Yahoo Music Shutting Down, Users Going to Real

Tech.Luver sends in word of Yahoo's decision to exit the subscription music business. Yahoo's current subscribers — the company doesn't disclose how many it has — will be switched over to Real's Rhapsody service, and Yahoo will promote Real on its site. Yahoo had priced its subscription service significantly below Real's: $5.99 a month (if users pay a year in advance), vs. Rhapsody memberships at $12.99 a month and up. The Mercury News wonders how the Yahoo-Real deal would fare if Microsoft takes over — not well, the betting goes.

Comments

RealPlayer

[misleb]

Does that mean users would be forced to use the abomination that is RealPlayer? All I can say is "Haha!"

Re:RealPlayer

[Billly Gates]

Real player no longer sucks and its the only player on Linux that has correct color calibration and brightness on my laptops.

IT no longer has spyware and adware but the reputation quite damned it. Its quite slim now and fast since the company went in a different direction a few years ago. ... no I dont use it anymore on Windows and prefer Itunes. Raphsody requires real player so some people still use it. My wife has it on her computer but she rarely uses it anymore.

Re:RealPlayer

[kcornia]

Some of those of us who are willing to give people/things a second chance have been pleasantly surprised with current incarnations of RealPlayer. It is non-adware, non-spyware, light on the CPU, and Rhapsody is AWESOME.

I've bought five or six albums in the past few months, several from artists I'd never have listened to (Daft Punk, Modest Mouse, Big Audio Dynamite to name a few) if not for Rhapsody including them in custom channels that I built. Granted I'm buying the CDs because Infiniti SUCKS and can't play home grown CDs in their player without it breaking and they don't have an input jack, but the point is I'm getting exposed to a bunch of new music for the first time in years thanks to Rhapsody.

I actually feel bad for them for having to pay such a high price for their early bad decisions. I mean, I shit-canned them back in the late 90's when they pulled those stunts, but they've matured a lot, and are one of the most complete players out there (although .mov files have quit working on them recently).

I encourage those of you who still have bad memories of Real to read up on the changes and perhaps give them another shot. Rhapsody really is kick ass. I'm sitting here listening to my Sansa player that has 4GB of music that I don't own and loving every minute of it.

I even take it out when I run now, even though I still have to cart the iPod Nano for the running shoes/chip combo.

Re:RealPlayer

[The Orange Mage]

I would have loved to read your post, but I waited five minutes for it to buffer and I got bored...

Re:RealPlayer

[Seor Jojoba]

I love Rhapsody. It has its problems, like forcing you to too frequently upgrade the software, but the basic subscription idea is great, and Rhapsody has a very good selection. You can pretty much just put in any artist, obscure or famous, and 19 times out of 20, their music pops up ready to listen to.

The reason that the pay subscription model is not insanely popular is probably because it is competing against the "free subscription" model, where you get all the same music, but for free. Who is offering that? Millions of torrent clients, spread across the internet. For myself, I guess I'll just be a chump and pay twelve bucks a month for all the music I could ever want and then some.

Re:RealPlayer

[Symbha]

Not true...
Rhapsody requires the Rhapsody client, or the Rhapsody web plugin... but does not use Real Player.

I'm sure it uses the same tech...
However, I'm a Rhapsody subscriber, but I too refuse to install the Real Player.

Re:RealPlayer

[kcornia]

This argument always fascinates me. The same is true of your cable TV, but I don't see constant bitching about the cable pay model. The music goes away if you stop paying because you're paying for a SERVICE, not for the music. If you want to pay for the music, then Amazon/iTunes is all there for you. But to buy just what I have in my sansa right now you'd be paying about 5-10 years worth of rhapsody monthly fees. Do you think you'll still want all that music that far in the future? I know I don't listen to many of my old CDs, so Rhapsody is great value for me.

And as far as the comment above this, you're asking the company to let you download whatever you want, whenever you want, as much as you want, in any bitrate/codec you want, on the HONOR system, the promise that you won't download it and then stop paying and share it with your friends?

DRM for music that you guy is lame, I agree. But DRM for music that you buy as a service makes total sense and I have no problem with it. Sure it would be nice if they could all agree so I didn't have to have both a Nano and a Sansa player. But Sansa players are 40 bucks and its plug and play from there so I'm not losing sleep over it.

Re:That sucks

[darkhitman]

Well, if you're looking for a replacement, I've tried out two streaming music sites recently that are pretty good:

http://www.imeem.com/ - Like youtube, but for music I guess. It has a lot of good playlists, even for my doom metal tastes.

http://www.pandora.com/ - Streaming internet radio, dissimilar to imeem in that it randomizes what it will play for you - though it tries to play music similar to what you like/tell it you like through some sort of algorithm. Good for finding new stuff. I found Electric Wizard here.

Re:crap crap crap

[ScrewMaster]

I remember when it used to be 55 a year and now its near 70, I am not willing to pay any more. This sucks!

Yes, well ... in a crunch, I guess there's always Gnutella. Pricing is better than most, I understand, even if the quality is somewhat uneven.