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Music Media The Internet Businesses

Napster - Music Subsciptions Are Overrated 205

Posted by Zonk from the hope-they-don't-pull-your-access dept.
kevinbr writes "Napster has concluded that PC-based music subscriptions aren't a growth business ... because it's retreating from its core business. 'Six months ago the subscription music service had 830,000 subs, three months ago it had 770,000, and now it has 750,000. The company says that last drop was expected, because kids stop using the service during the summer. But it's not as if those numbers will swell this fall: NAPS projects only a 4% revenue increase for next quarter. So instead of talking up its core subscription business, Napster is now pinning its hopes on the mobile industry. Music on your cellphone may one day be a real business, but hard to see why Napster is going to be the company that will capitalize on it.'"
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Napster - Music Subsciptions Are Overrated More

Napster - Music Subsciptions Are Overrated

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  • I could have told them that years ago (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Apple Acolyte ( 517892 ) on Friday November 02, 2007 @09:33AM (#21211523)
    Music subscriptions aren't valuable? What a revelation. Gee, do you really want to pay a monthly fee for limited (DRMed) access to music files, access which goes away if you terminate your service. That value proposition is exceedingly poor, unless you take measures to copy the files into non-DRM form.

    • Big Business (Score:3, Insightful)

      by meehawl ( 73285 )
      Gee, do you really want to pay a monthly fee for limited (DRMed) access to music files, access which goes away if you terminate your service.

      Yes, you're right. There's no way this could work. I predict that the delivery of media by subscription using satellite (Sirius/XM, Dish, DirectTV), cable (TV, PPV), cell (mobile TV) and fibre (FIOS TV, etc) will remin a tiny and marginal market, doomed to obscurity.
      • Sirus had to buy XM because two companies in the sat. radio business was one too many. there just aren't enough people willing to pay for radio.

        Subscriptions in many cases aren't valuable to the end user, as you take music with you, yet video's aren't very useful while driving down the road.

        You subscribe to a newspaper as it changes every day. You subscribe to TV as you have to sit down and watch it. How many people sit down and just listen to music?

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by Dan Ost ( 415913 )

          How many people sit down and just listen to music?
          I do. I consider it a reward for getting things done with time to spare.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by meehawl ( 73285 )

          Sirus had to buy XM because two companies in the sat. radio business was one too many. there just aren't enough people willing to pay for radio.

          14 million people are paying subscriptions. The urge for these two companies to merge comes from their difficulty in servicing the huge debt associated with developing and launching their satellite fleet. Imagine if Apple had had to build out its own fibre net and install metro routers in every market where it wanted to sell itunes? It's unlikely it would have succe

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Apple Acolyte ( 517892 )

        Yes, you're right. There's no way this could work. I predict that the delivery of media by subscription using satellite (Sirius/XM, Dish, DirectTV), cable (TV, PPV), cell (mobile TV) and fibre (FIOS TV, etc) will remin a tiny and marginal market, doomed to obscurity.

        I was specifically referring to music subscription services. There is a much more popular alternative to music download subscription services - iTMS - and it succeeds where these services fail. If there were only music subscription services available and no iTMS, they would much more popular. But the fact is people don't like paying monthly fees for services, yet they will if there's a lack of competition in a given market. I'd prefer not to pay any monthly fees for many common consumer items, but I end up

        • the fact is people don't like paying monthly fees for services

          I am having trouble parsing your words "fail". The vast bulk of the media marketplace in the United States and even the world is based on subscription revenue. Compared with these, Apple's revenue from single-licence sales is a blip. It's big when considered against the declining revenues of the other single-charge retailers who usually package their content onto plastic disks, but it's still a very slow growing market, subject to random, huge di

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by ubrgeek ( 679399 )
            But I thought there was a /. story awhile ago about Google trying to lay their own pipe and start up data centers? Wouldn't that be to control distribution of whatever content they chose?

          • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

            by Apple Acolyte ( 517892 )
            Once again, when I said "these services fail," I was not writing broadly about all subscription services of every kind; I was referring to music download subscription services like Napster. I thought that was clear. Most of them have failed. And while I agree that satellite radio has to charge a subscription fee both due to the technological and business models involved, satellite radio is in a different position versus music download services. You talk about Apple benefiting from net neutrality, but so do

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by kcornia ( 152859 )
          What narrow-minded crap. To get the equivalent from iTMS that I have in my portable Rhapsody player right now, I'd be spending a metric shitload of cash. I'm sitting on 4GB of music, none of which I own, that I pay the price of an album a month for. Every time I plug it in it updates the channels I've selected (5 of them, 3 custom built by me) with about 4 hours of music each.

