Yahoo Music Unlimited launches

Today marks the official launch of what Yahoo announced back in March: their Yahoo Music Unlimited service is a direct competitor to both Napster/Napster To Go and RealNetworks's Rhapsody/Rhapsody To Go, as well as Apple's pay-per-download only iTunes Music Store. Yahoo is going to be undercutting the former two both by a good 60 percent, by offering the music subscription service (including transfer to portable devices) for $6.99 monthly, or $4.99 per month for an annual subscription. Plus, they're going to include (and focus on) music sharing via the Yahoo! Messenger chat network, a unique feature they can tap into by virtue of being a company that already does a lot more than just provide a music service. The beta version of the service starts today, and gets members into unlimited tracks from a catalog of about a million songs.

[Thanks, zainali]

[elliemicelli @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Everytime I turn around I hear somebody saying "yeah but when you stop paying for it, the music goes away".

Instant message. Earth calling...

Why would you ever stop paying for it. Do you ever stop paying for cable, electricity, cell phone, movie rentals, gas, etc. These things will all go away if you stop paying for them. Does that mean you might do it? Uh, no.

Hell, stop paying for food and it goes right down the toilet. Does that mean you didn't own the food? Can you own SportsCenter or Fox Snooze?

Why would you EVER STOP PAYING FOR IT. It is $7 per month tops. That's less than two movie rentals or 2 packs of cigarettes per month. Many people spend 3 times that much at vending machines at work!

I don't get it. When you consider it's 90% or more of all the music in the world, it's practically free at this price. Simple steps:

1. Subscribe
2. Pay the 30 cents a day.
3. Don't not subscribe.

And if you're ever so poor (some people actually are so I'm sympathetic to them) that you can't affford $7 a month for all the music you can eat during that month, chances are you have bigger problems than your music collection. Like food and other basics.

Please, no more "I don't wanna lease my music". Do you wanna lease the power that runs the player. Nobody does, but everybody does it anyway. Oh, and Apple's proprietary madness and licensing paranoia will eventually bite them in the ass again just like in the 80's and 90's.

[Jon @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Strange, I stopped my subscription about two weeks ago and I checked today--all my music still works...

[Blake @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

The answer is simple folks. Yahoo should offer WMA lossless for those music freaks, and the 192KBPS WMA for the people with limited space/bandwidth.

[Cyberwhore @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Just what everyone needs, another WMA music store.

Yahoo you bunch of muppets ... where is the iPod support?

[Question @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Where can I find a list of their "million" songs? Can someone point me in the right direction?

[Doctor Jones @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Where can we find the specs for the new store (i.e. bitrate, filetype, etc.)?

[Doctor Jones @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

I think I just answered my own question. Click the Engadget "Read" link, duh. More specifically, go to: http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/050510/106235.html?.v=1

[JP @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Why don't they sell music in mp3?
I am still thinking that mp3 is the best format and works everywhere.

[drbadass @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

One interesting aspect of these subscription stores is that it's a lot easier to change stores. If I download 1000 songs on subscription from Napster, but then Yahoo offers a better price, I can switch and just download them again. Maybe this is one reason why Apple has avoided this sales model...

[TheZodiac @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

iPOD SUPPORT: BAW HAW HAW !!! GREAT joke dude.
You <---- Rule.

[Jacob Varghese @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

I think if the software works well, this will be serious competitor for iTunes. The price point is hard to ignore $5-7 per month. If they can make money at that price, then apple should consider offering a similar subscription service. That would really make iTunes unstoppable. As the quality and price of competing music services improves, Apple might see iPod sales suffer. I wonder what the impact of Yahoo's store will be on sales. They seem to have integrated it well with their messenger service as well - this sort of community sharing aspect is attractive to many young people.

[Derek @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

To the first poster - don't blame yahoo for the lack of iPod support, blame Apple. Apple chose to use it's FairPlay technology and then not license it to anyone else. While WMA is proprietary to Microsoft, at least they license it for use by other companies...

