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Business Models: Napster to Go vs. iPod
CNet offers an interesting comparison between Napster to Go and iTunes.
For $15 a month, Napster to Go offers over 1 million songs (access to which lasts as long as subscription is valid), while songs for iPod must be purchased and last 'forever' (but it takes about $10,000 to fill an iPod). Is Napster to Go the future of digital music distribution? Would moving to an all-you-can-eat model hurt iPod business and balance the power among authors, studios, hardware makers and consumers?" It might take $10,000 to fill an iPod with songs downloaded from iTunes or with music converted to MP3 from newly purchased CDs, but there's a lot of downloadable and legit free music out there, not to mention Griffin's RadioShark.
Just get on the Napster 14 day free trial and convert their stuff to mp3.
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how hard is it to ocnvert a file from napster to a cd or to mp3 where it is free of DRM?
...Or until they go bankrupt.
It all sounds impressive to begin with but there are too many catches.
"Who says nothing is impossible? Some people do it every day!" - Alfred E. Neuman
Judging from cable and satellite radio subscription fees just keep rising and rising.
I would expect nothing less from the music rental services..
I have a feeling that renting your music will be harder and harder to get stuff you want. (like some bands charging more than 9.99$ for an itunes album..)
itunes "playlist" which users post there mixes is very clever. When you select a song, you can search for playlists with that song on it (more songs you might like..)
However the napster "try" part is a way to discover new music I might or might not shell out cash for. Then again alot of bands have sites with free downloadable mp3s..
If my free 3 month trial of XM radio has taught me anything (I bought a car), there is a lot of music out there I don't care for.
...about Napster. Explicitly, anyway.
Once you stop paying your $15/month or $180/year, which will likely become $17, and $20, and so on, in the future, you no longer have access to your music.
If you want to keep it forever - or burn it to CD or use it on something other than an approved device - you have to buy it for a dollar. Just like with iTunes.
Also, that money you're spending on Napster is 180 songs, or 18 albums per year, on the iTunes music store, that you get to keep forever. I suppose it just all depends on your usage style.
That, and whether you want to use the hard-drive based music player with 92% market share.
To say nothing of the fact that Apple will introduce a subscription plan if they need to, anyway.
Do we really want to pay for everything monthly for as long as we live?
I don't mind a monthly fee for something I'll use within that month, or that has a time-based cost component, but you try to bill me monthly for something where I can pay once (even a higher up-front fee) and you'll lose my business. It's not worth it, long term.
'Sensible' is a curse word.
I think this could go over quite well. An all-you-can-download plan where you can get as much as you want and only pay per month. Even if the general public won't download 14,000 songs in a month, they like the idea of being able to do something they probably never will do. This is why SUV's and all-you-can-eat buffet menus sell so well.
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Apple is using Napster like a fisherman uses chum.
Let Napster burn thru their millions trying to convince people that subscription is the way to go.
The moment... and I do mean the _moment_ apple sees this catching on and taking root, they will come out with iTunes subscriptions and blow napster out of the water...
This 10000$ to fill an iPod is a bit exaggerated - keep in mind that a typical iPod owner has managed to accumulate a considerable CD collection over time. I have been collecting music ever since CD's became widely available in my area, which means that I've had roughly 10 years to acquire more than 100 disks by the time iPod appeared. And that equals the capacity of iPod mini, even without breaking the law:)
...not iPod compatible. Thats a show-stopper for the 20 MILLION iPod users out there.
I can buy a song on iTunes for $1 and keep it for the rest of my life, lets just say thats 80 years.
Since the Napster songs go away as soon as you stop subscribing I need to pay $15 a month for the next 80 years. That folks, is $14,400.
Considering I still listen to my grandfather's 78's that price just keeps going up and up.
Introducing Microsoft Vacuum 1.0 The first Microsoft product that doesn't suck.
Even then, there would have to be a LOT of popular songs on there for me to take that route.
How many good CDs worth buying get out per year? Not too many if you ask me, and too many of those only got 1 or 2 songs worth listening to.
Take that 15$ a month * 12 months, that's 180 songs off ITMS, even with an average of say, 3 good songs per CD, that's 60 CDs worth of "good tunes", which is more than what's put out yearly in the first place imho.
Of course YMMV, mainly depending on what you listen to (what genre).
And paying every month for the next 10 years or so, then cancelling (or they go bankrupt, you get fed up of issues with their service or whatever happens), then you have absolutely NOTHING left for all that money you paid over all that time. Not to mention that price will most likely increase too.
And even if you listened to so much stuff that it would cost more to buy them than renting, the music you want to listen to has to be available on napster as well and it just may not be (not like I really looked closely at their selection).
I'm not sure what bitrate ITMS uses (using AAC is still an advantage over napter no matter what), but napster being 128kbps (correct me if I'm wrong) rules it out as far as I'm concerned, and I'm not really picky or anything (I'm not an audiophile but I'm not deaf either).
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Disregarding for a moment, the fact that this will work for precisely as long as it takes for someone to work out how to remove the DRM, has anyone commented on how artists get compensated under this model?
It seems to me that the best that could be hoped for is some (small) percentage of the revenue subscription is divided up by the proportion of downloads per artist.
Because a subscription service will encourage more indiscriminate listening behaviour, this may have some strange consequences. On a positive note, it may spread the money paid to artists out more widely.
On the other hand, it may also mean that less popular releases are swamped by the monthly traffic in the latest manufactured pop album, and make even less than they do these days.