          I bet most of the people spewing about how this is a flawed model haven't A) looked into the details of it, or B) tried it.

          I am lo

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Opportunist ( 166417 )
        I hope you can see the difference between constantly getting content for your viewing (and recording), and not being able to use those records anymore when you cancel the subscription, yes?
      • Different subscriptions.

        These are service subscriptions, i.e. subscriptions that provide a service.

        GP is talking about content subscriptions, i.e. subscriptions that provide an actual product.

        Service subscriptions work, because anyone can provide a service, and the need for a service varies over time.

        Product subscriptions are rentals. And rentals work only when the need varies over time. Which, for music, that need does not. In fact, musical tastes rarely change. Instead, they grow.
    • The DRM is how they trap subscribers, I think. Notice this part of the article:

      The company says that last drop was expected, because kids stop using the service during the summer.

      That's because the college students at schools Napster has agreements with (no doubt by scaring them with file-sharing legal FUD) are FORCED to pay for a Napster subscription as a part of their technology fees and since they don't take classes during the summer, those subscriptions stop. It's not because they stop using the service, it's because they don't have to pay for it anymore. And the small percentage who used the

    • I think attitude is presented by people that don't understand it.

      Nobody claimed that you were buying music. Music subscriptions offers you legal access to more music than you can possibly buy with the same amount of money per month in your lifetime.

      If you want subscriptions where you keep your tracks, then eMusic is the way to go, but that limits you to about 30 tracks a month.

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by JeTmAn81 ( 836217 )
      Actually, the value proposition is incredibly high if you're a music lover with eclectic taste. I use the service to listen to probably at least 40 new albums a month, and all it costs is about half the price of a single cd...per month. If I had to buy those albums I'd be spending at least $400 instead of $6. So yeah, the value's definitely there.
      • Actually, the value proposition is incredibly high if you're a music lover with eclectic taste. I use the service to listen to probably at least 40 new albums a month, and all it costs is about half the price of a single cd...per month. If I had to buy those albums I'd be spending at least $400 instead of $6. So yeah, the value's definitely there.

        I can get just as much good info on whether or not an album's worth hearing by listening to the 30 second snippets on Amazon. If it's worth hearing, then it's wor

    • Re:I could have told them that years ago (Score:5, Insightful)

      by halcyon1234 ( 834388 ) <halcyon1234@hotmail.com> on Friday November 02, 2007 @10:33AM (#21212499) Journal
      I've been thinking about this lately. A lot of people at work have no problem shelling out $12 a month for a satellite radio. The music and talk selection isn't really any better than what you'd get on AM/FM. What they're paying for is the availability. It's mainly because they travel a lot between FM "zones", and don't like their music interrupted. (And they like the web interface, which they pipe through the office PA). It's pricey (in my books, anyways), but they have no problem with the payments.

      But they'd never go with a pay-to-access Napster-esque service.

      The cost is about the same. ~$10/month. With both of them, you lose access to the music as soon as you stop playing. Both are DRM'd (poorly and can be analog-hole'd). Both require access to a network, though the S-Radio is easier to connect to in the car. (No reliable metro wifi in Toronto yet).

      So why would they pay for one, but never for the other. After talking about it, the reason we all seemed to agree on is the promise of what's offered. The S-Radio people are right up front with it. "Pay us money. We'll pipe you channels of music. If you stop paying, we stop piping. It's a service we're offering. Okay?"

      Whereas these music places are a bit shadier with their promise. "Pay use money, and you can download music, as much as you want.". They say it knowing full well that people associate "download music" as "I transfer a file to my computer and it's there forever, and I can play it however much I want". They think of iTunes, which instantly brings up the thought of "pay per song". So Napster et all are effectively trying to trick people into thinking that they're just like iTunes, but you get unlimited music rather than paying per track. They dance around the "lose access" part of the deal. It comes off as very, very scummy and untrustworthy-- and people don't like dealing with companies like that. After all, if they're going to lie right to your face about this (outright or by omission), then what else are they going to lie about? What else can't you trust them with? Are they REALLY unlimited? It's already too good to be true-- and isn't true at that-- so what else is going to screw you out of your cash?

      The satellite radio company tell you right up front what you'll get, and they give it to you. They're business is music.

      Napster (and other Music Services) tells you a veiled lie, and seems only intent on taking your money. They're business is exploiting people's desire for music. They don't care about the music at all.

      THAT'S why they will always, always fail.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by xil ( 151104 )

        satellite radio... The music and talk selection isn't really any better than what you'd get on AM/FM.

