At some point, you may have found yourself bored out of your mind by your current music selection, and resisting the urge to try one of the eleventy million music discovery services out there, you think, “By God, I’m going to do it myself.” You rush home, download a music suite, start furiously clicking and recording, only to be sooner or later confronted by the reality that you have no idea what you’re doing, and reprimand yourself for turning down those music lessons in fourth grade.

The Korea-based, VC-funded MusicShake launched back at TechCrunch40 in 2007 to solve these woes, allowing users to create their own music in a fun an intuitive way.

Today, MusicShake provides over 2 million different music patterns, categorized into different generes and samples, to allow users to build music — as if with Lego blocks. For music novices, MusicShake has an intelligent algorithm that, when starting with a blank slate (or staff), you can add different samples or templates, picking and choosing from sounds you like, and the algorithm works in the background to optimize them, make sure the different parts are aligned — so you sound like a maestro.

MusicShake General Manager Kihong Bae tells us that it’s essentially a free, web-based GarageBand, which has very low barriers to entry and is a bit more novice-friendly. It can’t compete toe-to-toe on every level, but its a great alternative.

All of the service’s samples are created by the team’s very own musicians and “music robot,” which means they’re copyright free. The team revamped the service last year, offering a brand new website, and a user experience that allows you not just to create new music, but comment, listen, consumer not only your music, but those of other aspiring musicians — the goal of which was to create a mini-community for all music lovers.

MusicShake also enables users to add their tracks to slideshows and videos, then upload those videos to YouTube or their social network of choice. To date, MusicShake tunes are acting as soundtracks on over 300,000 YouTube videos that have generated over 1 billion page views. Again, this is all free, unless of course you’re looking to use the tracks for commercial purposes, in which case the company charges a reasonable $20 for licensing. (The company recently released its “YouTube Producer” iPhone app, which lets users search for copyright-free music, add to their videos on their iPhone and upload directly to YouTube.)

Naturally, many video and content creators want to add music to their content, and as MusicShake provides a trove of license-free tunes, it’s a great resource to quickly find and upload soundtracks. With this in mind, MusicShake has recently launched a whole new addition to their service that focuses on education — in bringing its service into the classroom. Nearly every school, whether it be elementary, middle, or high school, has media class where students learn to generate video, music, slide shows, etc. — and there’s always musical accompaniment.

Of course, some schools have the funding resources to buy Macs for their classrooms, and thus already have GarageBand in use. Of course, most schools don’t have that budget, and when teachers want to grab music, they’re forced to rely on paying for stock music, which isn’t cheap, or taking their chances with free music.

MusicShake EDU gives students an unlimited supply of music to use in their projects without requiring them to have prior music experience. Songs can be created instantly and used immediately, or students can refine each block in the song; plus, music samples are copyright free. At $499 per year, the service is pretty affordable, especially as it provides unlimited MP3s and WAVs for every student in your school, which, in most cases is less than one dollar per student per year. (It also helps that MusicShake meets the California Learning Resources Network review criteria, meaning it’s approved for social content.)

Next up, MusicShake will be building out an API, so that smaller video-creation services can quickly add tunes from the MusicShake catalog into their content, in addition to focusing on creating an award system to encourage users to return and up the level of stickiness.

MusicShake struggled through the recession, but they’ve seen increased traffic since launching their web app. Bringing the service into the classroom and to small video providers is a great way to increase their reach. We’ll see if it can help turn the startup around.

For more, check out the introductory video below, and let us know what you think.

If all goes well you should be able to see the widget in action below. It’s composed of a number of blocks that indicate what type of sound bite (instruments, vocals, etc.) you can expect when you hit the ‘play’ button, and a simple timeline-based overview of the song with all its elements. Hitting ‘Shake’ will make the widget select a random music category and composition. You can then move, delete or add elements by clicking the blocks, or configure them to play the element in a different way or at a higher or lower volume.

