Internet music services

[ShoogarBear]

I'm on a free month trial of Rhapsody. For an eventual $9.99 a month it's not bad, but its jazz collection isn't nearly as complete as I would like. Does anyone use any other (legal) services they would recommend?

[MannyIsGod]

Does that allow you to actually burn cds? I know you're only given the license to those songs as long as you keep using the service. If you cancel, you lose the license to the songs.

[ShoogarBear]

Yeah, the files are .wma not .mp3, so you can't use them directly to burn CDs.

But there are a lot of .wma to .mp3 converters out there, though I think you lose some resolution when you do.

I'm not sure exactly sure what happens to the files if you let your subscription run out.

The setup is pretty sweet though. The first night I had downloaded about 700 MB without even trying hard.

[MannyIsGod]

Nice. I haven't tried anything out yet, but check out PCWORLD.com. They have a weekly show on PBS and they were talking about the different services this weekend, but I didnt' pay very close attention. There might be something on there as far as reviews and what not.

[CharlieMac]

Yahoo Music is working alright so far...

[ShoogarBear]

Couldn't find anything on pcworld.com, however, there was a pretty decent recent article in the NY Times:

LInk (http://www.iht.com/bin/print_ipub.php?file=/articles/2005/08/09/yourmoney/music.php)

Downloadable music business: Rent, lease or sell?
By David Pogue The New York Times
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 10, 2005

The Internet has been described by enthusiasts as a global conversation, a giant encyclopedia or a 24-hour news service and by detractors as the world's most technologically advanced time waster. What peeves record-company executives, however, is how many people see it as a free music store.

A Supreme Court decision at the end of June, however, may eventually put an "out of business" sign on that store. In MGM Studios v. Grokster, the court found that software makers like Grokster, which lets Internet users freely browse and copy songs from one another, can be sued for encouraging copyright infringement. The record companies' lawyers now have a green light to try to shut down the file-swapping services.

Using Grokster, or similar services like Kazaa, always entailed a degree of risk, from PC virus and spyware infections. Getting sued, though it can happen frequently when dealing with the recording industry, is never a highlight of anyone's day, either. And now the courts are getting involved. What are fans of downloading music to do? Pay for music?

If it comes to that, they will find that a lot has changed in the online music business since Apple opened its wildly successful dollar-a-song iTunes Music Store in 2003. In that time, Apple's catalog has grown to nearly 1.5 million songs from 200,000, Apple has sold 500 million songs, and it has been joined by similar stores run by Microsoft, Yahoo, Sony, Real Networks, MusicMatch, Dell and even Wal-Mart Stores.

The essentials are the same for all: each song costs about $1, each album $10. Each song is compressed using a format like MP3 and encrypted in such a way that you can copy it onto five computers, burn it onto several blank CDs, and copy it to pocket music players - but not distribute it on the Internet.

The insanely popular iPod music player and the iTunes Music Store, for Mac and Windows, still work only with each other. Most of the other stores' songs come in a Microsoft format that works on much less popular music players. You can identify these anti-iPods by a logotype on their boxes, evidently composed at a PC with a broken space bar, that says PlaysForSure.

But "a dollar a song" is no longer the only game in town. In an effort to exploit the popularity of music downloads and still make money, the music stores have begun to tinker with the formula.

One intriguing alternative is the subscription plan allowing unlimited downloads that is offered by Napster, Yahoo and Rhapsody. (Each also maintains a traditional $1-a-song service.) Microsoft, Target, MTV and AOL have also announced plans to get into this subscription business, and even Apple is rumored be interested.

The tantalizing concept: instead of buying songs one at a time, pay a monthly fee for the rights to the entire million-song library. On the Napster to Go plan, for example, you can fill your computer and your pocket music player over and over again with as much music as you like, for $15 a month.

Unfortunately, there's enough fine print to fill a phone book. The biggest footnote is that if you ever stop paying the fee, you're left with nothing but memories; all the music disappears. You're not buying songs under this plan - you're just renting them.

A famous Napster ad says that filling an iPod at $1 a song would cost you $10,000. But you could just as truthfully say that under Napster's plan, listening to one favorite song for 20 years would cost you $3,600.

Relatively few pocket players can play songs in the rental-music format. And this time there is no handy sticker on the box to help you; you must check the compatibility list on the music service's Web site.

The player must be connected to your PC once a month so it can ask the mother ship if you're still a paying customer. Note, too, that the monthly fee does not include the right to copy songs onto a CD to play, for example, in your car; that costs an extra 80 cents to $1 per song.