This is the best thing for all involved. As an iPod/iTunes customer, I hope apple feels the pinch and either opens up their format a bit more or offers a competitive service.

[TheZodiac @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

iPOD SUPPORT: BAW HAW HAW !!! GREAT joke dude.
You <---- Rule.

[Matt @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Yahoo!'s doing a good bit of marketing here... the subscription service does not mean you get to permanently keep the songs you download every month.

Permanent songs still cost $0.79 each. So there must be a time-sensitive DRM built in to the songs that make them inaccessible once you cancel your subscription.

It's still a pretty good deal, but the thought of "leasing" songs never sits well with me.

I agree with Cyberwhore on the WMA issue - why oh why are so many companies using this horrible codec to compress their music? WMA is the worst sounding audio compression I have ever hear. I know that the full professional version of the WMA9 codec is decent, but at 128 and 192k bitrates, WMA always pales in comparison to MP3 and especially AAC.

If Yahoo was as innovative and "underground" as they think they are, they would've moved to ACC/MP4 or used OGG, FLAC, etc. as their codec.

The one feature I am interested in is the encoder within YME. It encodes to AAC, FLAC, OGG, etc. If it's decently fast (which I doubt), and it uses good versions of the codecs (doubtful), and if you can update the codecs when new ones are released (again, doubtful), then I might use it. Then again, iTunes' encoding is pretty decent, and I love my iPod Mini.

I also think it's funny to hear about iPod "support"...

"Kinda! We support the iPod to the extent that Apple will let us -- which means we support transfer of non-DRM tracks (your ripped and "imported" content) to the iPod." (from http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-FDuiCSg4eqinB8z.GGJ7TmAz?p=89)

If online music sellers would switch from WMA to something decent, they wouldn't have this problem. iPods/iTunes support WMA, MP3, WAV, AAC, etc. etc. If you really want to steal the iPod users away from Apple, you have to give people a format they can do more with.

[Matt @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Yahoo!'s doing a good bit of marketing here... the subscription service does not mean you get to permanently keep the songs you download every month.

Permanent songs still cost $0.79 each. So there must be a time-sensitive DRM built in to the songs that make them inaccessible once you cancel your subscription.

It's still a pretty good deal, but the thought of "leasing" songs never sits well with me.

I agree with Cyberwhore on the WMA issue - why oh why are so many companies using this horrible codec to compress their music? WMA is the worst sounding audio compression I have ever hear. I know that the full professional version of the WMA9 codec is decent, but at 128 and 192k bitrates, WMA always pales in comparison to MP3 and especially AAC.

If Yahoo was as innovative and "underground" as they think they are, they would've moved to ACC/MP4 or used OGG, FLAC, etc. as their codec.

The one feature I am interested in is the encoder within YME. It encodes to AAC, FLAC, OGG, etc. If it's decently fast (which I doubt), and it uses good versions of the codecs (doubtful), and if you can update the codecs when new ones are released (again, doubtful), then I might use it. Then again, iTunes' encoding is pretty decent, and I love my iPod Mini.

I also think it's funny to hear about iPod "support"...

"Kinda! We support the iPod to the extent that Apple will let us -- which means we support transfer of non-DRM tracks (your ripped and "imported" content) to the iPod." (from http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-FDuiCSg4eqinB8z.GGJ7TmAz?p=89)

If online music sellers would switch from WMA to something decent, they wouldn't have this problem. iPods/iTunes support WMA, MP3, WAV, AAC, etc. etc. If you really want to steal the iPod users away from Apple, you have to give people a format they can do more with.

[Ken @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

If you REALLY want to steal the iPod users away from Apple, you're going to have to offer something that would impress Apple's consumers, that would mean offering a Mac option.

Anyone who hopes to take market away from Apple is going to have to go for the core, not the fringes. What will happen is that the other subscription services will QUICKLY realize what happens when the customer isn't vested in your service. "I can get all the same songs at half the price on my crappy Janus enabled (how many now...4?) portable player? Where do I sign up!! Where's the cancel button for this other service?!!"

