AOL Music just launched an application which allows you to display videos, photos and information about your “favorite artists.” While it’s a pretty well designed flash widget there are some definite downfalls. After adding the application you are prompted to select your top 10 favorite artists (as displayed in the first screen shot below). Well, your top 10 favorite artists within their selection of 100 artists. While not a bad selection, it didn’t include all of my favorite artists.

After selecting your “Top 10 Artists,” you are asked to select a skin for your widget. I found the skins to be slightly tacky except for the Facebook skin. AOL is definitely targeting this application at “the masses” so perhaps it will appeal to whoever belongs to their generic group of people. I think the one downfall of this application is that it is simply a widget and doesn’t encourage interaction from within the application itself. While widgets can be popular on Facebook (as my bush countdown clock illustrates), the most effective applications will be those that encourage active user involvement. This is why applications like Warbook and Fantasy Stock Exchange have been highly successful.

Regardless, for being designed as a widget, the application is built relatively well. I just encourage other developers to stray for simply building widgets but to focus instead on interactive applications. Just a thought! If you want to add your favorite mainstream artists to your profile, go grab the AOL Music: My Favorite Artists application.

Artist Selection Screen

Skin Selection Screen