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Microsoft Unveils 'Urge' Music Service
CHaN_316 writes "CNNMoney has an article entitled, 'Gates unveils his Urge.' From the piece: 'Bill Gates aims to take over your living room and late Wednesday he unveiled a new music service and new software to do it. Using an appearance with Justin Timberlake, the Microsoft chairman debuted a new music service, Urge, to directly compete with the iTunes music store and interface. Urge launches with over 2 million tracks for purchase or as part of an all-you-can eat subscription, an option the iTunes music store doesn't have. The offering will include exclusive material from MTV.' Begin the living room wars we must." Confirmation of an earlier story on this topic.
When will somebody notice that with a sentance that include the words
in a story about a online music shop, that all this DRM is really just shooting themselves in the foot! If it doesn't work on a iPod will it not work on a RIO either? how about a sony walkman? Maybe I should download a copy for free and at a higher bit rate from the internet?
Why would i want to buy/rent music that i can't even listen to?
"In a time of universal deceit - telling the truth is a revolutionary act." - George Orwell
The articles are short on technical details unfortunately, so I'll assume that the music is in WMA format, which, for me, is a reason right there not to download it.
Anyway, I imagine this service is much like Napster in its all-you-can-eat mode; all the music you can download, until you stop paying, and then all the music stops playing. While I could easily strip the DRM off the WMA files (assuming they use a current-gen version of WMA, which we don't know), that would take too much effort on my part to make it worth the money.
Message to Microsoft: If you want to attract people who are currently downloading their music for free elsewhere, you have to offer more than what other music stores offer. Let people who download music through the subscription service (with perhaps a decent per-month limit, say, 100 tracks, to keep people from trying to download the entire database) keep their music when their subscription ends. Otherwise, the service has no value to me, because I know later on I'll get tired of downloading music for a while, and quit paying for the privilege to do so; that doesn't mean I want my entire music collection that I've already paid for to stop working.
I'd also recommend using non-DRM MP3, but hey, this is Microsoft we're talking about. Can't expect everything...
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
Now, let's see... Microsoft, MTV, Justin Timberlake?
Throw in "50 cent" and we're all set.
Save your wrists today - switch to Dvorak
Bullshit. Napster might switch but MSFT will not use any format that they themselves didn't create/enhance/ruin.
Just look at the ODF spectical. Independant researchers and archivists have been chiming in saying MSFT format is horrible. MSFT could easily support ODF. MSFT could easily support W3C standards. MSFT could of been smart and killed ActiveX years ago preventing the majoity of the viruses currently in existance.
It's MSFT's way or the highway. Now Napster and Real have all but begged for apple to open up Fairplay. And Apple should of done that by now. But in the end Apple is just as bad as MSFT when it comes to those ideas.
of course I still own a powerbook and have no working windows machines in my presence any more.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
If they offered FairPlay up for licensing, I guarantee you Microsoft would be interested.
You guarantee that do you? (Is that you Bill?)
Microsoft doesn't license anything - they developed wmv rather then licensing quicktime and so on.
It is simply not in their nature to pay royalties to another company - especially Apple who've been a thorn in their side all these years.
I suspect Microsoft are waiting to see what happens Real's Harmony before embracing and extending fairplay.
My pics.
Amen, though the whole "digitally signing / banning" is DRM, however you want to put it. Besides, if they did what you suggested, non-Microsoft players would simply ignore the digital signing bits and play the music regardless of its status.
The solution is simply to avoid DRM altogether. DRM is fundamentally flawed and will always be broken, because in the end, I have your music on my hard drive, and you're not going to be able to stop me from doing what I want with it.
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
Oh, no, history shows they're perfectly happy to license (or partner on) anything from anyone, provided the terms of the agreement somehow give MS the right to rip the other guy's balls off at a later date.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
When Steve announces a product, he makes it available. There's no coming soon, or available within 4 years, or in the near future crap...
Steve announces these things and you can buy one immediately. If it's software, you can download it/buy it today.
I think the slow lumbering of MS will make this product as much of an also ran as every other competing service to itunes. Tying themselves to MTV is supposed to appeal to a younger demographic, but what teenager associates MTV with music? Unless they're awake at 2:30 am on a Tuesday, they've never seen MTV air a music video. What older person does? VH1 coulda been a better fit than this.
Good rock is good rock, and Stryper and Creed would suck no matter what their message.
So, would you rather sell 10 million units of something at a loss or 2 million with a profit?
--Rick "If it isn't broken, take it apart and find out why."
I didn't RTFA, but I'm guessing they're going with DRMed WMA files. Does anyone actually use WMA besides Napster and Microsoft? I have a lot of idiot friends who don't know how to use computers and they ripped their CD collections into WMA because it was default encoder in MediaPlayer. As soon as they bought iPods, they had to re-rip their CD collections as MP3.
Subscription-based music is the way to go.
Gee, really? I guess that explains why none of them are doing very well then and why analyst after analyst has found that people want to own, not rent music.
I've found it is definitely worth the $60/year. Right now I've got 744 songs in my collection, which if purchased at iTunes would cost more than 12 years of subscription fees (assuming the price doesn't go up).
So how many songs do you think you will download, versus how long do you think you will live? I spend under $60 on used CDs and music downloads a year. Plus, I don't ever have to worry about whether or not I will get enough any given year. It stays forever. Finally, there is no danger that someone will go out of business and my CDs or downloads (which I burn to CD) will go out of business. You're betting that in 30 years Yahoo music service will still be around and carrying music you like, otherwise your investment is wasted. That's a lot of commitment to one service. I have some friends who are looking for a good man, would you like me to forward some marriage proposals to them for you?
Seriously though, I hope it works out for you, and nothing is wrong with choice, it just isn't a choice many consumers seem to want, according to most market evaluations.