Yahoo played it smart and let other companies spend the money to promote the Windows "To Go" idea, now they're just going to step in and clean up. Can anyone come up with any reason why a subscription user WOULDN'T switch immediately?

[Jacob Varghese @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Dude, I love Macs and all, but at this point in the game why should Napster and Yahoo be concerned with less than 3% of the market?

And you speak of the core and not the fringes? They are offering a subscription service as well as album and single song purchasing. It's an excellent offering from Yahoo. To stay on top, Apple really needs to offer a subscription service. And it needs to be done before they lose market share. Yahoo's user base is much higher than apple's, so they can't be underestimated.

[ElBatcho @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Yet again apple has a great idea and then ruins it by not being flexible. The whole unlimited use thing is cool, the price is great and it allows the average user to expand their music library and try out songs and recommendations that they may not have wanted to before. The price per download is awesome too. It's a win win for Yahoo.

Apple could have done the same thing, but yet again they have chosen to isolate themselves for the real world. They could have also had Sirus radio built into the iPod but choose not to do that.

Any tool which allows people to hear more, learn more, and get more is great. Knocking a great idea and anyone with the guts to give it to us for a better price is just silly. Yay Yahoo!

[John Beckman @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

It good to see that the price of the items is .79 and the bit rate is "in the highest audio quality 192 kbs". Whatever "highest" means for 192 is questionable.

Better that the .99/128 kbs that napster offers.

If you like this new WMA music store idea, this may be one of the better out there.

Another store is not bad. I see it as another place that may have a hard to find track/disk that others may not have.

Apple, your next. make us happy.

[Velvet Revlvr @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Apple's Ipod/Itunes will soon become Sony's Beta Max fiasco. I own an Ipod I won it, but sure as hell would never buy it. Apple will go rotten when people will wakeup and learn. They are following the heard to the meat grinder.

[Jeff @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

"I think if the software works well, this will be serious competitor for iTunes. The price point is hard to ignore $5-7 per month."

Equally hard to ignore is the fact that as soon as you stop paying that, your music disappears.

This store might be good for the 20% of the DAP market that *doesn't* own an iPod, and whatever percentage of that 20% of the total market that doesn't care about losing all their music eventually. I'd be surprised if they managed 5% of the total market.

Doesn't strike me as particularly threatening to Apple.

[Mongrel @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

I love my iPod, my wife loves her iPod mini, but that doesn't change the fact that I'm endlessly annoyed with Apple for locking out our options. It goes a step further for me, I have an Airport Express that serves both as my Wifi access point and my wireless link back to the living room stereo. Of course iTunes is the only app that talks to it...

[Pusher Robot @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

"If online music sellers would switch from WMA to something decent, they wouldn't have this problem. iPods/iTunes support WMA, MP3, WAV, AAC, etc. etc."

Eh, to the best of my knowledge, the iPod does not play WMA files. Or OGG. Which is a pity, because most of its competitors do. And you're stupid to blame the music stores for not using an unprotected format. Don't you realize that they MUST use a DRM format or else they could not obtain the necessary licensing? Since Apple refuses to play nice, that leaves only one real viable alternative: WMA.

[benjamin @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

To poster #16 (Mongrel):

http://www.rogueamoeba.com/airfoil/

It'll set you back 25 extra bucks, but it lets you play anything over your AirPort Express.

[Ken @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

--Dude, I love Macs and all, but at this point in the game why should Napster and Yahoo be concerned with less than 3% of the market?--
Dude, that 3% of the market BUYS music. Unless something has occurred that I'm not aware of, Apple sold more music to just this 3% in the first week of operation than their competitors have sold in their first MONTH of operation selling to a FAR LARGER market. (For example, BuyMusic ASSUMED that since the PC market was larger that they'd outdo Apple in sheer numbers alone. Where are THEY now?) Expanding to Windows was a good thing for Apple, but if you make something that appeals to Apple users, then you're halfway to understanding what people who BUY music want out of a service.