When you’re finished composing your own mix, you can embed the result on your blog and/or share it with your friends in a variety of ways. You can even download the tune as an MP3 from inside the widget interface. The song catalog is a bit cheesy though, and it sometimes takes a while for the widget to respond to actions, but all in all it’s a fun way to waste some time.

The widget is not spectacularly unique, but it’s most definitely a good way for MusicShake to show off the capabilities of its more extensive desktop application and have its users spread the word about its service. All you need to start playing around with the widget is Flash Player 10, no additional downloads are required.

MusicShake offers a free desktop application (unfortunately, Windows only for now) that lets users create personalized, professional sounding music using a variety of modules and pattern-combination methods, which is quite addictive once you get the hang of it (takes about 10 minutes and there are templates to help get you started). You can convert music you make to mp3 and download them to your computer, or convert them into a personalized ringtone. You can also show off music you create to your friends and place it in charts to promote your work to others.

So far, there have been close to 50,000 music tracks created with the service, which can individually be purchased in the MusicShake store; the company gives back 10% of the revenues back to the original creator. There’s also a subscription option that gives you a month of unlimited MP3 downloads and ringtones in exchange for 1,499 in “Shake Cash” (or $14.99).

TechCrunch readers are in for a treat today: the first 1,000 readers to sign up for the service using the promotion code “PROMOTC” get access to 3 free mp3 downloads (worth $3.00 each).

The new website comes with a redesigned UI and color scheme, and also adds a social layer on top of the online part of MusicShake: direct communication between members, a dedicated page that gives an overview of users’ profiles, forums, a way for registered users to build and share their own playlists etc. Music tracks created through MusicShake can also easily be shared via Facebook, Imeem, YouTube, and other communication channels.

The service was launched in September 2007 at the TechCrunch40 conference – see video below – when the company was still based in South Korea. MusicShake has raised $3.5 million in two funding rounds.

Story Blender

Story Blender is an online collaborative video production platform where people can work together to “blend” their content into a new multimedia show. StoryBlend’s online editing tool lets users create videos by “blending” images, sound, text, and video clips. When users have created new video blends they can then share it with their friends and the StoryBlend community.

Session 3 starts. CEO is also the founder of Cyworld.

Online video mixing with friends, nice interface.Multi-level relationship model for contributions, friend of a friend sort of thing. Easy to use video mashing with lots of features

TripIt

TripIt is a travel organizer that helps do-it-yourself travelers manage their travel plans. Travelers manage their travel itinerary with TripIt by forwarding their purchase confirmation emails to the service. TripIt automatically creates master itineraries with travel plans and other critical information like weather, maps and driving directions, and destination information. You can print or access your itinerary from anywhere including online, in print and on their web-enabled mobile devices. They can also share itineraries and travel calendars and collaborate on planning trips with friends.

CEO and Founder is ex-Hotwire, along with most of the team.

TripIt wants to eliminate the vanilla travel folder, bringing the travel itinerary into the 21st century. Travel is an information management business, TripIt is not a booking service.

Users send their plans to plans@tripit.com, compiles online itinerary, a sort of travel plan aggregation.

TripIt supports export to iCal and other platforms, also looking at microformats

Friends can share travel calenders. TripIt believes a multi-functional travel planner with collaborative tools will be a much needed service.

Site is live today, out of beta. I’d like to see the site before I pass judgment, but in theory it’s a great idea.

Flock

Flock is a social web browser we have reported on extensively. With Flock, people can discover, access, create and share videos, photos, blogs, feeds and comments across social communities, media providers, and popular websites. Flock is offering custom browser modifications as a revenue model. To date, Flock has shipped editions of its browser for Photobucket and Piczo.

Flock feels that the browser has not evolved over time, and that’s a market opportunity for them. So interesting new features, Facebook sidebar was something new to me. Drag and drop functionality has improved a lot since earlier versions.

