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Burn A Song For 99 Cents
tusixoh writes "CNN is running an article about an online music company, Listen.com, who has signed deals with Warner Music Group and Universal Music Group allowing users to burn songs from both companies' catalogs (more than 75,000 available tracks) on Listen's Rhapsody music subscription service for 99 cents per track. Until now, Rhapsody had primarily offered only streamed music to subscribers from all of the world's largest record labels as well as several independent labels." The upside of this, of course, is that it won't be necessary to pay for songs that are just "album filler".
Now: let's see if they also allow independent artists distribute their music the same way.
Finding God in a Dog
They're actually changing their business model to coincide with modern times. I'd like to believe music companies generally care about their customers. This may be the first step to realizing that dream.
Honestly, from this point on, if I want an mp3, I'll check to see if one of those labels are the labels that the artist in question is on, if so, they get my 99 cents.
Finally, math books without any of that base 6 crap in them.
Then, all you have to do is buy 10 more songs at our regular price of $2.99 and you're done. There is nothing more to buy... ever!
Now I don't have to bother will all those inconvient P2P networks.
Metallica S&M would run over $20 on this. I'd rather pay the $16 for the CD and be able to burn it in the for4mat of my choice. (i.e. ogg)
I've dirtied my hands writing poetry, for the sake of seduction; that is, for the sake of a useful cause. --Dostoevsky
make it 25 cents a minute. Canadian!!! I can't afford 99 cents per track... That's like $18 a cd!!!
---
Programming is like sex... Make one mistake and support it the rest of your life.
Please God!
Please don't let them get Alf and Terry Bradshaw to do thier commercials.
I can't take that anymore Lord.
Metallica S&M would run over $20 on this.
Metallica's S&M CD is a 2 CD set. It retails for $25.
$ .99 * 21 songs = $20.79
You save $4.21!
neurostarI have two problems with this new service:
Their client, Rhapsody, is Windows only, and you can only burn
10 songs per month. Nice try, but lame.
EMusic, for that same price, lets you download fully unlocked standard MP3 files.
$9.95 a month gets you unlimited downloads - not an additional 99 cents per song. You can burn 'em and do anything you want with 'em.
Emusic a very underrated site, now that their big-advertising VC stuff has gone. Really wonderful. (NO I'm not affiliated.)
Do you need to subscribe to one of their monthly plans first? This could cost you an additional 9.95/mo or 4.95/mo depending on the package they make you buy. $0.99 per track doesn't seem like such a good price anymore...
Need a website host? Try out http://WebQualityHost.net
I believe that thier 10 tracks a month is only refering to their subscription service which is $9.95 a month. This new service would be pay as you go $0.99 per track. Also if you dig a bit deeper on thier site you'll find it's not even available yet.
This requires Windows. So, when Version 2.0 comes out and requires a Palladium-enabled version of Windows, how exactly will this be a good thing? Not to mention they've replaced standardized components with their own. What will happen when this software starts burning special copy-protected CDs only and your CD-R reaches the end of its lifespan?
I'd better not hear one peep out of the Slashdot crowd on this one. All anyone ever says on here is "well, I would buy the songs if they were cheap and by the track so I didn't have to buy a whole album". Put up or shut time, /. Most of the posts I've seen so far have been either "they had better let indie artists do it too" or "they don't have anything I want".
Personally, it's nice to own the music I listen to, and if this makes it so I get the songs I want for $15 on one cd rather than for $225 on 15 cds, great. Now, the article seems rather slim on the facts in this case, but I would hope that (a.) the music is in a machine readable format (not copy-protected), or (b.) available in MP3 or some other open format as well.
