner.com brand and roll the Webcasting property into its Netscape
portal.

Beginning August 12, AOL said Spinner
would relaunch with a new media player as Radio@Netscape Plus, in keeping
with plans to turn the Netscape.com site into a full-fledged media portal.
The new Radio@Netscape Plus player would add local radio stations with news
and sports Webcasts to the list of channels now available on Spinner.

AOL has integrated the Spinner.com Web site will rolled into Netcape’s Music
Center, completing a rebranding that is being viewed as a major shift in
strategy for AOL, which is now merging all its Internet Webcasting
operations under the Netscape or AOL brand. The company also runs the
Radio@AOL streaming operations.

AOL Music properties include Radio@AOL, Radio@Netscape, Winamp SHOUTcast.

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