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Napster and Best Buy Joining Forces
Ruds writes "Best Buy will market a music service co-branded with Napster. Napster will give Best Buy stock valued up to $10 million, and they'll share marketing costs. From the story: 'The retail chain will feature Napster products in its brick-and-mortar stores and demonstrate the service through interactive kiosks throughout the nation. Napster will also support Best Buy's artist promotions.'"
...to create "Best Napster".
It's amazing how agressive the online music selling business is getting, companies teaming up with each other to get that advantage over their rivals etc.
My only problem with them all is they're US based. I realise of course this is where the major market appeal is, it does mean however the rest of us end up having to resort to pirated music if we want to get the latest and greatest online.
Here's hoping that soon iTunes and all the other online music stores will soon be available the world over. License rights I guess will be the biggest hurdle to this though.
What about mac's, I use my mac for all my music, so I can not use their service, and I dont think that they support iPod's (or the other way around) No thanks, just like the sony one, I will not use it, infact the other day I got a code for the sony one (bigmac) that I asked if any one wanted, no one wanted it so I just trashed it. ( Of cource I do not buy sony products since they don't us SD cards and only use the stupid memory stick BS)
BestBuy used to partner with Rhapsody. Apparently that didn't last long. Anyone know what happened? Not that I really care, Rhapsody and Real Networks stuff are pretty crappy anyway...
bash: rtfm: command not found
Well, maybe this will work better than the last investment in music downloading (what the hell was the name of that). But honestly, I don't see BestBuy doing much with this. I've never quite understood the appeal of retail (read: brick & mortar) tie-in with downloading services. Buying pre-paid cards may be nice, but that seems like a better business for 7-11, Starbucks or supermarkets. I suppose they'll start giving away CDs with Napster software, but I think the novelty/appeal of that wore off a long time ago, especially for broadband users (download market) who can easily download software from the net.
On the whole, it can't hurt Napster, but I fail to see how this is going to help them very much. Maybe I'm too skeptical, but overall this seems fairly pointless.
So the question is... Is Napster the "Best Buy" when is comes to online music? Why not just install some kiosks with a CD Burner and an emule installation? It would do wonders for the sale of blank media.
I remember back when Napster was still cool. I was at a party and all the music was downloaded illegally (wasnt my house, I'm not liable la la la la). Anyway, the guy had a fast internet connection so we could have pretty much play any song we wanted on demand. Kinda miss that. At one point it turned into sort of a one-ups-manship of trying to find and download increasingly obscure songs.
Unknown host pong.
So will the Metallicops be stopping by the local Best Buy to beat up fans in the near future?
And with this it just seems like Apple will pull the plug on both its iPod and monitor sales at best buy
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
Best Buy isn't the first joint venture that Napster has undertaken. Samsung and Napster teamed up to design an mp3 player around the Napster download service.
It seems as though Napster doesn't have much faith in their ability to survive. These corporate sponsorships provide companies such as Best Buy and Samsung an interest in Napster's well-being. It's definitely a far cry from the heyday of Napster, when it couldn't keep users away.
Napster is getting desperate now. First they offer to give away players, now they wish to give away stock. I can't see this stock going anywhere but down. These new 'plans' will not bring the needed cash in. (Too long term too many bills to pay) The online music industry is a market that has no room for napster any more. I for one am saddened by this, napster allowed me to broaden my music tastes.
Why can I not mod a message to crap?!?
When they started doing Rhapsody, I had about 5 employees come up to me one day and try to sell me the service. I don't mean just hawk it. No. I mean trying to offer me demos, explaining to me what the service was, etc. Every time I'm in best buy, I have no less than 6 people ask me if I need help with something. While I appreciate the attentitiveness to an extent, it is a little over the top. Now, they'll be trying to hawk Napster to me. I love the store and I like shopping there but I just want to be left alone while I'm there. You have HUGE signs saying "customer service" and those distictly blue shirts. If I need you, I'll find you.
/rant
Lately it has been magazines. "Oh. You purchased a CD. You are entitled to 6 months free of Entertainment Weekly or People!"
