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Why AnywhereCD Failed

Posted by kdawson on from the unblinking-look-at-the-business dept.

An anonymous reader writes "In an obituary for AnywhereCD, which closes in one week, founder (and MP3.com founder) Michael Robertson chronicles how at least one record label wanted him to embed credit card numbers of buyers into songs. A fascinating story about how at least some of the labels still don't get it and why AnywhereCD is about to be buried."

17 of 184 comments (clear)

  1. All about control by Major+Blud · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The reason that Robertson' business didn't succeed is that the record companies are getting tired of dealing with third-party vendors selling their music. They want total control over their content, whether it be distribution, payment methods, and DRM. They want to decide how you buy it, how much it cost, and what you can do with your purchased music. We're seeing this come to light now, with Universal and others pulling out of iTunes and controlling distribution internally.

    --
    If you post as Anonymous Coward, don't expect a reply.
    1. Re:All about control by Gr8Apes · · Score: 5, Interesting

      And this is where the music industry as it stands fails to see the logical end to their model: If it is more profitable for them to pull out of an aggregating portal site and run their own, then what's to prevent artists from doing the same? Why should artists remain with them in this scenario? Artists could, gasp, make their own deals with iTunes or the like. Odds are that artists will wind up with agents that manage that for them in return for a fee.

      I would not be surprised to see this develop to their logical conclusion where there are distribution sites that offer a range of services to artists to distribute their work but do not "own" the distribution or copyrights to those works. This can only help artists in the long run, although the conversion to that environment will mostly likely have some short-term hiccups as marketing etc is worked out.

      --
      The cesspool just got a check and balance.
    2. Re:All about control by gfxguy · · Score: 4, Insightful

      And they are going to wonder why sales drop further as they pick one form of DRM that many players can't handle.

      So they'll sell DRM WMA files and lose all the iPod users, or they'll sell AC4 and lose all the "Windows" compatible players.

      AND

      They'll piss off people who don't want to go to fifty different sights trying to hunt down the music they want.

      And then they'll blame piracy for slow sales.

      --
      Stupid sexy Flanders.
    3. Re:All about control by king-manic · · Score: 5, Insightful

      And this is where the music industry as it stands fails to see the logical end to their model: If it is more profitable for them to pull out of an aggregating portal site and run their own, then what's to prevent artists from doing the same? Why should artists remain with them in this scenario? Artists could, gasp, make their own deals with iTunes or the like. Odds are that artists will wind up with agents that manage that for them in return for a fee.

      At the moment the Labels still have control over traditional media. So While you could theoretically make a living via web distribution it still requires people be aware of who you are. Word of mouth can do it but traditional media has the power of hype. Word of mouth is a natural hype. Traditional media brokers in an artificial hype.

      I think it's inevitable that the internet replaces traditional media but it means the death of the super star. We'll go back to more regional artists with few cross region cross overs if there is a lack of a artificial national hype machine like the labels.

      I think that may be a good thing. You don't' need millions to produce good music and may mean that instead of a lottery mentality in artists you'd have more of a real natural industry. Instead of 90% going to the super stars and 10% divided over the desperate numbers of struggling artists you might have a profession where you could actually live off playing music without having to be a superstar or have a second job.

      --
      "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
  2. Another shining example of failure to adapt by LoadWB · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I have to agree with his biggest point, that people WANT the music, but they also insist on value. This is an area where The Labels have failed to grasp onto the idea of adapting to the medium of the day: the Internet.

    Isn't there a theory about failing to adapt and thus failing to survive? Sounds familiar for some reason. (Though, in this unfortunate case, failing to adapt to lack of adaptation lead to demise. Sounds soooo bass akwards!)

    1. Re:Another shining example of failure to adapt by gstoddart · · Score: 4, Interesting

      This is an area where The Labels have failed to grasp onto the idea of adapting to the medium of the day: the Internet.

      Isn't there a theory about failing to adapt and thus failing to survive? Sounds familiar for some reason.

      Well, the Labels want to make sure that they get paid every time you listen. If they can't do that, they'll try to ensure you only get to play it if you have the original CD (or if they can install a rootkit on your machine, or what have you).

      See, you only have to adapt to survive when you can't have the environment around you modified. When you can get laws passed like the DMCA which allow you to make it a crime to do things that used to be covered under fair use (or, indeed, try to legally remove the concept of fair use altogether), you don't need to adapt.

      In their current business model, they can change the reality around them. I'm with you, hopefully "adapt or die" will have to apply to them. But, I'm not holding out any belief that they're willing to accept any scenario in which I buy music, digitize it, and then listen to it on any device I want to when I want to without further requirements imposed by them. To them, they want complete control of how I use it once it's in my hands.