I’ll be honest, I’ve not be a Flock fan previously, the new version demoed here (release in 2 weeks) really is something more than Firefox with plugins. I’ll be taking another look at Flock soon.

MusicShake

South Korean MusicShake is a online amateur music mixing service. The service lets users create their own professional quality music using various tools. They hope to provide personalized music for ringtones, and personal websites (blogs, profiles). The service is developed and distributed by SilentMusicBand Corp.

Korean company. Started with music and the speaker dancing on stage. Funny start, he danced worse than I do

Speaker asked whether it was a Britney Spears track…music was created by a 9 year old girl in Korea with no experience of real music…just like Britney Spears.

Demo of interface. Seems simple to us, based on mixing music tracks and sound effects. Tracks are recommended by “Nuba,” the robot behind Musicshake.

170,000 music tracks, 1 million by 1 million. Also a model for creators to make music and sell it on the 50/ 50 rev share.

One of the best presentations so far, big round of applause. Fun idea.

8020 Publishing

8020 Publishing is a media company that publishes user generated magazines. They currently have two magazines JPG and the yet-to-launch Everywhere. Members of the 8020 community can contribute and critique the content in the magazines. However, 8020 Publishing still fills normal publishing roles like choosing themes, putting the magazines together and providing the final vote on all published content. The community also gives them a built-in subscription base not to mention loyal online communities.

8020 is aiming to “make magazines better.” JPG Magazine is used as an example.

Launching “Everywhere” Magazine, the “insiders experience”…travel magazine that is submitted by the community.

All submissions are added to the website, best make the magazine. Geographic focused search.

Submissions 300-500 words to make it easy to participate.

Interesting model, you’ll like this if you like JPG Mag.

Expert panel: Ron Conway, Don Dodge, Rajeev Motwani, and Yossi Vardi

Jason Calacanis asks Yossi Vardi for his favorite, answers: two that appealed Music Shake, will appeal to young people, and Flock, presuming that the user interface isn’t too hard to use. He can see himself using TripIt.

Don Dodge favorites: Music Shake and Story Blender, reminded him of his days at Napster. Question to Story Blender: what about copyright on the videos. A: YouTube didn’t block the copyright material from day 1, they will block copyright content at the “community manager” level.

Michael Arrington asks Don Dodge about copyright, A: just because you haven’t been sued, doesn’t mean you wont end up being sued.

Rajeev Motwani loves Music Shake, wish he’d come up with himself. Also likes TripIt, “Useful and solving a real problem.”

Ron Conway: likes TripIt and Story Blender. TripIt simple idea with potential to grow virally + from an investor view point can be easy monetized. Story Blender is in video, biggest growth opportunity on the internet and a Story Blender is unique idea.

Discussion about 8020′s model, how they pay, copyright. Authors hand over their content when they submit.

Audience questions: is video the hottest market online: Ron Conway, yes, and it’s getting easier as the tech catches up in terms of copyright filtering.

Don Dodge to Flock: market is old, entrench, how do you overcome that, and what is the business model. Flock: partner business, we work with others to include functionality. Multi-site membership works for us by making management easier. In terms of choice, Firefox 1.0 launched less than 3 years ago, 100million + users, there is choice and people will switch. They also have a search relationship with Yahoo that is a main revenue stream.

Jason Calacanis: why not just do Flock as a Firefox extension. Flock: most people dont use Firefox extension, we are targeting the broader market.

Michael Arrington to Flock: you’ve taken far too long to release 1.0, over 2 years, given plenty of rope. Can you guarantee that you wont take users for granted in the future. Flock: yes, people love us…and it’s a great product. (didn’t respond directly to the 2 year comment).

Question to Music Shake: will it translate. MS: yes, music is universal and if I hadn’t told you the demo song was made by a Sth Korean girl you wouldn’t have known.

Conclusion: best panel yet, particularly in terms of the qaulity of the startups. Hard to pick a favorite, Music Shake was certainly the most original idea, TripIt for practical use. Flock impressed.