If you’re a Live Spaces user, you might have run into a little bug recently. If your Space is unavailable, it might be due to the Windows Media Player module. The LiveSide blog has the scoop:

So for anyone with the Windows Media Player module installed on their space and set to “invisible” before the update, that site is now “unavailable”, but there’s a pretty easy workaround…

0. Sign in passport

1. Go to “http://youralias.spaces.live.com/?_c=WMP ” (no quotes, insert your spaces name)

2. Change “Display mode” as full — DO NOT Set “Display mode” as Invisible

3. Save

Not too hard to fix, but kind of annoying. Evidently the bug should be fixed soon. Good luck!

The news that Weedshare has closed its doors isn’t new, evidently, but I just came across it today (more coverage lately for some reason). I remember hearing about it once before, but even I needed a refresher on just what the service was all about, so here you go:

Weedshare was a digital download platform that used “viral” DRM in combination with a multi-level marketing approach to sell content of indie musicians. Musicians could distribute Weedshare files through their own website, official download locations and P2P networks. Users could listen to a file three times before purchasing it.

Interesting idea, I suppose, but choosing to use DRM put the nail in the coffin right from the get-go. Weedshare used Windows Media Audio files, meaning that the music could only be played with software and devices that supported Microsoft’s DRM schemes. Many reports make it sound like Microsoft is responsible for Weedshare’s demise:

Weedshare was smoked by Microsoft, whose latest version of Windows Media Player was incompatible with Weedshare files.

There is no information on the issues and attempts of SML to convert or translate Weedshare files to be compatible with Microsoft’s latest software.

As with all things however, there is another side to the story:

CD Baby was supposedly Weedshare’s largest content provider, with 60.000 titles available at the end of 2004. Still, 15 months later, CD Baby artists had only made a total of 1348 dollars, which means that Weedshare sold less than 3000 songs of the CD Baby catalogue during that time.

Sounds kind of like Weedshare was going nowhere fast and simply blamed its woes on Windows Media Player 11. The lack of mainstream coverage would seem to support this.

One of the tech industry blogs that I consider to be a “must read” is Mashable. Not only do they offer a ton of very timely news, they have some great analysis too, which generally leads to healthy discussion. The latest such post is entitled No Download Required: 30+ Apps That Are Killing Microsoft. Inside, author Ben Gold details new online competitors for Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and even Windows itself.

Notably absent from the list of applications is Windows Media Player.

Perhaps this is because it is more difficult to make an online media playing application than an online word processor. Or, perhaps it is because Windows Media Player is a pretty decent application. I have some issues with version 11, but generally speaking, it’s a solid piece of software.

WMP is fast, has pretty good codec support, and handles large libraries of media very well. It integrates with a number of online stores, and synchronizes with mobile devices superbly. Ripping and burning CDs is also a pretty good experience inside WMP.

And yet it could be so much more! If I were Microsoft, I’d treat the Mashable post as a call to action for the WMP team. Take WMP to the next level by extending it to the web before the competition beats you to it! Here’s an example of what I mean: make a Facebook application and WMP plugin that displays what I’m listening to on my profile page, just like the plugin for Windows Live Messenger. Or revamp the wmplugins.com site and integrate it into the application itself.

And please, please do something about the lack of podcasting support. That should be priority #1!