Amazon Music – FanCut
An AI-powered remix experience that turns music streaming into a participatory ecosystem, driving fan creation, social sharing, and continuous engagement.
Prototype
Duration
Context
Streaming platforms struggle to turn listeners into engaged users
Amazon Music offers a large catalog and seamless access to music, but users often experience it as a passive utility rather than a destination for engagement.
For many, especially those unfamiliar with or overlooking Amazon Music, the platform lacks a clear reason to stay, explore, or return beyond listening.
Why this matters?
Streaming platforms now compete on engagement, not just content. Without features that enable interaction and creation, users churn after initial exploration, engagement remains shallow, and platforms struggle to differentiate, ultimately limiting long-term retention and growth.
Who we're designing for?
This project focuses on emotionally engaged fans with creative intent who actively follow artists and participate in fandom, but lack the tools, access, or confidence to create. They represent a high-potential segment: already engaged, but not yet activated.
Design Challenge
Design Prompt Given by Amazon Music
How does someone who's never heard of Amazon Music or has overlook it to discover it, understand its value, and become an active listener?
While the prompt focuses on discovery and activation, research revealed the core issue wasn’t awareness, but lack of meaningful engagement beyond listening.
Reframed Design Problem
How might we enable fans to easily create and share remix content, so Amazon Music becomes a place where fandom comes to life, not just where music plays?
Solution
Turning Discovery into Continuous Engagement
FanCut transforms passive listeners into active participants through a loop of discovery, creation, sharing, and re-engagement.
Flow 1: Discover → Create
Ashley, a Billie Eilish fan, discovers a remix video shared by her friend Eva on Instagram. She taps the link and enters FanCut within Amazon Music.
Using licensed clips and her own media, she quickly creates a remix of “Bad Guy” with AI-assisted editing, turning a moment into a shareable fan video.
Flow 2: Share → Engage
After publishing her remix, Ashley returns to see how others are engaging with it.
While listening to “Bad Guy,” she opens the track page and sees her remix animated alongside the song. Experiencing her own creation within the music reinforces her connection to the artist and motivates her to create again.
Early Signal of Market Fit
FanCut validated strong user demand for creative participation within streaming
I tested our final hi-fi prototype with 5 fans, 90% of users found FanCut compelling and said it increased their interest in downloading Amazon Music to create and share fan content, signaling strong demand for participatory music experiences.
To validate and shape this direction, I conducted multi-phase research across users, industry dynamics, and the competitive landscape.
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Where Streaming Breaks Down
Why Streaming Fails to Activate Fans?
Mixed-method research of 154 surveys • 15 interviews • 60 validation surveys • market + competitive analysis
Passive Discovery
Users struggle to find value beyond the basic library access, leading to high churn rates and low platform loyalty.
Value Perception
Amazon Music is often seen as a secondary 'utility' bundled with Prime rather than a primary destination for music lovers.
Lack of creation and sharing loops limits long-term retention
Unlike competitors, the platform lacks features that encourage social sharing and daily creative habits.
The Competitive Gap
Competitors act as content distributors, but the future lies in community and co-creation. Amazon Music must bridge the gap between being a utility and being a culture-driver.
Amazon Music's Positioning Dilemma
Bundled but invisible, Amazon Music amplifies artist IP but builds little brand asset of its own
Amazon Music faces a structural challenge in a highly competitive market:
18%
Cancellation rate after the free trial period
92%
platform choice mainly driven by artist catalogs availability
"Having a richer artist library would strongly influence which music platform I choose. If the platform doesn’t have my favorite singers’ library, I would not choose it."
– Andy (20), a Spotify user
Competing on content alone makes Amazon Music interchangeable. Without deeper engagement or cultural participation, the platform struggles to retain users and build long-term value.
This raises a broader question: if content is no longer enough, where does future value come from?
