Friday, December 28, 2007

Rhapsody Online

I was browsing around the other day and ran into a small debate about whether subscription based music services have a market. After reading a few comments I found myself writing my own post, and then I decided to post part of that comment here.

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. By the way, this list is not weighted, even though I have more Cons I still think the Pros win.

Pros:

  • Access to all the music I can handle, which opened me up to more music. For example, when I heard that Bob Dylan released a new album, I decided to listen to it. I would have never given that album another thought if I didn't have this service. It’s the same story for a bunch of other albums/artists that I just never had the desire to buy a CD to try out.
  • TiVo - Rhapsody now works on TiVo. Navigating the music lists on a TiVo isn’t as easy as just playing a CD, but it has its advantages. I created a playlist for our Halloween party on my computer using Rhapsody, then hooked my TiVo to my stereo and played it for the party. We added some classic Halloween songs by the original artists and a few Top 40 songs that I would have never purchased otherwise. Despite his issues, I’d rather hear Thriller sung by Michael Jackson than some second-rate cover band.
  • I like to try new music and I sit at a desk all day, so if I like an album I usually get sick of it after a couple weeks of listening to it every day. I'm always looking for something new, and I used to buy at least 4 CDs a month. It's much cheaper this way and I look at it as a $14 monthly trial period for all the albums I'm considering purchasing (Kanye West - great album, 50 Cent – not so much).
  • You can share your playlists and other users can rate them. It’s nice since everyone using the service has access to the same songs.
  • It has its own music player you can download, or you can just play through a simple web app (which works with Linux).

Cons:

  • Great to use when I have a connection to the Internet, not so great otherwise. When I jump into my car I find myself wishing I had some of that new music I was listening to. Rhapsody Online does work with a couple portable players (Sansa), but I already have an iPod so I would have to make a commitment to switch players to get anymore out of the service. Not so much a knock on their service as it is just an inconvenience.
  • You don't always get every song with each album; there are certain albums and songs that are not available. I can understand a certain artist or album (though it still annoys me), but sometimes it's just some random song on an album, or every other song on an album with no rhyme or reason. It can also change: one day half of Common’s album “Finding Forever” was no longer available. I already own the album, but it was just easier to listen through the service.
  • Discovering new music is not as easy to do when you have so much available. Rhapsody needs some sort of service like Last.fm or Pandora. Maybe they should even consider buying or licensing Pandora’s technology.
  • I still get a strange feeling about not owning the music, or if my network connection is down that I might not have access to anything.
  • I haven't found a well-designed easy method of hooking the service up to my stereo. My wife still prefers to pop a CD into the player or just listen to her iPod.
  • It's priced higher than Yahoo or Napster, but I liked the fact that it works with more platforms

I'm sure there are some other benefits and annoyances I'm forgetting, but hopefully you get the point. The subscription model can work for you - not if you've been listening to the same Led Zeppelin album for the past 20 years, but there is a market for it.

In my opinion, the anti-DRM movement doesn’t really apply to these services. Their whole model is to provide a large amount of music for a monthly fee. If I’m going to buy music online, I feel I can only trust mp3. However, if I’m renting it I’m only concerned with it working on the devices that I am using. Rhapsody even provides an integrated way to buy songs from their store in mp3 format.