"What we elect to call imagination is mere combination of things not heretofore combined." - Frank Norris
Why $0.99 per song? That seems excessively high to me. I mean, most new CDs here with, say, ten songs on them sell for $14 Canadian (around $8.50 U.S.) while even non-new CDs rarely retail over $17 (about $10.50). It seems to me that this company doesn't provide the same nice CD inserts and the like so really, shouldn't they be charging less? Also, I am assuming they provide you with the uncompressed music burnt onto a custom CD for you. If it is MP3 and/or you download it yourself, $0.20 or so seems more reasonable. And yes, I would pay that. Perhaps a little more, say $0.25 or $0.30, for uncompressed music burnt or pressed onto a CD and sent to you.
Secondly, how much of this money goes to the artist? On the assumption that $1.00 of each regular CD goes to the artist, I would expect to see about $0.10 from each track be paid directly to the artist. Yes, that's while I'm paying approximately $0.20 per track. I don't want to pay per track if the artist simply will not see any revenue whatsoever from this. At least if I buy a CD, there's a chance the artist will see some profit from me.
Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia.
It sounds so good, then I see the details.
A dollar per track is a bit high, but I would certainly be interested in buying some tracks for that price. However, that price is "in addition to paying a monthly subscription fee of $9.95." I can't imagine buying more than ten songs per month. Once that's worked in we're up to two dollars per track. Two dollars? Too much.
Furthermore, I expect that this new functionality will be available through their proprietary software. I don't want to deal with your unknown software (even if it did run under my primary operating system: Linux). I want to open a account with some money, then download songs off your web site until my account is empty. Nice and simple. Do it for one dollar per song and I'll very occasionally use it for catchy tunes. Do it for fifty cents and I'll regularly use it. Do it for twenty five cents and I'll make heavy use it, regularly buying music on a whim.
Search 2010 Gen Con events
$.99 a song? That's great! For a CD with 15 songs, why that's only ... $15 ...
Hey, wait a minute!
if(!toilet_paper) roll.replace(new roll);
As a few people have already mentioned this; when is the record industry going to realize that the product they are trying to sell isn't worth the money when compared to other items you can buy.
...
For example, on Amazon.com you can buy Mariah Carey's Glitter cd for 13.28
Even if you're a die hard Mariah fan, there are really only one or two tracks that made it onto the charts. Not to mention that two of the songs on the CD are the same, where one is just a remix.
Compare this to the The Lord of the Rings for 17.97.
Hrm.. a cd that probably was thrown together in a month [free nervous break down included] compared to a movie, like LOTR, which I won't even begin to comment on how magnificiently it was created.
Add in the fact that it would take about 10 minutes to download and create your own glitter cd for free. Unless you're buying this as a gift, most people would just download the one or two popular songs and be done with it. Currently, it's a huge pain in the ass to download avi files. It's easier just to buy the dvd.
Anyways, the worst part about this post is now Amazon is reminding me on the left hand side that I looked at the Glitter cd. If it starts recommending
Live web cams
[trying to sign up for trial] "Please upgrade your browser. In order to register for Rhapsody, you must use one of the following browsers: Internet Explorer 5.0, or newer Netscape 6.0, or newer (Please note: In order to use Rhapsody, you will need Internet Explorer 5.0 or newer.) Get the latest version of Internet Explorer Get the latest version of Netscape"
The upside of this, of course, is that it won't be necessary to pay for songs that are just "album filler".
The down side is that $8 punk album I just bought would cost $29.69 online.
this is bad. not good. for one simple reason - you are still getting hosed. $.99 is a rip off when you have to pay for the bandwidth, and the materials (blank cd) to make a single track usefull.
.... .99 .30 (guessing)
not to mention the only reason i use p2p is to find non-mainstream non-commercial stuff. if i wanted to listen to some friggin skinny blonde chick sing about her teenage crush i would go buy her CD ! i want indie artists and sampling.
if you dont own the CD how are you supposed to know what you want to download ? pay $.99 per track off the album plus for your bandwidth and the blank CD ? so
15 songs 15 x
1 blank cd 1 x 1.00 (guessing)
bandwidth
= $ 16.15 per CD.
wow that sounds like its STILL A FRIGGIN RIPOFF !
ill give them credit when they come up with a better soulution for ME ! the CUSTOMER. NOT THEM the EVIL MEGA-CORP.
although i will give them credit for trying. albiet a shitty attempt.
"Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the the universe." --Albert Einstein
I will never pay a single dime for crippled formats.
314-15-9265
Read the FAQs. This is horrible. You can't even burn one average-sized album onto a CD. Not to mention the proprietary CD burning component isn't available yet.
Because you get what you pay for in this world. when I download an mp3, it might not be at the bitrate I prefer.. but it's hard to find more than a few copies of it, so i get it anyway. Or you get to the end, and there is no end. The reason I never used napster (not once) is b/c the idiot filter just wasnt there for me.. way too many kiddies who didn't know how to encode worth shit.
I'm not saying I will jump to sign up for $9.99 a month, or use listen.com at all.. I'm pretty bitter about the RIAA's behavior in the past few years, it will probably take me a while to get over it, but at least now I *can* pay for an mp3 and I know that if I pay for it, there better be a fsking ending on it, and maybe even a selection of bitrates to choose from.
You have paid for a total of 0 pages and so far 0 have been used up (0 today).
I can think of 2 reasons:
1. Existing p2p networks are slow and unreliable. I hate getting half way through a download only for the guy at the other end to disconnect from the network
2. The quality of rips varies *wildly*
Sure you get to cut the worthless songs but even then the prices match the store prices
The price matches, but the quality I can get for a given price increases dramatically. When I go to Best Buy and plunk down my hard-earned 13 USD for an album with 13 songs on it, I want 13 songs I like, not three. The way I see it, these CDs will be four times cheaper than[1] the CDs I can buy at Best Buy.
[1] Pedants: "Cheapness" here refers to the number of discs I can afford with a given amount of money. Thus, "Four times cheaper than" means "one-fourth as expensive as".
This is not far enough a benefit to make it a sustainable venture.
How can you be sure that four times cheaper for the average fan of oldies singles isn't enough of a benefit?
Will I retire or break 10K?
I'm wondering what stops someone from doing this exact same thing for 1/5th of the price from a country that does not respect the United States intellectual properties laws.
My
Limekiller
I *still* like my nice packaging and nice looking CDs, rather than a CDR with "Bob the Box - I Like Potatoes" or whatever written on it with a Sharpie.
;) )
Also, as other people have commented, the whole "album filler" thing seems a bit off to me. In general, my CDs have one or two songs I don't like, or even songs that suck, but those are the minority.. I don't get the "one song rocks, everything else sucks" thing.
And even if you could weed out the songs that suck, how would you know which ones suck and which ones don't, unless you already know them? Many times the best songs are the ones that hit me suddenly after weeks or months or years of having the album, and never really noticing it before, and suddenly, bam, wow, that song rocks, why didn't I notice it before?
well, that's just my 2 lire (I don't presume to think that my opinions are worth as much as $0.02..
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
Can someone provide a breakdown of that 99 cents, and what goes where? I'd rather use a service that interfaces directly with the artists, so that the artists get to keep 80 of those 99 cents. If a few major musicians band together and create something like that, many more will follow. Janis Ian are you listening? The catch is that the artists who have already signed their rights away to the labels in perpetuity will never have this option. The most often heard piece of advice for new artists negotiating contracts is "get a lawyer!"
--Mike
Correct, but I'd much rather have a service that works right out of the box and allows what we need/wish/want/do anyway. It's called customer service and customer satisfaction.
if and when Palladium and trusted security prevents the average non-techie home Windows user from burning his or her own CDs
And that's a big if, to which the answer is "probably not." Microsoft has repeatedly stated that Palladium will not interfere with any applications that don't know anything about Palladium, such as CDex or CDRDAO. The only way your scenario will play out is if a future version of Windows places CD audio extraction and recording into a Palladium vault, which I don't see as likely to happen given the big stink that users raised about CD writing software not working with Windows XP. Microsoft doesn't want another black eye.