--And you speak of the core and not the fringes?--
Yes, because the CORE of the market is buying music from Apple. Then there are fringe companies (Napster, Real, WalMart) that are just picking up the leftovers. Remember, computers and OS's are one thing, but where Music is concerned you have to realize that the rules have been set by Apple and they are the company to beat.

--To stay on top, Apple really needs to offer a subscription service.--
And the iPod has to be able to play DRM'd WMA AND OGG, has to have a FM receiver and play videos, otherwise they'll never sell more than a million. :) As long as other companies are looking at this as a game of "features" they'll always be playing catchup. I think competition is good to push market leaders to even greater things, but.

Let's not forget that Microsoft's user base vastly dwarfs that of Apple as well, so Apple should have about 2-3% of the Music Download market, right?

[Mongrel @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

To poster #18 (benjamin):

Yeah, I've seen that, but it's Mac only still, isn't it? And Yahoo Music Engine is PC only - so clearly there's a disconnect here :)

[tf @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

To back up Ken's points, Apple no longer says how many of which platform are buying the iPod, but a few qaurters, it was still at 45-55% of all iPod purchases were Mac versions. That's 45%-55% of 15 million iPods. That's around 7 million... Creative pats itself on the back for selling 2 million players, of which, a large percentage were cheap flash players in the Asian market. In the US, where the digital music game is really playing out, Apple is king and about half of their iPod customers are still Mac users. Yes, 5-10 million sounds small in comparison to 500 million worldwide PCs but we aren't talking about PCs. We are talking about a small, developing market that is moved by the influencers and buyers. 5-10 million Mac users is a HUGE potential market. If Napster or Yahoo or Real could grab a percentage of THAT market, their own markets would experience HUGE growth.

It's all relative.

[tf @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

I think it's hilarious the bulk of attention is on Apple. Napster went from a 300 million to 180 million dollar company in a half hour; Real went from over a billion dollar company to 990 (a loss of 20%) in the same timeframe.

Yes, Apple got hit too, but for 5% and they are a 28 billion dollar company. If Yahoo steals anything close to 5-10% of a market Apple owns 70% of, the odds are much higher that Napster dies (remember, they have NO earnings, they burn as much as 20 million a quarter) and Apple regains share.

How will people feel about subscriptions if the major players start dying?

[Aaron @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

"Equally hard to ignore is the fact that as soon as you stop paying that, your music disappears."

Ok, so you pay your $3000 for 3000 songs, and I'll pay my $5 a month for essentially unlimited number of songs. For $3000, I can keep paying the montly fee for 50 years!! In that time I will also have been able to keep my music up-to-date and listened to whatever I feel like at the time.

[Tracy @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Uh, Apple is not selling music only to people with Mac's. Not even close.

And iTunes is not the only option you can use with an iPod. eMusic has nonDRM MP3 files. There is a great World Music site, Calabash, that does nonDRM WMA files.

I think the most interesting thing Yahoo has done is show Apple an excellent business model. A subscription service *in addition to* a buy service, where you get a discount for being on the subscription. It's almost enough to make me sign up, if it was on iTunes or some other service that gave decent quality music. Otherwise, it's better to just buy the CDs and rip them myself.

[Matt @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

"Airport Express that serves both as my Wifi access point and my wireless link back to the living room stereo. Of course iTunes is the only app that talks to it.."

That's not Apple's fault. Other companies need to integrate the technology into THEIR apps, no?


"Eh, to the best of my knowledge, the iPod does not play WMA files."

I said iPod/iTunes... iTunes supports WMA files, as long as they do not contain DRM. iTunes will import and convert non-DRM WMA files.


"And you're stupid to blame the music stores for not using an unprotected format. Don't you realize that they MUST use a DRM format or else they could not obtain the necessary licensing? Since Apple refuses to play nice, that leaves only one real viable alternative: WMA."

Okay, easy on the language buddy. Would you call someone stupid to their face if you were having a civil discussion about technology? Grow up.