      Cheers
      --
      Lost at C:>. Found at C.
  3. AnywhereCD ??? by fishybell · · Score: 5, Funny
    I think I can offer a better reason why this company failed:


    Raise your hand if you both a) have heard of AnywhereCD and b) purchased anything from them.

    --
    ><));>
  4. Seemed like a good idea... by bteeter · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I'd never heard of them until today - and I practically live online. They must not have been marketing all that much for me to have not even heard of them.

    In any event, it sounds like AnywhereCD had a pretty decent business idea, except maybe that it should be the CD as the "addon" instead of the downloads.

    I wonder if Apple or any of the other major retailers will ever offer an option like "buy this digital album for $x and for $y more get a CD copy". I don't see why not. CD's are so cheap you could sell them as add ons for say $5 dollars more than the download and make a nice profit. Plus the buyer will have the permanency of the CD.

  5. Not even /. covered it by Alizarin+Erythrosin · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Sadly, few press outlets covered our grand opening. Looking back I suspect there were probably many contributing factors.

    I did a search for anything here on the /. and, other than this article, nothing came up. I guess that not even /. wanted to cover a new (and rather interesting) online music store.
    --
    There are only 10 kinds of people in this world... those who understand binary and those who don't
  6. Re:FTA by User+956 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "I believe that if you give people real value (music or anything else) they are happy to pay."

    I believe that if the RIAA members were in the business of giving people anything of real value, there would not exist an RIAA.

    --
    The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
  7. The music industry sucks by mlwmohawk · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Sorry, no one is addressing the real problems:

    The music sucks. Maybe one good song on an album.
    Little girls who can't sing dancing on stage with no cloths
    Utter and complete pathological need to control the content
    contempt for their customers
    Failure to recognize that people like music on CDs, MP3 playes, and their computers and don't want to pay three times.

  8. Embedding credit card numbers???? by Iphtashu+Fitz · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Am I the only one whose jaw just about hit the floor when reading this asinine comment? It absolutely amazes me that ANYBODY would make such a suggestion. I could see identity thieves salivating at the thought of this. (Yes, I know you would need more than just the number to really do anything with it)

    That guy should see if the job of CEO at Sony is available...

  9. Credit gift cards by Weaselmancer · · Score: 3, Informative

    Michael Robertson chronicles how at least one record label wanted him to embed credit card numbers of buyers into songs.

    Credit gift cards are excellent to use if you're buying stuff online and don't want the vendor to have any personal info. Good for sites like mp3sparks. Or if you're buying modchips. Or any online transaction where you don't want the buyer to know anything about you, or have any access to your accounts.

    Or so I hear.

    --
    Weaselmancer
    rediculous.
  10. Never heard of it before now by jj00 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I believe the real reason is that no one has really heard of the service and the site seems pretty amateurish.

    1. Re:Never heard of it before now by nwf · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Indeed, it looks just like a domain squatter site. When I first went there I though it was already gone and replaced by an advertisement site.

      Tip for potential businesses: don't make a site whose business model relies on tech savvy people look like a site tech savvy people are trained to ignore.

      --
      I don't know, but it works for me.
  11. Thanks for all the feedback by Lindows.com+Michael · · Score: 5, Interesting
    A couple points I might add:

    - Until 9/30 most all of the CDs are $7 which includes a physical CD and 192K MP3 files loaded nicely and permanently into your locker.

    - One poster complained you can't download the MP3 file without installing an application. That's inaccurate. You can download all the tracks individually directly from the locker - no application install required. Just click on the triangle in the flash UI and select "download".

    - We do provide several different applications for your convenience all of which work on Linux as well as the other PC OSes. There's an Album Downloader which will with one click download any new purchases and load into iTunes or your fave media player. There's also Locker Sync 3.0 which will sync your entire music library from locker to PC. So lots of different options.

    - Slashdotters might be interested in our API (see: http://mp3tunes.com/api). My vision is all your music goes into your personal locker and then with a click can be streamed or synced to ANY device in the world. It's a very open view of the world and of your media. We have 100,000 lockers and a great list of devices coming by this holiday season all of which talk directly to a locker. We're even having a contest to spur developers for $10,000 to come up with new music devices/interfaces: See http://mp3tunes.com/contest

    -- MR

  12. How sad by FreeBSD+evangelist · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This Slashdotting of the Going Out of Business posting is the first I've ever heard of AnywhereCD. Which is unfortunate, because I'd be a customer.

    I have about 400 CDs, and buy one or two a month from Amazon. If I could get the same CDs, at approximately the same price but someone else would do the ripping for me, I'd be there.

    Where did they advertise?