EA Acquires Music Community, Networking Site SingShot

Electronic Arts has announced the acquisition of San Francisco-based online karaoke community SingShot Media, which the company says will "accelerate EA's efforts in community-building and promoting user-generated content." The web-based social networking platform, the product of a year of work between CEO Ranah Edelin and CTO Niranjan Nagar, allowed SingShot members to "record their own renditions of famous songs, share their recordings with friends, rate and comment on other members' tracks, customize recordings with photos and videos, and compete in a variety of contests." Though EA's plans for the SingShot technology and platform were not immediately made clear, company officials said the five person SingShot team would be brought in to EA's Sims division, suggesting that franchise of games would be the first to see the fruits of the merger. Under the terms of the agreement, Edelin and Nagar, who formerly were core members of the Listen.com team that completed what is now RealNetworks' Rhapsody music subscription service, will join EA as vice presidents. Said EA executive vice president and group general manager Nancy Smith, "We are thrilled to bring the SingShot team into EA. They are tremendously talented, technically adept and true experts in developing user-generated communities through music. We see a bright future for the technology and each of these individuals within EA."