        Are you serious? Have you tried to listen to terrestrial radio lately? Aside from the odd college or community station, nobody -- and I mean nobody -- is willing to play anything even slightly adventurous, anything that diverges from their cast-in-stone format. And if you don't like one of the three available formats, sorry, too bad.

        Satellite's got a much wider range of channels, and no commercials. Sure

      • You are absolutely right that there is a place for the type of service that Napster offers, and that they are being disingenuous with their marketing of it.

        They need to emphasize in their marketing that people are not paying for the music, but rather for access to the music. Full-text article databases like EBSCOhost [ebscohost.com] provide this same service: sign up for a monthly fee, and read any article in the database at any time, as much as you want. When you stop paying the subscription, you no longer have access to

      • The music and talk selection isn't really any better than what you'd get on AM/FM.

        That's just wrong. The music selection is vastly better than AM/FM radio, even in a major city like Toronto. If you listen to top 40 radio only it might be about the same, but if you listen to any sort of "niche" music it's unbeatable. The number of stations and deep playlists for those stations is way beyond anything done in traditional radio. Plus, you don't get commercials. When I had XM I had about 10-15 favorite s

      • Yeah. but there is a no-fee way, if you can find what you want online. Just get a car stereo that can read mass storage devices, and download the podcast each day.

        This admittedly isn't probably the best for music (I haven't tried), but I use it for NPR news every day (Bryant Park Project, Midday News, Most E-mailed stories, car talk), along with schneier's monthly cryptogram.

        I also use dj steveboy's podrunner site for my daily workouts. Some of it isn't that great, but I like most of the groovelectric st

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sm62704 ( 957197 )
      "Napster has concluded that PC-based music subscriptions aren't a growth business ... because it's retreating from its core business.

      Damn, I just made the comment [slashdot.org] in the other RIAA story

      Their third mistake was seeing MP3s as "product" rather than "advertising". They have always been known as "record companies", and they sold records. Now they're trying to sell music, and music is a non-tangible item. Note that the indies actually do this, giving away MP3s and selling CDs at their shows.

      If brains were dynami

    • >>Music subscriptions aren't valuable? What a revelation. Gee, do you really want to pay a monthly fee for limited (DRMed) access to music files, access which goes away if you terminate your service. That value proposition is exceedingly poor, unless you take measures to copy the files into non-DRM form.

      Well, yes, I do. XM Radio. I can listen in my vehicles or over the Internet. It is DRMed.

      But I think the real problem here is there are too many players in a small market. The fish in this pond nee

    • Re:I could have told them that years ago (Score:5, Insightful)

      by MobileTatsu-NJG ( 946591 ) on Friday November 02, 2007 @10:58AM (#21212927)
      "Gee, do you really want to pay a monthly fee for limited (DRMed) access to music files, access which goes away if you terminate your service. That value proposition is exceedingly poor, unless you take measures to copy the files into non-DRM form."

      That's one way to look at it. I see it a bit differently. I've subscribed to a music service for quite a while now. (Rhapsody, if anybody's curious.) There are a few benefits to it that are worth $10/mo. to me.

      1.) I have access to all their music. Often I go find a bunch of new albums to listen to. That means if somebody recommends a song, for example, I'm listening to it like 20 seconds later.

      2.) I don't have a big collection of music to take with my everywhere. Lots of people don't mind that, but I do. I have 3 different computers I constantly access. (Home desktop, home laptop, work desktop.) If I switch computers at work, I just reinstall Rhapsody and I'm hearing music again.

      3.) Yes, if I terminate the service, I lose the music. On the flip side, there's lots of songs I used to listen to all the time that I don't anymore. This became wasteful, trying to manage all that. Here I just delete it from my list, and if I want it back like a year later, I just go hunt add it again. Before I was a packrat, keeping songs I didn't know if I really wanted to keep anymore. I can go buy them later if I really really want to make a long-term investment. I haven't done that in ages, though. My playlist today is far different than the one I had a year ago.

      4.) This was sort of covered in the first point, but I'm always on the prowl to find new music. This service often gets new albums just as they're released. I pop them into my list and explore. I've found a ton of new music this way. One thing I didn't like about my music scouring before is that it was often tied to how much disposable money I had in a given month. I hated buying 3 or 4 albums and only getting a handful of interesting songs. In theory I could hear the clips and decide, but too many times I've not really liked a song until I've heard it a couple of times in its entirety. This makes me squeamish about buying a whole album.

      5.) There's lots of stand-up comedy on this service. I use it to enterain myself at work from time to time during long monotonous days.