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Market Opportunity
Value is shifting from streaming to IP participation
Industry research revealed a critical market value shift:
Music streaming market 2024
Music Copyright Value 2023
Spotify paid in royalties in 2025, with indie artists capturing 50%+ share
This indicates that value is shifting from music consumption to IP amplification and participation.
Untapped Creative Demand
Industry research revealed a critical shift:
Opportunity
The future of music platforms is not just distribution, but enabling participation in IP creation.
Fan Segmentation
Fans Are Not One User Group
Exploratory research revealed that “fans” vary significantly by behavior:
Passive Listeners
Consume music with minimal interaction
Emotional Fans
Engage through sharing, liking, and occasional expression
Creative Fans
Actively remix, edit, and create content around artists
This project focuses on emotionally engaged fans with creative intent who are motivated to create but blocked by tools, access, and platform support.
Key Insights
Key Insights Driving the Strategy
A set of behavioral and ecosystem insights that reveal why streaming alone fails to drive engagement.
01
Creation is a form of identity, not consumption
02
Editing friction blocks otherwise motivated users
03
Copyright uncertainty suppresses participation
04
Streaming platforms fail to extend engagement beyond listening
If engagement comes from expression, not listening, the platform must shift from distributing content to enabling creation.
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Strategic Shift
From Music Distributor to IP Co-Creation Platform
Current State
Music Content Distributor
Value comes from catalog and pricing
Engagement ends at listening
Low differentiation and retention
Future State
Artist IP Co-Creator
Fans remix and expand artist IP
Engagement becomes continuous (create → share → re-engage)
Platform grows through participation, not just content
This shift turns engagement from consumption into creation, enabling a self-reinforcing growth loop across artists, fans, and the platform.
Each loop compounds value: fan creations drive distribution, distribution increases artist visibility, and increased visibility fuels more participation, creating a self-reinforcing growth engine.
We validated this strategic direction with target users before investing in product development.
Fan remix creation shows strong potential to shift perception and drive engagement.
said this feature would make Amazon Music more engaging
expressed their willingness to try it
reported strong intent to use Amazon Music because of it
Validation
With strong directional validation, we moved into prototyping to test usability and refine the experience.
We tested our Hi-Fi prototype with 5 fans of the artist with different levels of video editing experience. Feedback revealed key friction points that guided the next design iteration
Product Roadmap
Scaling the FanCut Ecosystem
Phase 1
MVP
Objective
Validate fan remix behavior with controlled users
Key Actions
Invite 200 creators from TikTok and YouTube
Launch FanCut closed beta version
Test the AI remix creation workflow
Phase 2
Product-Market Fit
Objective
Validate the fan participation loop across listeners and creators
Key Actions
Improve AI auto-remix quality
Introduce remix templates
Launch artist remix prompts
Phase 3
Go-To-Market Fit
Objective
Align artist incentives with fan participation
Key Actions
Launch creator tiers and badges
Introduce fan recognition features
Unlock advanced AI remix tools
Phase 4
Global Scale
Objective
Scale the remix ecosystem globally through localization
Key Actions
Launch regionally in waves
Brazil/Japan → US/UK → Germany/Korea → India/SEA/LatAm
Localize artist campaigns and remix formats
Expected Impact
Turning Fan Creativity into Platform Growth
Increased Daily Active Users
FanCut motivates users to return to Amazon Music more frequently by turning listening into an interactive creative activity. Creating, editing, and sharing fan videos encourages daily engagement and longer session times.
Higher User Engagement
By transforming passive listening into remix creation, FanCut deepens how users interact with music. Generating and sharing fan content increases repeat interactions, time spent, and platform engagement.
Attract New Users to the Platform
Fan-generated remix videos shared across social platforms introduce Amazon Music to new audiences. These videos act as organic discovery channels that bring new listeners into the platform.
Increased Amazon Unlimited subscription
As users engage more deeply through remix creation and sharing, they gain greater value from the platform. This deeper engagement can help convert free or trial users into long-term Amazon Music Unlimited subscribers.