Will I retire or break 10K?
I'm happily pay for music (or movies or tv shows or books) I might download, but the details have to be acceptable.
These aren't difficult requirements to meet it seems to me, except by panicy and sluggish business entities that can't read the writing on the wall.
--
bachiatari na torisetsu o yome!
Wrong!
There's no information on Listen's site about Rhapsody 2.0, which will feature burning. The FAQ you list applies to their current service, specifically the Naxos Classical subscription.
The new service will have no DRM, and you will be able to buy as many tracks as you want at 99 cents each. The interesting thing is that they are going to stream PCM audio directly to the burner. So, DRM won't be the issue, buffer underruns will be when their streaming servers can't keep up with your CD player!
One "set charge per track" will break in a lot of ways.
Yeah, but it's the law. In the USA, a songwriter gets a fixed 8 cent cut per song five minutes or less in duration. (The royalty increases with the duration of the composition.) The songwriter typically splits the royalties 50/50 with a publisher, meaning that on a typical album with twelve songs, the songwriter gets just under half a buck a disc.
Will I retire or break 10K?
1) the FAQ is OLD. We're launching on Monday with what we call "a la carte" CD burning. This means you can burn as many CDs as you want. No monthly restrictions, no restrictions at all.
2) The audio format on the CD is regular redbook audio. No DRMs, no restrictions. They're yours after you pay the $.99
3) If you want to check out Rhapsody without paying, just register and download it if you want to see the artist list. You can listen to 30 second clips and a selection of radio stations without paying us.
(remember that this is not released yet. wait 'til next week. ok, back to QA...gotta burn me some CDs ;)
make it a dollar per track, but I'm licensed to use that track for my entire lifetime, in whatever current music format is popular, that way I don't have to re-buy the song for my 8-track, cassette, LP and MP3 players.
That's what the current model does. A 10-track disc costs $10, and under the Betamax precedent, you can copy it to whatever writable medium is popular at any time.
let me mix and burn my own music without the need of my own PC
Mix your own music without a PC? How are you supposed to do beat-matched crossfaded transitions between songs? Yes, I do that on my own mix discs, even of rock music.
And why does a CD with one hour of audio (which cost thousands of dollars to produce) cost as much as a DVD
A soundtrack album (or any other CD for that matter) is as expensive as the movie because unlike the movie, you can play an CD in your car, in the kitchen, in your pocket player while jogging. Unlike a movie, a recording doesn't demand your full attention. Thus, you play it more often.
Will I retire or break 10K?
If they supported my iPod, and I was even forced to download directly to the iPod and not even keep a copy of it on the computer, I'd be very happy.
Don't they realize that the people who will sign up for this service are the cutting edge music-listeners, the ones that will probably own an mp3 player and not a discman for their portable music needs?
Okay, that song you've been toying with a bit gets recorded. Its ok, not ideal. But if you spend another week in the studio, you're paying even MORE for the time and your contract says this will be ready to be mastered by next week.
You're not proud of it, but it's good enough to slide in between tracks 6 and 8.
It happens. Really.
Bad is when you have 4 - 6 songs like that.
The grateful dead cut side two of an album up into several tracks to meet warner brothers contracts requiring "n tracks" per album.
Music and law meld as well as music and big business.
Hehehe, you must not watch much DVD pornography, then :) It's been said time and again -- porn always seems to drive technology. Lots of adult DVDs these days have multiple camera angles. Sometimes they do a crap job (i.e. to keep one "angle" you have to switch angles around as each stream has edits in them where they switch to different cameras), but sometimes they do pretty well with it.
I don't know if I'd want a pornography director to bother with multilingual audio and subtitling, though. Pornography with 5.1 audio? "Man, oh, man, it sounds like she's right there in your living room, er, moaning and stuff!"
Read my stuff.
This still isn't good enough. Why? Oh, god, let me count the ways.
In conclusion, I'm sticking with the indies. Go, baby, go!