I know that the music sold online has to be protected by a DRM scheme. But what I am saying is that there is the opportunity to add DRM schema to other file formats. AAC can be licensed, but all the online stores are going with WMA. It wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't such bad quality, especially when the stores usually sell songs at 128k. At least Yahoo is using 192k. At this point though, with hard drives getting bigger and cheaper, bigger file sizes wouldn't be a big hinderance, especially when the quality of the music being "bought" can be improved exponentially by moving up to 256k encoding.


Also: "Apple's Ipod/Itunes will soon become Sony's Beta Max fiasco."

I keep hearing this. People keep bringing up this comparison. But after 3 years of completely dominating the market, it's absolutely ridiculous to call iPods a "fad" or predict their firey demise.

[Jeff @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

To Matt:

Talking about codecs (WMA quality) it's obvious that you don't know what you are talking. GO home, start Lame mp3 codec and tell us that you are codec quality master...;-)

[Matt @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

"Talking about codecs (WMA quality) it's obvious that you don't know what you are talking. GO home, start Lame mp3 codec and tell us that you are codec quality master...;-)"

Okay, Jeff, what exactly are you implying? Your post makes no sense.

The best quality codec I have heard in testing (at several bitrates) was in fact the LAME encoder. However, that was before I began testing AAC. It is by far the best quality codec, especially at bitrates around the 128-192k rate.

I have tried several different versions of the WMA codec. The only one that is listenable is the WMA9 Pro codec.

Obviously OGG, FLAC and so forth are good codecs as well, but FLAC in particular is "lossless", meaning huge file sizes.

For my MONEY, I choose AAC at the 128k rate. 192k WMA is close, but I definitely prefer AAC. 128k WMA is a joke and I will never buy from a store that sells them.

[met @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Ok, here goes...for all the guys who buy DRMed music for $1. You have 128k AAC or WMA or whatever.
What if there is a new codec tomorrow? A better quality compression. Or what if the standard becomes 256k (coz the hard-disk sizes have increases so much).

You are stuck with an inferior quality audio format for the rest of your life.

Subscription users enjoy the benenfit of new music and getting adapted to a new codec/bitrate as the industry changes/adapts.

Somone was mentioning that you'll lose your subscription if the company shuts down. Who cares, its a subscription, move on to the next one :)

Truth be told - its today that the iPod owners are feeling the pinch. Yahoo's pricing is very competitive, I don't think they could profit from this, this has to be a temporary thing till napster and real take a hit.

[tf @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

"You are stuck with an inferior quality audio format for the rest of your life."

No. If you are buying low quality now, that's what you are buying and you know it. If the norm becomes higher quality, then you make new purchases of those files. This can already be seen: some small independent dance labels are already pushing much higher quality tracks on the iTMS. They are available.

"Somone was mentioning that you'll lose your subscription if the company shuts down. Who cares, its a subscription, move on to the next one :)"

I care a whole lot about rebuilding a collection of thousands and thousands of songs.

"Truth be told - its today that the iPod owners are feeling the pinch. Yahoo's pricing is very competitive, I don't think they could profit from this, this has to be a temporary thing till napster and real take a hit."

Not at all. As you said, there is no way they can make money. Napster is already losing tons of money at their prices. Real barely makes a profit (and much of that is probably based on their older traditional products) and they are in a huge law suit. They are going to be hurt very badly by this.

As for Apple, nothing is preventing them from offering subscriptions. They can jump in the game whenever they want. And a more profitable option for them, and something I have suggested quite often, is: offer a $3 a month subscription but cap it. (The reality is: you don't really download 10,000 new songs a month, and if the goal is to be able to swap in and out of music, 100-200 tracks would suffice.) They'd be cheaper while preserving some benefit to the artists (if a Napster, Yahoo, Real subscriber really downloads 10,000 at $10 a month, that's .001 cents per track for EVERYONE!).

So... how is Apple hurt? Yahoo either preserves this model and never profits and the music industry sees that it doesn't help them (because they make even less and less the more music is sold and because it simultaneously kills other music services). Or... it is temporary, and Yahoo looks foolish upping the price at a later date. Isn't that fun? Don't we all love having subscription fees increase when we are getting the same thing?