No. No I'm not.
And am I the only one that thinks that a reciept that is no less than a foot and a half long for a single CD purchase is a little extreme?
So First, we had Napster comming back. Then they decided to give away free mp3 players for registered users IIRC and now partnership with one of the biggest retailers in north america? Yes They really don't like iTunes do they? heh. An Alliance with BestBuy will surely boost popularity among average joes but if they really want to hurt the iTunes Music Store, they have to offer something special to their customers.
What I'd like to see from these music stores is something unique in it's kind. Maybe some kind offer which says "Buy 65% of the songs of any album and get the album shipped for free!" Or I donno I can think of many other special offers but I guess that would make em lose that $1 which is so precious for them... damn capitalists
So I want to buy a song from napster (mp3 lets just say)... so I go into a store to buy said song... and it comes on a little circle shaped disc... oh wait, isn't that like buying from a record store? Damn it, looks like I've just bought a CD with a new fancy name and a bit lower price but alot less tracks..
I like muppets.
Funny to see the suits manipulating a "brand" that used to stand for individuality and defiance. Napster has been made the RIAA's bitch and now they want to trot out the name -- shamed and debased -- as some sort of hip corporate brand.
Oooo, "Napster teams with Best Buy." Wow, surely Best Buy is cool and if you want to be an individual you need to head on over to your local box store and buy some Sony / BestBuy / Microsoft / PepsiCo product.
Personally, I think if you're smart you'll ignore everything with the "Napster" label altogether. And if you're really a rebel, try scratching "Best Buy" off the list too. Now that, would be cool...
Presently, Best Buy stores are marketing Real Rhapsody in their stores and online... they mention online that they offer Napster 15-song gift cards for $14.85 (99 cents times 15) but they can't sell those online.
I have a feeling that one of the side terms of this new deal is that the other deal isn't gonna get renewed.
I wonder if when you download a song you will get 1,000 pop-ups asking you to but a Performance Service plan in case your mp3's ever get erased or damaged.
I hear that in July a lot of retailers that currently sell Napster cards are going to be selling them 2-for-1.. that's probably not too bad a deal. $15 for 30 songs.. sure beats buying a CD!
Best Buy Clerk: Thanks for shopping with us today. Would you like to sign up for a Sports Illustrated or Entertainment Weekly Subscription with your Napster purchase? Perhaps sign up for Rhapsody as well?
Customer: I'm not interested.
Clerk: You know for just $.45 you can purchase an extended warranty on your Napster download. It cover's against damage caused by power surges, unlike Naptster's own warranty.
Customer: Not interested.
Clerk: Oh, it looks like we're actually out of that song, sorry.
It's so fun trying to shop there.. all you hear is *BOOM* *BOOM* *BOOM*, courtesy of the idiots in car audio.
It used to be about sharing, now it's about selling. Not that selling is a bad thing or that sharing is a good thing. It's just that the two are very opposite in consumer's minds, yet there are these dumbass MBA's who somehow think that just branding something with the Napster name will make it cool, so they bought the name.
If you could buy cool, Bill Gates would be The Fonz.
- Greg
Start a happiness pandemic
Is this really such a big deal?
I've seen Napster gift cards in a local supermarket chain. OK they cell other stuff, kinda like a nice Target, but there are a lot of them in the Northwest.
And, some have already questioned that the whole of Napster is worth $10 million dollars, but why would they pay that much for just selling little cards that give you codes to download stuff?
Doesn't seem too much different from pre-paid long distance cards to me.
Anyone seen these cards in other stores?
I guess it is incentive to give customers the Hard Sell.
Howdy Doodly Doo!
Anybody want some Toast?
I saw Napster stuff on the shelves in there a couple days ago...made no sense to me then, and even less now. It was good, now its gone, let the brand die for gods sake.
