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

no problems here

[Anonymous Coward]

I think there's noth**Call Geico 1-800-861-8380 - So easy a cave man could do it**ing wrong with this business model

Re:Depends on the catalog

[NorQue]

Personally I wouldn't mind paying 3-4 EUR for a movie *without* ads in the beginning. You can get most movies little time after the release for 2-3 EUR more already, why should I waste my precious time just to save very little money? It'd also be naive to assume that you'll be able to skip these ads.

"Costs the same"???

[pla]

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.

I don't know about the FP author, but I consider "legal" a pretty big point to factor into "cost"!

And I say that as someone who loathes ads.

In my day....

[History's Coming To]

Hmmm....interesting concept....you listen to tunes which have commercial messages attached. They might even put the ads over the first or last few seconds to avoid ruining the entire track, but still have the ads embedded.

In my day we called that "commercial radio".

Been done before

[david.given]

I remember this from amp3.com, a defunct and unlamented mp3.com clone.

I've still got a couple of tracks somewhere with the amp3.com ad header on them; however, it turned out that they had stuck the header on by directly fiddling with the mp3 stream, and simply by running the file through a mp3 sanitiser, the header would magically vanish.

I wish we7 lots of luck, but if I were to start using them I'd damn well write an ad removal program.

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..."

Flawed Analysis

[malsdavis]

By the article author's calculations, all paid music services are doomed to failure, not just free ad-supported ones.

From TFA:
"don't waste your time in thinking this is going to do anything positive to the industry"

I've heard that so many times about services which have actually revolutionised industries, many of those services are no longer in business but that didn't stop them being positive influences on the industry.

Case in point: A few years ago in the U.K., Altavista advertised an flat-rate, £10 a year internet service at a time when virtually all domestic ISPs only offered per-minute deals. Several other ISPs then started offering competing flat-rate offers.

The Altavista service never even ended up launching, but it had already caused other ISPs to offer cheap flat-rate deals. As a result, Altavista are often credited with helping to give the U.K. some of the cheapest internet deals in the world.

Maybe this service won't be a massive hit, but to instantly dismiss an innovative idea is extremely stupid!

Re:Big Surprise

[ackthpt]

People don't like listening to ads before listening to music? Shock and awe.

Tell it brother!

I have DVDs which are years old and they still play these gawddam previews for upcoming films of years past. I'm ticked because my DVD player gives me guff when I try to fast forward, skip chapter or go directly to the menu, with the circle with a slash through it stating such behaviour is vorboten. I must sit like a good little monkey and watch whatever shite they deemed necessary prior to enjoying the content I shelled many quid for, however many times I want to watch the films.

Come to think of it, it's a very strong argument in favour of ripping, editing and burning your own videos to get around this abhorent behaviour.

Now if they think I need to listen to the Coke or some sports figure hawking the latest rubber shoe straight outta China before I can listen to my toonz, they can forget it.

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.

Pot meet kettle

[gsn]

cnet is really one to talk. You had to suffer through ads before every single video clip on their site. Sometimes their ads are longer than their video reviews (only useful to get some indication of size).

Sure ads are annoying but music is good and free music is better. If not just pay for it. You can you know. cnet might have learnt that if they even tried looking at the bloody frontpage http://www.we7.com/

At We7, we know that ads are not always desirable, so as with everything in life it's a balance and We7 will give you a choice.

        * If you want a track now with no ad, then we will give you a way to buy the track at normal price.
        * 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. Oh right and as has already been pointed out if its DRM free I can simply strip out the first ten seconds or whatever.