And as always a big piece of the puzzle has been ignored thus far: is the software any good? Napster is decent, better than iTunes in some features. Real's software sucks. How 'bout Yahoo's? We know they don't have the iPod so the question is can Yahoo develop and maintain a jukebox app that is equal to and/or superior to iTunes?

[daniel free @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

unlimited?

so theres no DRM right? cos if there were it would be a blatant case of deceptive marketing practices...

[Goodman @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

Yahoo claims they'll make money, oddly enough.

I joined FYE, the music download service that nobody has heard of, though they offer the same kind of music subscription as Napster and Rhapsody. It's fun to browse the music store, and download hundreds of songs to my music player at a time, without taking a gut punch to the wallet. If Yahoo's service works just as well, I'll just switch to them to save money. Wouldn't bother me to download my music again, since I'm always swapping out my music anyway. I don't need to "own" music because I'm always getting tired of the old stuff and trying something new. (How many of the CDs you buy now do you think you'll listen to much in 20 years? Some, sure.)I'll stay with the subscription model was long as they offer it, so I'm not concerned about whether my songs "expire."

[mr.karmalicious @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

"Yahoo you bunch of muppets ... where is the iPod support?"

Yes, where /is/ the iPod support...




for WMA?

[knayte @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

I just started the 7-day free trial and there are already a few noticeable bugs.

The first two times I tried to initialize the radio feature, Yahoo Music Engine crashed. It's working now, but still not a great sign.

I tried importing some songs, about 1300, and they are working just fine. But YME, for some reason, does not order them by track number. They are organized by "artist", then "album," and then "date imported," I'm guessing. I have all the track number info correct and up to date, but it doesn't seem to matter. That's just silly and unnecessary.

Also, there is a large space above the library to display the properties of the currently playing track, including album art. But YME does not allow you to change the album art. Apparently it just goes through your library and looks for recognizable artists and albums and automatically assigns the album art. This only worked for about half of my library, and maybe 20% of that number doesn't even have the right album art! WTF? For the rest of the tracks, there is just a large, empty, white space on top. Good thing this is only the beta version, maybe they can get these things fixed soon.

These are just my impressions after about an hour of use.

[Matt @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

"I don't need to "own" music because I'm always getting tired of the old stuff and trying something new. (How many of the CDs you buy now do you think you'll listen to much in 20 years? Some, sure.)"

I buy a few CDs every month, and have a collection of over 500. I listen to a good portion of those albums, and there are very few that haven't been listened to in the last five years.

Obviously, I'm sort of an anomaly right now. Most people I know, except my music-playing and music-loving friends, haven't purchased an album in 5 or 6 years.

I guess the reason I don't give a shit about Yahoo or Real or Napster, etc. is that I still buy CDs and the bulk of the music on my iPod Mini is from albums I own.

I like iTunes service the best, and I don't mind buying a song here and there that I really like but don't want to buy a full album. But if I like an artist and their work, I buy the album to support them, particularly local/indie bands, and Canadian artists.

People often disagree me when I say that if no one buys music, a lot of bands will go out of business. But I think it's a reality. I do think record execs and bands could take a bit of a paycheque, but what is unfortunate is that there are a lot of middle-of-the-road bands who get airplay and video play and tour their asses off, but still make just enough to get by. These are the artists that will suffer when EVERYONE stops buying music.

I support online music retailers, it's better than everyone stealing from Limewire, etc., but I don't agree with purchasing music that is not as good quality as the CD you would buy in the store.

[Goodman @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

What's cool is that for the price of a Dell DJ ($250) and $15 a month or so, anyone can now have a collection of over 500 CDs worth of music. And next month, they can change to a completely different collection of 500 CDs if they want.

The down side is that the sound quality of music downloads isn't as good as with CDs. But technological advances tend to be driven as much by convenience as quality. I hopeful that as time goes by and the storage capacity of these devices goes up, the music services will keep upgrading the quality of their downloads. Who knows if they'll offer "upgrades" to those who purchased tracks though. It won't be a problem for those who get their music by subscriptions however.

