Ad-Supported Free Music Downloads Doomed to Failure?

madonna writes "CNET extensively explains why the new We7.com download service — which offers ad-embedded free music downloads without DRM — is doomed to failure. 'This service absolutely, categorically will not succeed. You can quote us on that. It's true the best way to combat piracy is to provide a realistic and affordable alternative, and free is certainly affordable. But music downloaders are not going to switch to using a service that costs the same as using BitTorrent or Limewire, but comes with abominable disclaimers or advertisements.'"

Comments

The Elected Ones

[Itninja]

Music downloading types are like electrons. They always take the path of least resistance. You can charge for music downloads, and if it's super easy to do, people will pay it. But if you make the process even slightly more complicated, no one will touch it, even if it's free.

Removing the ads

[koreaman]

If I wrote a program to cut off the first ten seconds (or whatever) of these songs, removing the ads, would that be legal or not?

disingenuous?

[owlnation]

This negative review - of course - has nothing, nothing whatsoever to do with CNET owning mp3.com does it?

I mean why would it? Must be a coincidence, surely...

Notable advertising failures.

[Animats]

At some point, ads get too intrusive. Some notable failures:

• Ad cards bound into paperback books. That was tried in the 1980s, and customers were so angry publishers stopped that, and it didn't come back.
• Ads during telephone ring. Yes, little blipverts between each ring. Tried around 2000. That came and went so fast few ever heard one.
• Fast food table clutter. Little stand-up things with ads on every table. The fast food industry has mostly backed off from that since the 1990s; not many sales and too much hassle.
• The big one - sound trucks. 1930s idea, around the time amplifiers started really working. Trucks driving around blaring ads. That was so obnoxious it was made a criminal offense in most US states.

Besides, music already has ads. 50 Cent mentioned 20 brands in his songs in 2005, according to American Brandstand. "Mercedes emerged as the top brand of the year, and 50 Cent outbranded the rest to become the top brand-dropping artist... Meanwhile, weapon brands surged..."

Re:Morality is hard to define

[koreaman]

Well, copyright infringement isn't theft, but neither is what the RIAA does (even less so, in fact!). So, what are you talking about?

PS: IANAPhilosopher, but as best as I can tell, morality doesn't exist.

Extortion racket?

[Garry Anderson]

Quote: Even EMI -- the first of the Big Four to release music without any DRM -- basically said, "If you don't want DRM, pay more for you music."

Pay more to remove something that shouldn't be there anyway - something THEY added to stop you having fair use of the music.

Seems like an extortion racket to me.

DRM

[Profane MuthaFucka]

OK, let's stop calling this by the name Digital Rights Management. That's the name that the industry puts on it to cover their true purpose.

It's actually DENIAL of FAIR USE. DFU. Call it DFU. When you're explaining why it's DFU instead of the industry's pet name, just say "Disney Fucks U."

DFU. That's the framing which will help to change people's minds. Don't say DRM any longer. It's not about their rights, it's about OUR fair use rights as citizens.

Re:Big Surprise

[Who235]

From the we7.com site:

If you want a track that is free, legal, safe and the artist gets rewarded then we add the ad. However, you don't have to have the ad forever, as with We7 technology, after a period of time (4 weeks) you will have the choice to have the track 'ad free'. So, enjoy We7 and the new digital music download model.

Looks like you can DL the song, shelve it for a few weeks, then have it add free. Sounds good to me.

I hate ads, but I like free music. I can wait.

For those who didn't actually download from We7

[SpeedyDX]

I just downloaded a song and am listening to it as I type (Coolio's Gangsta walk it was one of the first songs on the list).

- There's a 10 second ad clip in the beginning for We7. After that, the music starts.
- Half the song later, no second ad, just music.
- The music inexplicably stops 10 seconds before the song's done, but there's still no second ad.

I don't know how they make money off of advertising their own service in the beginning of the song. Does anyone have an answer for this? And couldn't anyone just download a song, then import it in an audio editor like Audacity, delete the 10 second ad in the beginning and export it back? A quick scan of the terms doesn't seem to prohibit that.

Re:Morality is hard to define

[koreaman]

Going out and capping everyone I can find would violate my personal interests, none of which have to do with morality.

Re:Morality is hard to define

[koreaman]

My interests are defined by whatrever will increase my total happiness over the course of my life. Capping a bunch of people will not, thus, it does not serve my interest.

Talk radio... the evil infiltrator .

[zakezuke]

In my day we called that "commercial radio".

I remember when commercial radio was like this... where you could passivly listen to music, 2-4 songs and then an equal amount of time was dedicated to commercials and dj jabber. Odds were you could hop stations if the commercial breaks really bothered you.

Now... I have a hard time crusing the FM dial without finding some radio station that hasn't been infiltrated by the "talk radio craze", which is some solo jackass with a string monologs lasting for 8 hours, not related to the music, but usually a cry of moral outrage over scented toilet paper followed by fart jokes.

I for one welcome our music serving commercial overlords... at least there is MUSIC.

Re:Big Surprise

[Laur]

I'm stuck. Use DVDdecryptor & DVDshrink to remove all the annoyances & re-burn to a blank DVD. Yes, it's a bit of work, but yields a far superior product.

How do they say that, I wonder.

[Kadin2048]

I'm not going to download one to find out, but how the heck do you pronounce "we7"?

Is that "wee-seven"? Or do they try to amalgamate the words into "weven" or something?

Who here thinks that having a short URL was a key part of their plan to get venture capital...? (Raises hand) Who thinks this will save them...? Anybody? ... Bueller?