Actually, this might be different than what you saw. The intention here is that Napster and Best Buy will be marketing music together, instead of idependently. This is interesting for a number of reasons:
1: Napster is currently in a rather weak position when it comes to promotion. Let's face it, their credibility is zilch with the fickle internet-enabled teens and early-twenty-somethings. Corporate brass, aka "Blue-Haired's", don't sway so easily and still see the Napster name as something the kids are into. This alone is dangerous territory. (And I agree with you, the Napster brand should just be allowed to die on it's own.) And this younger crowd is where roughly 80% of the music industry gets their paycheck.
2: Best Buy sells music as a loss leader to get people in the stores to buy other things, mainly product accessories where margins are at their highest. This loss leader approach is a proven, successful marketing technique, especially for Best Buy.
The Best Buy/Napster deal makes sense due to one last interesting item:
3: Best Buy typically buys proven, successful solutions to expand their business, instead of developing anything in-house. I cite Geek Squad as my prime example, and there are plenty of others if someone else decides to do the rest of my homework for me.
But how Best Buy can see Napster as a successful entity is beyond me. Perhaps they see value into bringing it under it's own umbrella of operations and making it work for them instead of with them. Direct control would certainly be easier, which might just be what Best Buy is aiming for.
Otherwise, I think Best Buy got wound up stuck with some magic beans...
My sources are unreliable, but their information is fascinating. -- Ashleigh Brilliant
1st Ave just lost the guy who's been running the club for the last 30 years. This is one of the last nails in the coffin of indy music in Minneapolis, and probably MN. Sure, bands are still going to play and write, but the locales have dwindled over the years. One of the few bars left with any integrity is the 400 Club in Mpls.
I've watched the slow dissolution of original music in MN for the last 5-10 years, and the clubs that host them replaced with Clear Channel owned properties and cover band havens.
I don't buy music from Best Buy, I don't support Clear Channel, and I ain't gonna be picking up any songs from Napster.
But someone will.
This deal makes absolutely no sense.
/temp/$user directory. User is prompted that their files are ready and to attach their MP3 player via one of the available cables and transfer their files over. As another option, blank CD's could be available in a handy vending machin for $.50 a pop and the KIOSK equipted with a slotloading CD Burner.
Why can't retailers get out of the "tangible object" mode and realize that it's bits that are being sold not a product that needs a bunch of packaging.
What I'd like to see is an obitquitous KIOSK equipted with touchscreen, a mag-card reader and USB/USB2/Firewire cables.
User walks up, browses the online store via the touchscreen, makes a shopping cart and swipes their credit card to copy songs to a
The point is, this is something that makes no sense for bestbuy, but makes perfect sense for a company who wants to build and market a network of KIOSKS that could be installed at 7-11, blockbuster, Kinkos, Malls and well... just about anywhere that you could stick one.
I worked for Best Buy less than 3 months ago for about a year in the PCHO(that's personal computer, home office to you outsiders)/Software department. Those little Napster demo disks and subscription kiosks have been in most Best Buy stores since before Thanksgiving, 2003. We employees were briefed on the future of the "BestNap" alliance way back then and even had a Napster rep visit several times, handing out Napster demo subscriptions, nifty little badges, keychains and necklaces advetising Napster. The usual fare brought to us by reps, nothing different. The only oddity was the fact that I began my internet career upon exposure to Napster at its very beginning as a fringe underground utility only to see it represented at my job by a slick gentleman in a suit and tie!!!
I'm not downplaying their stupidity. I know of it intimately.
My local best buys are rife with kids who picked a department out of a hat to work in.
I was shopping for a cell phone headset, and found another customer milling over buying an iPod. The employee was lost as to how it worked, what music was compatible, if it even worked on a PC. I waved mine around, offered help, and the BB employee VANISHED for 20 minutes. I ended up helping the customer all the way to getting his 'pod out of lockup. He even chased me down at the register to thank me...
2 weeks later, I was shopping for a wireless router, and accessories for my computers and xbox. I had the video games guy tell me that the xbox MUST be wireless when you have a wireless router. meaning, you can't run a line from the ports on the back of the router to the unit.
And the computer dept guy told me that the wireless unit had to be from linksys in order to work with the xbox adapter.