      Subscription's not for everybody, but it's certainly not for nobody. Yeah, you've got a point. For me, the termination of services doesn't multiply the other values of it by 0. To me it's sorta like cable TV for music, only this is on-demand. I certainly like it better than satellite radio or other subscription services just for that reason. Considering all the new music I've found, I'd say there's plenty of value in it for some people, especially those with multiple computers or finicky music tastes.

      • Those are all very reasonable points. But for me the thing that matters most is long-term dependancy. Can you say for certain that Rhapsody is going to be around next year? Or the year following? Say some lawsuit shows up, blows it out of the water and it ceases entirely. What are you left with? Not a thing. All your money that you spent on music is gone, and you have nothing to show for it. That's you putting your ability to listen to the playlists you want at the mercy of things entirely outside of your c

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by nolife ( 233813 )
          What are you left with? Not a thing. All your money that you spent on music is gone, and you have nothing to show for it. That's you putting your ability to listen to the playlists you want at the mercy of things entirely outside of your control.

          That does not make sense, what you have to show for it is every month you had the service, you had unlimited access to millions of full length songs for about the same price as a single CD. You have cable or satellite TV right? What do you have to show for paying

        • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

          by MobileTatsu-NJG ( 946591 )
          "Can you say for certain that Rhapsody is going to be around next year? Or the year following? Say some lawsuit shows up, blows it out of the water and it ceases entirely."

          Nope. Either I'll pack up and move to another service, or I'll go find the songs I really want to have and buy them.

          "What are you left with? Not a thing. All your money that you spent on music is gone, and you have nothing to show for it."

          Though I get what you're saying, that isn't quite true.

          - I have found a LOT of music I wouldn't have
          • I am a happy subscription music user and I agree with basically all the points above. One I would like to add is that i got sick of managing my music. Once my music collection got into the 5 digits it was a real pain to manage it all. I spent a lot of time going through once to tag/name everything correctly (especially the old napster days stuff). Once I had my 'clean' zone, i would have to dmz new albums before I would put them in the real collection. This was just a holder until I could get everythin
    • As in, I'm one of the few people for which this would be a bad idea, as I basically refuse to buy DRM'd media for my own use. Partly on principle, mostly because it won't work on Linux.

      But for most people, if you actually calculate it out, the DRM is the only bad part. It's otherwise a damned good model -- as others have pointed out, it costs about the same as satellite radio, but you get to pick what you want to listen to, and you can throw it all on a Zune (or any PlaysForSure player) and take it wherever

      • and you can throw it all on a Zune (or any PlaysForSure player)
        IIRC, in an evil twist of irony, Microsoft's Zune player doesn't support Microsoft's PlaysForSure standard . . .
    • goes away if you terminate your service

      Or, when the service terminates itself. Which is an even better reason for not subscribing.

    • Music subscriptions aren't valuable? What a revelation. Gee, do you really want to pay a monthly fee for limited (DRMed) access to music files, access which goes away if you terminate your service. That value proposition is exceedingly poor, unless you take measures to copy the files into non-DRM form.

      Short answer: YES

      Long Answer: I am a music subscriber, but I use it as an on-demand music service rather than a method of "owning" music tracks. I travel large distances by car, so I like to have a large s

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by ghuytro ( 917208 )
      The value proposition when it comes to digital music is not exclusively defined by "owning the music" or music files being "DRM free".

      The value propositions of a subscription service are:

      1) Having access to a vast catalogue of music
      2) All you can download
      3) Transportable to my portable media player
      4) For a low monthly fee

      What does $12.99 get you on itunes in one month? 12-13 songs? Songs that you own? Pfft, I go through that many songs in an hour or two.

      I have over 1,000 CD's that I "own" and are "DRM fre

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by hey! ( 33014 )
      The problem is that the music industry had no friggen' idea of what Napster really was.

      They thought it was a music distribution mechanism. Since it wasn't a sanctioned mechanism, they fought it. When they'd gutted it, they took the only thing of value -- the brand -- and slapped it on a sanctioned music distribution service.

      And failed, because that wasn't the real business opportunity. What they had was not a viable music distribution model; what they had was the kernel of a killer social networking site

  • Who even uses Napster anymore? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by InvisblePinkUnicorn ( 1126837 ) on Friday November 02, 2007 @09:34AM (#21211541)
    Everyone I talk to refers to Napster in the past tense... "back when Napster was around" ... "I used to use Napster all the time", etc. Rather than fight, it gave in. That's why users have moved on.