Even so, these rental-music outfits are highly conducive to exploring and discovering new music. They are also more attractive if you think of them as services, like cable TV or satellite radio, rather than stores. As with satellite radio, you get music only while you are still a subscriber. You pay $3 more per month than satellite radio costs, but you get to pick the songs.

Even the most extensive online stores, however, do not include songs by Madonna, the Beatles or any other group that has refused to make its catalog available, and some other songs are restricted as well.

No matter which approach you choose - à la carte or all-you-can-eat - you can save a lot of money by shopping around. Yahoo, for example, offers both kinds of plans - buy-a-song and rent-unlimited - but undercuts its rivals' prices considerably.

The monthly fee for the unlimited-rental plan is $7 a month, or $60 a year, paid in advance. These are introductory prices, although Yahoo says that when it finally announces a permanent price, it won't be "substantially" higher. If you want to buy a song outright or burn it to a CD, you pay an additional 79 cents each.

Analysts calculate that even Apple, king of the music-store market, keeps only a few cents from each song purchase; the rest goes to the record companies. How can Yahoo make money selling the same songs for 79 cents each, or renting its catalog for a third of Napster's and Rhapsody's fee?

Yahoo is not saying, but rivals assert that it is losing money on every sale in hope of attracting customers and promoting its other services.

And sure enough, Yahoo's music software is cleverly integrated with the Yahoo Messenger chat program; when instant-messaging your friends, you can see what Yahoo Music songs they are listening to - and if you both are subscribers, they can send the songs right over to you.

Rhapsody.com offers a program that should be equally tempting to cheapskates: Rhapsody 25, a free plan that lets you listen to 25 songs a month, in their entirety. Clearly, the object is to persuade new customers to try out Rhapsody's own music-store/jukebox software. You can listen to these songs only at the computer; you cannot burn them onto a CD or transfer them to a portable player. But even 25 songs a month can give the casual listener a good feel for what is happening in pop music.

Rhapsody's paid plans are worth investigating for another reason, too. Like its rivals, Rhapsody's software lets you listen to Internet radio stations through your computer's speakers. But only Rhapsody lets you dictate who plays on your personal radio station.

Wal-Mart's music store has never had much of a market share, despite its 88-cents-a-song pricing. For one thing, its music library is considerably smaller than its rivals' - 600,000 songs versus 1.2 million or more.

But the company does offer a clever twist for the lazy or the technically timid: it will press a custom CD for you. You pick the songs, in any order you like, and Wal-Mart will burn and mail it to you, complete with label and case. The price: $4.62 for three songs, 88 cents for each additional song, $2 for shipping.

Will any of these approaches be enough to quell the musical thirst of the millions who, at the moment, get their music from free file-swapping services?

The trend is shifting, but only infinitesimally. Despite all of Apple's success selling songs online, a recent study by NPD Group, a market research company, says nearly 10 times as much online music is swapped as is bought.

If the Grokster ruling does not change the way things are going, the record industry may have to consider more radical solutions, like embedding every song file with a serial number. That way, customers could freely copy their songs for personal purposes but would avoid posting them online for fear of being hunted down. Or maybe the record companies should deliberately release free, low-quality song files to the Internet. Music fans would be able to discover bands and albums as they do using Grokster but would have to pay for the full-quality versions of their favorites.

One thing, though, is already clear: the business of downloading music is still in its fumbling, bumbling infancy. It may take the music stores several more years of hammering away at their problems - software complexity, steep pricing and holes in their song catalogs - before the recording industry can think of the Web without wincing.

[Boo]

Do you have Windows XP?

[ShoogarBear]

Yes.

[Boo]

Yes.

Then you should have Windows Media Player.

I use it all the time I just found out I had it.

Check it out, it's free.

[SequSpur]

okay....

Winmx.com is down now, so I need another swapper file music service. I don't give a shit if it's illegal or not.

Any ideas?

[MannyIsGod]

:lol wtf?

WMP sucks though. I use Winamp. WMP uses too many damn resources.

[ShoogarBear]

Are you saying Media Player provides you with a source of downloadable music????

[Boo]

Are you saying Media Player provides you with a source of downloadable music????

Yea and it's all free

[Boo]

^and you can burn cd's and copy off of cd's

for free

[ShoogarBear]

:wtf

I see links to lots of online stores that want you to buy their music. I see no "free" songs.

[Boo]

:wtf

I see links to lots of online stores that want you to buy their music. I see no "free" songs.

Go to guide, click on music, type in what music you wanna listen to (album/singer and song) and select one of those links. The link will play the song free for you, and if you want, add the song to your favorites (library), and then you won't have to click on links anymore.

[baseline bum]

Check limewire, sequ. Stay away from Kazaa though. There's so much fake crap on their networks.