Connecting groupies
to groupies

Music service iLike has launched a news feed that tells fans what their favorite artists are up to: when they go on tour, for example, or release new songs and videos.

The news feed lives on the iLike website, but it can also be used as an iTunes plugin and general social networking add-on.

iLike is among many small brands that managed to build a viable business atop Facebook's open applications platform.

Its U2 Facebook page has 1.9 million members. Meanwhile, U2's own MySpace page boasts only 168,000 members. There are 933,000 members on its Last.FM page.

All told, iLike's Facebook app had 4.5 million members in July 2007. The figure ballooned to 14 million today. Its website gleans 3.5 million unique visitors per month.

Most iLike members interact with the application via iTunes or on Facebook.