I don't take terrible issue with their advice, since I choose to ignore it, and go against their recommendations. But there are people out there spending their hard earned cash on stuff they don't need, want, or are pressured into buying, simply because the 16 year old on the floor is supposed to be a percieved "authority" on their chosen department's products. Their customers don't deserve this service. People are being lied to about quality and preference by a child's part time job. If the kid's got parents that bought him a Sony/Panasonic/Samsung/etc. TV/VCR/DVD player, they're biased. Let them spend their own money, do their own research and form their own REAL opinion about what's good and what's not, and not base it off of what they think looks cool.
Hell, I'd even settle to find a kid working at a BB who can properly manage to navigate their way through setting a TV up via Video Essentials. They don't even align their floor models for good color and brightness.
That's why I'd support Tweeter or Ultimate Electronics over BB, since at least they have the forsight to hire people who have SOME knowledge of what they sell.
Orginally napster depended on the size of its marketshare to succeed . . . like the telephone, the more phones hooked up to the network, the more valuable the network became (the potential to call more and different people and businesses), at its peak, napster was by far the biggest network of its kind (even the only network of its kind) . . . like microsoft on the desktop with a lot of the evil removed (or focused at the RIAA depending on how one looks at it)
Napster no longer has its network . . . it had been defunct for a long time, it has been trying to reinvent itself on exactly the business model that it was working against . . . but most importantly, its no longer the big kid on the block. Its not the biggest, its not the most popular, and in the selling of songs online, it certainly does not have the brand recognition of being a leader (currently that goes to Apple and the ipod.). Napster is now a follower, not a leader and the brand tarnished . . . napster is the sellout, they are the ones that lost the lawsuit . . . They were even bought by one of the major labels. Their rebellious market credibility was gone a long time ago.
Why is BestBuy partnering with them? Perhaps to compete with WalMart. Successful or not, BestBuy cannot afford to let WalMart get a beachhead in the higher end consumer electronics market through online music sales . . . Basically, BestBuy is doing this because they have to in order to protect their marketshare from the big kid on the block with the virtually infinite spending account.
Where does this leave Napster . . . somewhere between the pet rock, beanie babies, and mood rings, after the fad was here and gone.
...of this (unrelated) strip.
There are not too many things more rude than customers on cell phones. I've said it once and I'll say it again, cell phones are the most detrimental inventions ever. Detrimental as far as common courtesy, manners and politeness.
If it's so obviously illegal, why is it still up? If they're that certain this is illegal, why not get a legal injunction? It's not like the RIAA couldn't post the bond. Even in Russia there's a legal system (particularly if you have money, bleh, but that's something the RIAA do).
The RIAA claimed Napster was illegal. They were proven right. The RIAA claimed KaZaA was illegal. They were proven wrong. Until they actually take it to court, it is just a claim. Anyone can make a claim. SCO can make a claim against Linux, which they have done in the press but not in court.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
On another note it is interesting to note that Best Buy considers their three main competitors Dell Computers, eBay, and Wal-Mart. In their mind Circuit City, Ultimate Electronics, Tweet and whoever else are relics of the past. I am intrigued to see what Best Buy will do to compete against these companies. Personally I doubt they have any chance against the number one computer retailer, the world's garage sale and the largest retailer in the world, period. Should be an interesting battle.
Best Buy is the number #2 distributor of the iPod, behind Apple. Why would they want to distribute a service that isn't even compatible with their NUMBER 4 selling product in the whole store and not sell a service that is compatible with the # one music store, the #1 player, and that is cross platform compatible.
It's just a bad marketing analysis in my opinion.
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
These partnerships always work wonders!
Remember Circuit City and DIVX?
If you're correct about this, and I'm sure you are, the deal with Napster makes no sense at all. One of the main advantages of online music services is that you can download music from the comfort of your own home without having to make those pesky trips to the music store. Oh wait, Best Buy is the music store, and they make money by selling you gizmos while you're there to buy cd's. Except they just showed you a place that lets you get the music you want without having to go their stores. Aim gun at foot, pull trigger.