    • Re:Who even uses Napster anymore? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by eln ( 21727 ) on Friday November 02, 2007 @09:51AM (#21211787)
      Napster far overestimated the value of its "brand". The Napster name was tied to the ability to get limitless music for free in a way that had the added bonus of being somewhat illicit (but not with huge monetary consequences that the RIAA has since tried to impose on P2P users in the years since). The Napster name was never, ever tied to the ideas of quality service, quality music, or anything else that would allow it to monetize the brand.

      Napster never had a corporate reputation to bank on like they thought they did, they were only a tool to get free stuff. Then, when the music business came knocking, and everyone who used Napster started fighting, Napster itself folded like a cheap suit. They shut down and came back with a boneheaded business model: You can still get (some of) the same music you got for free before, but now it's crippled and you get to pay for it. I don't know anyone who thought even at the time that this would succeed.

      Other companies with tighter relationships with the record companies have since come up with far more successful ways to market music online (such as tying the store to a hugely popular MP3 player, for example). I don't understand why Napster is even still in business.
      • Other companies with tighter relationships with the record companies have since come up with far more successful ways to market music online (such as tying the store to a hugely popular MP3 player, for example).

        You know you can say "Zune" around here if you want.

      • Napster far overestimated the value of its "brand"... Other companies with tighter relationships with the record companies have since come up with far more successful ways to market music online (such as tying the store to a hugely popular MP3 player, for example)

        Why do you think Napster overestimated the value of its brand? In other words, what should Napster have done differently once their original business model was shut down? If the only answer is, "they should have entered the consumer electronics

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by ucblockhead ( 63650 )
        The original Napster didn't overestimate the value of its brand. Roxio, which bought the name from the sharing people overestimated the value of the brand. The people called "Napster" now have no relation to the "Napster" that allowed music trading.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by garcia ( 6573 )
      That's why users have moved on.

      No, users have moved on because other technologies are better at transferring the files to you faster. Napster had two things going for it:

      1. Centralized database

      2. First popular sharing site of its kind.

      Once the centralized database was gone and other methods popped up, there was no reason to stick with it. Napster is nothing more than a name and a lame character in a movie.

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by illectro ( 697914 )
        I don't want to sound like a broken record but... imeem.com has gone one step further than #1 - centralized database *and* centralised data - all the mp3s get uploaded to the site and are instantly accessible to anyone else on imeem. as for whether it's popular, it's top 100 on Alexa but we all know those stats mean nothing.

  • Napster is overrated (Score:4, Insightful)

    by suv4x4 ( 956391 ) on Friday November 02, 2007 @09:43AM (#21211675)
    It' not that music subscriptions are overrated, Napster is. They're not in the position to do what they're doing. Subscriptions are worthless if you can't take them with you on the device(s) you use.

    Do you know who's in that position. Apple. I bet my money if Apple introduced subscription model that works with iTunes (Win/Mac), iPhone, and iPod, then it'll be largely successful.

    Napster just have a somewhat recognizable name and a funny cat logo.

    • Meh... Even with Apple, I'm not sure they could make music subscriptions work. I think the real problem is that people just don't want a subscription model for music. They want to have a collection that they can keep perpetually, and not a temporary license.

      You know what I was listening to on my way to work today? Bob Dylan, Blonde on Blonde. You know how long i've had that CD? Neither do I, but it's been a while. Now, do I want to spend $20 a month in order to keep listening to it? Absolutely not.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by jj00 ( 599158 )
      I don't use Napster, I use Rhapsody Online, but the idea is the same. I was against subscription based music for a long time, but eventually broke down and decided to try it out. My overall experience is good, some things I love, others no so much.

      Pros:
      • Access to all the music I can handle. When I heard the new Bob Dylan album came out, I decided to listen to it since I had the access. I would have never given that album a look if I didn't have this service. Same for a bunch of other albums/artists

  • Makes Sense (Score:3, Insightful)

    by kamapuaa ( 555446 ) on Friday November 02, 2007 @09:43AM (#21211677) Homepage
    It makes sense - why pay for music, when it's so easy to download the pirated stuff for free? iTunes has the people who aren't computer savvy, eMusic has people who like non-RIAA music that can't easily be found, Napster didn't really have a niche.

    That said, the actual service (and Yahoo! Music, a competitor) is/was really awesome, for who enjoy listening to a huge selection of music - and have an always-on Internet connection - and have their stereos hooked up to a computer. I guess it was a niche, it was just too small of one.

  • XM in cell phone? Prolly kill the batteries though ...

    Would be fun though.