It would be interesting if a subscription service tracked what you actually kept/listened to, rather than downloaded, listened to once, and deleted. It might even encourage the production of less rubbish.
Of course, the main point, from the perspective of publishers, is that they get a guaranteed income stream regardless of the quality of the music they produce, which may just remove the last tiny bit of incentive they have to try and produce music that people actually want to listen to.
... that's the same comment that gets posted on here every time a subscription music service comes up.
The point could be equally well made about every other subscription service, though -- why rent city water that keeps getting more expensive and goes away when you stop paying, when, with a larger initial investment, you could dig your own well and have water forever?
The answer is, gee, they both make sense in different situations. It depends *how much* more expensive the initial investment is than the subscription, and whether the specific resource you are buying will always be sufficient, or it would be better to have a provider committed to keeping new sources available.
You acknowledged that it depends on your usage style, but I just wanted to drive this point home: pointing out that a subscription service stops when you stop paying for the subscription, and therefore is different from a one-time purchase, is no longer insightful. They're both different; they both make sense sometimes.
Personally, I pay $100 per year for Rhapsody. For me it makes sense -- there's no way I could purchase enough music for $100 to satisfy my needs, and downloading music for free would cost me literally thousands of dollars in terms of time spent. If it doesn't make sense for you, fair enough -- but don't act like it's a blinding insight to point out that I'm renting rather than buying.
iTunes is like $1 per song, meaning it would cost $10,000 to fill an iPod.
Napster charges $15/month for unlimited downloads, right?
Do the math. Find out if you really download more than 15 songs per month, and that will indicate which one is the better deal. Cause who would pay $15/month for a service when you only download perhaps once a week?
Maybe I'm not typical either, but I'll bet the typical user is closer to 550 than 10,000. And how did I get my 550? Mostly ripped from CDs in my existing collection, plus about 90-100 bought from iTunes over the last year. That's $90-$100 for me instead of $15x12 or $180. And I get to burn them to CD if I want (and I do want), and keep them for as long as I want. My monthly bill? Whatever I happened to buy that month. Maybe $2 or $3 or even zero. The Napster math makes absolutely no sense to someone like me. I don't want to rent my music, I want to own it. It's cheaper this way too.
Not true at all. When you buy from the iTMS, the music goes into iTunes, not to an iPod.
From iTunes, you can either play it as is or route the music to other places such as burning a CD, which lets you play it in a portable CD player, car player, etc. You can also rip that CD in both iTunes OR ANY OTHER MUSIC PROGRAM, to put on ANY OTHER MUSIC DEVICE.
It's really the convenience and hyperfast synching that confuses people that iTMS is ONLY for iPods, but it's more true to say that iTMS is a way of getting music into iTunes. Where it goes from there is still largely up to you. It's not forever locked onto an iPod when you buy the track.
It all comes down to simple "buy" vs. "rent".
These decisiojns happen all the time - think of major purchases like a home or a car, there are both choices - 36 mo. car lease vs. buying the car - rent an appartment vs locking in that 30 yr. mortgage.
On the surface, looks like the answer is simple - offer both because there is choice and then you let the people decide - and that is a simple answer and I think that it is a good one.
But consider the flipside for a moment - these major purchases I just mentioned offer both models from a financial model too - not everyone can afford the downpayment and 30 yr mortgage, some people like a new car every three years and would rather rent. Point is, these comparisons aren't that comparable.
The original slashdot article was comparing business models and the problem with the $15/mo napster model is that there is no "rent-to-own" scenario. There is NO ONE in their right mind who would rather rent music for 20 yrs. versus buy the albumns they like for a lifetime - especailyl the way that music sort of picks you - we listen to the same 80's trackes over and over - country music, old hip-hop, whatever.
So perhaps the better model is a "rent-to-own" where you pay a lower monthly amount ($10) and you get X songs per month to download and Y ( X) to 'register' as your forever and they don't count against your X downloads next month and don't expire when you stop paying.
Vioa! You get to 'try' new music and 'keep' the stuff you like - all for one low price per month. And just like a cell phone, if you want more songs to get registered forever, just pay an additional fee - just liek a per minute fee over your air minutes.
Now right now the $0.99/track, $9.99/albumn model is WAY easier payment plan thatn my cell phone bill, but perhaps there is something to the convolated system AT&T, Cingular, SPrint, and others have created.
I only came here to do two things; kick some ass, and drink some beer...looks like we're almost out of beer.
This is one of the most compelling reasons behind buying a home over renting. I was telling a friend that I prefer to rent because it is cheaper and I don't need the extra space. My friend told me that for just a little more a month you could be spending that money on a house payment.
When you rent, you get a place to live but that money is gone. When you buy (or mortgage) you get a place to live and all that money is still yours in equity.
When all is said and done, my iTunes will always be mine. They have no expiration date.
Not since Marie-Antoinette played milkmaid has looking simple and honest been so fake and complicated.
...but it's always been that way, hasn't it? If an iPod was around 10 years ago, it still would have cost you about $9000. It's just the price of OWNING music, always has been.
Napster is different. It LOANS the music to you. So comparing them is like comparing *insert obligatory Apple dichotomy here*.
The price difference is still a choice for consumers. Do I want to be able to listen to that music after I stop paying Napster? If yes, then iTunes, if no, the Napster. Done.
"The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance - it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel Boorstin
Just the best quote ever.
:)
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I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.