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AOL Enters Music Service Fray

Posted by michael on from the buy-the-cow-or-get-free-milk dept.

Masem writes "Several sites, including The Washington Post and News.com report that AOL is planning to enter the online music service market with its own MusicNet offering. The service rates vary from $4 to $18/month, the latter giving you unlimited downloads and streaming content and 10 burnable tracks a month to CD. Future plans will include a pay-as-you-burn cost as well, expected later this year. However, the service is strictly limited to AOL customers, making many wonder if it will grab enough attention of the current subscriber base to actually be of value."

5 of 243 comments (clear)

  1. Another one that flops before it starts.... by grapeape · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Ok lemme get this straight for $18.00 a month I get to listen to sub par streaming radio and get roughly one cd's worth of music...what a bargain :(

    Of course when it goes down in flames they will blame it all on piracy and claim they offered an practical alternative.

  2. Sounds Fair... by Talez · · Score: 5, Insightful

    $18/month for unlimited downloads plus you get a free CD of tracks you actually like in the process. Sure you need to keep subscribed to listen to the songs but many people spend more than that on their CDs every month.

    Pay by the song will be interesting so long as the price point is sufficiently attractive ($0.25-$1 per song) as well as the conditions (physical PCM on the CD, no DRM bullshit).

    Maybe they're sick of fighting us and actually want to give us what we want? How many people were saying they'd start buying music if they were given a chance?

  3. Re:aren't most of their subscribers dialup? by goldspider · · Score: 5, Insightful
    "No thanks, I am not paying $23 + $4 - $x for songs when Kazaa is still fucking free."

    It's statements like this that validates everything that the RIAA claims.

    If you want to positively change the music industry's approach to digital media, this surely isn't the way to do it.

    --
    "Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
  4. Meet the Basic Requirements of Consumers! by asv108 · · Score: 5, Insightful
    The problem with this service is that it does not meet the demands of the average music enthusiast. MP3 devices are pretty much ubiquitous these days, even in non-techie circles. Nobody is going to subscribe to a service that does not maintain fair use rights. When I purchase a CD or download a song from a pay service, I expect to be able to play that song on my Ipod, put it on a samba share to play on an audiotron, or burn it to a CD for my car.

    If your going to provide a pay service, it must be in a standard format. MP3 is the current standard, and if it is not in MP3, it will go under. With this current strategy, Musicnet users can only play downloaded tracks through AOL! The CD burning feature is such a joke, 10 tracks? 10 tracks, considering the average song length is not enough to fill a 74 minute CD.

    The most ridiculous part about this whole service is the requirement of an AOL subscription. So in order to use this service a prospective customer needs to pay $25/month for an AOL subscription and $18/month for unlimited downloads of a DRM crippled format and the ability to burn 10 tracks. So for $43, users can download low quality, DRM crippled songs from a 56k modem, and every month they can burn half of a mix CD with 10 tracks!

    I've said it before and I will repeat it again, because apparently nobody at AOL/TW reads /. If you are going to charge for a service, any service whether it is downloadable music, catering, or blowjobs in a cheap motel, you need to meet the basic needs of your potential customers.

  5. Re:aren't most of their subscribers dialup? by Anonvmous+Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "t's statements like this that validates everything that the RIAA claims."

    It might validate them in their eyes, but as far as it being a good argument, that's questionable. He does bring up a good point about the pricing.

    My math was a little different. You get 10 tracks a month, but you pay $18 a month. So you're buying an album for $18, that's a little spendy.

    The flip side is that you get streaming options (presumably from the actual content...) and your CD is nothing but music you want. That's not all bad.

    But there's still the sticker shock deal like the guy mentioned. Yeah, he sounds bad for saying Kazaa is "fucking free", but when you think about what he's really saying here, Kazaa is just plain a better service. I imagine lotsa people'd be happy to pay $20 to use Kazaa, just for the right to use it legally. (Note: that's completely different than paying $20/mo to use Kazaa because the company demands it.)

    The RIAA hasn't figured out yet that the price tag isn't the major issue here (Lots of people are buying $50 games when the tools the pirate them are there and waiting to be used), it's a matter of the service. The RIAA still has a wonderful opportunity here that they're arrogantly overlooking. They should set up their own music download service. All the songs they can muster, they guarantee the quality, and they provide a server that can handle quick downloads. That's it. Don't make it more complicated than that.

    I mean seriously, every single music service I've seen has pricing policies that resemble cell phone plans!