  • Napster--Very Worth It (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Fierythrasher ( 777913 ) on Friday November 02, 2007 @09:45AM (#21211705) Homepage
    I really hope this doesn't mean Napster (and Yahoo and the like) are taking away the "all you can eat" subscription service.

    I am a Napster customer with the all you can eat model and I LOVE IT.

    I am sorry, but I do not want to pay $0.99 for a DRMed music file that I can only use on so many systems, etc. This buck-for-a-song model has existed for far too long and I have only bought four songs this way, through iTunes, and all four were immediately burned to CD and ripped back so I could stip off that horrible DRM.

    So with the buck-a-song model it made me do something that probably made RIAA very happy--I bought CDs. I'm sorry, but on a CD I get songs for less than a buck each (while there are some I won't like, there will also be gems I may never have heard had I not bought the CD) plus you get cover art, a media that's higher sound quality than a digital downloaded file. It just didn't make sense to me.

    Then look at Napster. Suddenly I had a LEGAL world of music open up to me. I was able to explore the libraries of artists who are somewhat less popular. I'd never have spent $12 for their CDs, but a "Download Album" button had me pulling down every song I could find and listening to it.

    Moreover, it is VERY easy to strip the DRM from a Napster WMA. I am an iPod user and Napster WMAs won't work with an iPod (though I wish Apple would relent and add that as a firmware/software upgrade to the iPod). So I use FairUse4WM and, bam, now I have MP3s that play on my iPod. I still pay the Napster music subscription every month and if I cancel I will delete all those MP3s. I'm only playing while I'm paying, so I'm playing by their rules.

    This model has weened me from buying CDs altogether. I used to have a $200-$300 per month CD habit. I'm not kidding on that, I have over 3000 CDs and just kept buying every month. But with Napster I don't need CDs, I just get what I need from Napster. It's saving me THOUSANDS of dollars every year.

    And my wife and I have very different music tastes. She used to not get music she liked becuase she didn't want to spend as much on CDs as I did. Now for one low monthly fee we both have all the music we want.

    Sure, sometimes Napster is frustrating. I was looking for some songs on there that were "album only", "purchase only", or not available at all. It's not a silver bullet. But it is DAMN close.

    If Napster doesn't see it as a growth business, that's because WMAs aren't a growth format. If you could do a subscription format that worked on iPods natively then you would have a model that would grow with each iPod sold. PlaysForSure??? If you're basing your business model off of Zune sales, well good luck with that!

    But anyone who reads /. on a regular basis should know how to strip DRM from any file using free tools. Given that can be done so easily, I really think we should spread the word to our less tech-inclined friends and help these all you can eat services become a "growth model" lest they go away and RIAA can roll in the money of a buck per song again.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by crgrace ( 220738 )
      You seem to have done very well with the Napster business model. Unfortunately there are not enough people such as yourself to sustain Napster in the long term. Also, since you are stripping the DRM from the WMAs, you are in fact violating the terms of service and Napster would be put out of business if everyone did that (they would lose access to the music).

      Enjoy it while it lasts.... as we all did with the original Napster.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by WorkerGnome ( 680060 )
      So, what you're saying is that Napster is a great deal, as long as you use it in a way that violates the EULA and circumvents the DMCA.
      Exactly like the old Napster, except that you're now paying a monthly fee to do so.

    • What an odd post, why focus on DRM? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by SmallFurryCreature ( 593017 ) on Friday November 02, 2007 @10:12AM (#21212089) Journal

      I am sorry, but I do not want to pay $0.99 for a DRMed music file that I can only use on so many systems, etc.

      Three statements in one sentence always leads to problems. The WMA files from Napster, as you later admit yourselve, are DRMed and run on only so many systems. Your claims of the DRM being easy to strip are meaningless, you can do it with equal ease with iTunes music. IF you are willing to violate US law as a US citizen, then both formats can be easily converted to non-drm formats (mp3) that plays on the fast majority of systems.

      So we are left with your complaint that music at iTunes costs 0.99 per song.

      How does this cost work out in the long run. The iTunes song is yours for "life". If napster closes, there goes your music collection. ALL your downloaded music, GONE. For good.

      Ah but your ripped it (and made yourselve a criminal by doing so) although you do claim that if you stop paying the subscription, you will delete those MP3's. Right. Sure, I believe that. There must be an honest person among us. Perhaps you are it.

      But what if you don't cancel, but Napster goes out of business. YOU may still be willing to pay, but you can't. Bye bye collection.

      As for spreading the good word, IT IS AGAINST US LAW and the RIAA does prosecute people. You may not agree with the law, but civil disobedience sucks when you are the one being made an example off.

