Music: Rent or Own?
The latest episode of the Mac Roundtable Podcast discusses the possibility of an iTunes subscription service. A couple of the panelists made some interesting points, but I think they also miss the major crux of a (typical) subscription service.
The Good: In the typical online music subscription service, you can listen to every song they offer whenever you’d like. You can put it on your portable player, you can download it to your computer, you can maybe even burn it to a CD. And you can do this to your heart’s content, that is, until you stop paying the subscription fee. And that’s the rub. The Bad: The second you stop paying for your subscription, every single song you’ve downloaded and put on your player will cease to play. That’s it, no more music.
Why does anyone want this? Historically, the music industry has operated on the idea that you pay for the music and it’s yours. So why are people clamoring for the chance to pay for music that they don’t own at the end of the day?
These subscription services have been likened to the cable TV model—you get access to 8000 channels forever as long as you continue paying, and that works great for cable TV. If I miss an episode of Good Eats, I don’t need to buy it. I’ll just catch the next one or be okay with missing it, no biggie.
The way I see it, music is different. Music is much more “background” than TV is, and also has much more replay value than most TV shows. When I’m finished listening to a song, I will likely want to listen to it again. And again. And again. Then I may put it down for 6 months before I want to listen to it again. And, personally, I don’t want to have to pay $15/month just because 6 months from now I’m going to want to hear a song again that I liked a few minutes ago. That’s not the way music is supposed to be.
