Twitter #Music Unveiled On ‘Good Morning America’; Music Discovery iOS App, Web Site Now Available To All Twitter Users

Twitter Music has been officially released to the public, expanding the audience for the music discovery app from an invite-only group of celebrities (including Ryan Seacrest) to the general public.

Twitter officially rolled out '#music' on Thursday's Good Morning America on ABC. Twitter later detailed the service in a blog post, explaining that people can download the iOS app through Apple's App Store. Users can also access the Web version at music.twitter.com.

The #music app uses twitter activity to detect the most popular tracks and emerging artists it also brings artists' music-related twitter activity to the forefront, allowing users to visit artists profiles to see what musicians they follow. Users can also tweet songs directly from the #music app, Twitter said.

Twitter is currently gathering its music from iTunes, Spotify and Rdio. Users of Rdio and Spotify can log into their accounts and listen to full tracks via the Twitter app. Twitter said that it would continue to add other music streaming services.

The app is easy to navigate with basic tabs. #NowPlaying shows which songs have been tweeted by people the user follows, the 'Suggested' tab recommends artists the user may like, and 'Profile' allows users to see what artists a particular person follows.

Last week, Twitter launched its music site, but invites were extremely limited. General users were teased with a "Coming Soon" banner and the Twitter bird icon on music.twitter.com.

Twitter #music is the company's first attempt to become a bigger player in the entertainment world. The news of #music's launch secures the social media site's role in the music business. A recent Bloomberg report suggested that Twitter might soon make deals with NBC and Viacom to feature those networks' Television content, while running ads, of course.

Twitter fans got a hint of the increasing role it would play in the entertainment industry when veteran Hollywood executive Peter Chernin joined the company's board last November.

The Twitter music app will be available in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand at first. The Web version will be launched in the next few hours. The blog post explained that the Twitter #music app will reach more countries and Android over time, though a release date hasn't been specified.