      I just wish you had left the DRM part out of your argument and concentrated simply on value for money. Is 15 bucks per month enough to rent music (It isn't unlike a library card and I think most of accept that) OR do we pay perhaps more per song but it is our song.

      Currently both models suck. 99 cents for a few megabytes of data is idiotic next to the cost of production. Loosing all your songs because a company goes out of business in a format that doesn't work on the majority of players sucks as well.

      Frankly the entire industry is screwed up. The music industry has become so obsesses with fat profits, that they are unable to see that by simply lowering the price they can make theft totally undesirable.

      Say that for 15 bucks per month you could download ANY music you wanted in the format you desired. WHY BOTHER WITH FILESHARING THEN? Oh sure, there will be small percentage who will do so anyway, but it should be almost trivial to get most of the western world to sign up just by putting ALL music in the system, ALL means ALL, including "bootlegs" classical music and rare recordings.

      • How does this cost work out in the long run. The iTunes song is yours for "life". If napster closes, there goes your music collection. ALL your downloaded music, GONE. For good.

        I'm quite sure with any DRM pay-per-track service, the song isn't "yours for life". Sure I suppose you could keep the DRM file around forever, but it will be useless unless you can authorize new machines and devices. Morally I'd argue that you have the right to strip the DRM, but as you point out, this is illegal in some regions.

        Tech

      • How does this cost work out in the long run. The iTunes song is yours for "life". If napster closes, there goes your music collection. ALL your downloaded music, GONE. For good.

        At which point he can subscribe to a competitor's service. It's just a service, nothing more. You're not supposed to make it your music collection, in the same way that you'd never make your radio your music collection. If the service dies, it is understood that they're not obligated to take your money and keep performing it. We have

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Lumpy ( 12016 )
      how is that working for you. I had to switch to using a combination of drmdbg and freeme2 or drm2wm to crack stuff. Is Napster still using the really old WM10 setup?? That's been cracked for a long time and microsoft cautioned everyone to move to WM11 WMA encryption as it's harder to beak... well until drmdbg came out :-)

    • Re:Napster--Very Worth It (Score:4, Insightful)

      by CheeseTroll ( 696413 ) on Friday November 02, 2007 @10:14AM (#21212137)
      "Moreover, it is VERY easy to strip the DRM from a Napster WMA. I am an iPod user and Napster WMAs won't work with an iPod.... So I use FairUse4WM and, bam, now I have MP3s that play on my iPod."
      So, you love the service, but really only love how easy it is to get around their limitations?

      "I still pay the Napster music subscription every month and if I cancel I will delete all those MP3s."
      I'll give you the benefit of the doubt on that, but how many other people honestly keep their legally-purchased mp3's completely separated from their less-than-legal mp3 files, so they can delete them at a moment's notice?

      So, I don't doubt that you've made very good use of a subscription model, but I think your example also shows why it doesn't work very well for most people, esp. if they don't have the expertise to work around the DRM, and why it doesn't work very well for the music industry, if most people don't share your scruples about deleting the music after the subscription ends.
  • Well, I have a music subscription to Yahoo and am completely addicted to music new and old. I also work at a computer all day where I am always listening to music. I absolutely can't understand why anyone who truly loves music and has eclectic tastes wouldn't do this. For $7 a month, I have access to several million songs of multiple genres. I don't mind paying for nonDRM'd music, but with all of the music I'm listening to on Yahoo, it would cost me about $5000 in downloads. It would take me being a subscri
  • Was that it didn't work easily. I'd happily pay $10 a month to listen to all music, everywhere. No qualms at all. And so I tried Napster.

    But making it work with my various different music devices was just too much of a pain. I didn't mind the DRM per se - I very much mind that there isn't DRM that works seamlessly across a whole range of devices.

    $10 a month to listen to music anywhere - no problem.
    $10 a month to listen to music at my computer - no chance.

  • Exit strategy? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by JoeCommodore ( 567479 ) <larry@portcommodore.com> on Friday November 02, 2007 @10:06AM (#21211991) Homepage
    Is that rumblings that they plan from exiting the subscriber music business?

    I have one friend who really enjoys Napster's subscription service probably have 1000 songs he listens to. If Napster were to shut down the service I think there would be a lot of very unhappy customers.
    • That's sorta the problem from a music industry perspective with subscriptions. If only power users use the service then the data costs are relatively large and a small subset of users who would be spending far more on music get a great discount. No one else sees subscriptions as worth it.

      $10/month is easy to pass if you're regularly buying music. Hell, it'd be hard to stay under for many music fans.

      Subscriptions would need to be as common as iPods to actually be worth anything to the music industry. Streami

  • The company says that last drop was expected, because kids stop using the service during the summer.


    What the hell does that mean? What's the basis for this supposed drop? Sounds like fluff to me.
    • What's so strange about it? I'd guess their research is that they've seen this drop every year.
      • Well, if I as a seller saw a drop in sales that was consistently reproduced at the same time every year, I'd probably do a little digging to determine what the cause was. I called it "fluff" since it didn't seem as if there was any factual information to back it up, and for me at least, that calls into question the rest of the data and figures in the article (i.e. projected 4% growth, etc).
  • Music on your cellphone may one day be a real business [apple.com].
  • I type this as I sit listening to a custom made channel full of house music on my Rhapsody enabled mp3 player that I got for 40 bucks.

    It is freaking awesome, and as soon as I get a car with an input jack, I will be even more in heaven than I am now (screw you Infiniti, your radio system SUCKS).

    Every album on this 4GB player (with 2GB MicroSD chip I got for 20 bucks) is an album I don't have to own.

    So far I'm finding Rhapsody to be worth every penny, even more so now that I have this portable player.

  • They already are in Japan (Score:3, Informative)

    by mattr ( 78516 ) <`moc.ydobelet' `ta' `rttam'> on Friday November 02, 2007 @11:01AM (#21212993) Homepage Journal
    The OP is perhaps mystified because he is expressing an opinion from 2005 as shown here [washingtonpost.com]. Clearly mobile is where the money is, as Steve Jobs can tell you. Their English [napster.com] compatibles page is not too exciting but take a look at NTT DoCoMo's lineup [napster.jp] (Japanese). DoCoMo sells advanced phones in Japan with Napster built in. Actually, the brand seems on that page to be "Napster x Tower Records" which will make you either gleeful or sick.. like the RIAA is selling Napster or vice versa. Phones providing unlimited songs it seems are made by several manufacturers (list [napster.jp]).

    There are two more data points to note.

    1. The monthly flat fee format is very popular at least in Japan. In particular, ring tones are a big business, but also all kinds of other media like games, weather reports, and what looks compelling to me is NaviTime which tells you the combination of train and other transportation to get you to your destination in the shortest time. Flat fees though are usually I think 300 yen per month though (for a subscription to downloadable Java games from a game manufacturer). Perhaps you can get more money if bundled when you buy the phone.

    2. The HSDPA [wikipedia.org] high speed data network rollout is marketed to people as the way to deliver songs to your phone. Personally I wanted to go to the Internet at high speed but it turns out (at least until sometime in the future) that this is only within the carrier's network, perhaps only to registered sites. So a Napster-like unlimited service is very useful for HSDPA rollout especially for carriers (all of them) who just want to stuff things down your throat and could care less about connecting you the rest of the world.

    I should note two things: it may be possible to get out of the network but you will go broke, and also the docomo person told me they might come out with a pcmcia card or some such that could do it. Anyway I'm waiting for the model supposed to come out this month or so that can also do roaming (World Wind service) in the U.S. (the last country to be added it seems).

  • ...but it's too expensive for me. Since I have a portable music player that can play Janus WMAs, it would be possible for me to use subscription music on the go. Yahoo did offer such a service for $5 a month, but I don't see anything about the ability to transfer to portables anymore. I'm assuming it's either no longer offered or cost quite a bit more.
  • I could have told you 2 years ago that subscriptions suck

    Amazon has what I want.
    I can get mp3 files that have no DRM whatsoever.
    I can get video downloads, (unfortunately still have DRM)
    I can get books and literally anything else you could imagine.
    I'm a member of Amazon prime. Free 2-day shipping is great. $3.99 overnight is even better.
    I buy most of the stuff I buy from Amazon. With a new baby on the way, we're going to save bundles on diapers and other baby stuff.

    Stuff, it's what being American is all
  • Napster has a lot of competition in the subscription-based music business, including the Zune / Zune Marketplace. Sure, the Zune has tiny marketshare in comparison with iPod/iTunes, but iTunes doesn't do subscription-based music.

    My guess is that Napster is losing customers to their competitors. Subscription based music is actually a pretty great alternative to stealing or buying for $1.99/$.99/$.89/whatever.

    It's an especially great way to legally listen to new music and find new artists. I know that the Zun

  • Monthly Rental Fees (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Swifti ( 801896 )
    Can someone explain to me why we love Netflix, a service where we get to watch unlimited movies for a monthly fee, but services like Napster and Rhapsody, where we get to listen to unlimited music for a monthly fee, is claimed to be an anathema to consumers?

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