The top of the line iPod can now hold up to 15,000 tracks. That's probably more than most people own, and the capacity just keeps going up. I wonder how many iPods are filled with music borrowed from friends, relatives and file sharing networks. It's definitely better that people get their tracks in a way that allows musicians to get a cut, whether its via CDs or legal download services. And I think frankly that when people try these subscription services, they'll find they're a lot of fun to use, and well worth the monthly fee to have so much music to play with (plus biographies, reviews, videos and other extras). I just hope that the smaller labels don't get left in the cold. So far Apple has been the most aggressive about getting the mini-labels on board.

[vivek @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

I just want to introduce people to a software that is called Tunebit - lets you convert your copy protected DRM music to a guess what a DRM free copy of music. I use that with my napster subscrip to load music to my ipod... and before the replies fall on this.. yea you have to listen to the track as it essentially line ins the audio and records so you have to listen to the whole song for the conversiton to take place

Yahoo music ? ehh... napsters interface is better but dont think i am happy paying $10 a month for napster.. cause 15 is for on the go crap which i obviously dont use.. and 10 is just to have access to their library... yahoo does this for 5... One thing you will notice is yahoo music gives you access to certain bands that napster doesnt like DAVE MATHEWS BAND... also napster has some peeps that yahoo doesnt have....

I HOPE ALL THESE MUSIC STORES CAN OFFER ALL THE OTHER MUSIC THEIR COMPETITORS offer.... but yea just checked out yahoo's interface it blows compares to napster.... but its in beta.. lets hope for the best

[vivek @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

err sorry thats Tunebite with an E

[Goodman @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

>napsters interface is better

Hope that's not true, I think Napster's software is slow and klunky. I think the new Rhapsody 3.0 software is pretty sweet, but I'm having problems transferring downloads to my player. Right now I'm using FYE, which works within Windows Media Player 10, and it works like a charm for transferring subscription tracks to my player and such.

[Cyberwhore @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

iPod support is critical to one these music stores breaking the mould and taking a decent chunk of business from the iTunes music store.

How many iPods are out there now? Is it 10 million or so.

How many will there be this time next year?
How many in two years time?

No online music store can ignore the fact that the iPod is number #1 and will be for a while yet.

Maybe the answer for them is to offer DRM'd lossless files. The end user can then re-encode to what ever they like.
File size will then be the only hurdle for the download market.

WMA files will never be the answer.

[Goodman @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

I am amused to hear so many lectures on the importance of market share from iPod users. I remember when Macs had REAL market share, and an absurd technological lead over PCs. The idea that Microsoft could take over the market with their vastly inferior Windows was once considered absurd by Apple users. Not by me though. I knew that people wanted choices.

Already by adding subscription support Microsoft compatible players have an edge in technology. The importance of that edge isn't apparent to everyone, but then the importance of a GUI wasn't immediately apparent to everyone. All the iPods have is fashion (which changes) and a GUI. That hasn't been enough to keep the Mac in the race.

[Jeff @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

For 42:

- Microsoft WMA 192 KBps 2-Pass CBR Encoded files (iTunes is STILL 128KBps AAC)
- Janus

Oh ya, the music stores can ignore ipods. The music from Yahoo, Rhapsody and etc is not only for devices but for playing at home as well. I have a lot of friends listening to Rhapsody via home stereo.
Not to mention that ipod and itunes is the best way how to lock yourself from outside music world.

[tf @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

"Oh ya, the music stores can ignore ipods. The music from Yahoo, Rhapsody and etc is not only for devices but for playing at home as well. I have a lot of friends listening to Rhapsody via home stereo.
Not to mention that ipod and itunes is the best way how to lock yourself from outside music world.
"

What hypocrisy! Yahoo and Rhapsody are for home but the iTMS isn't? For those without a clue: people have iPods but don't use iTunes or the iTMS, people have iPods and use iTunes but not the iTMS, people use iTunes but don't have an iPod and don't use the iTMS, people use iTunes and the iTMS and don't have an iPod, etc...

As for locking yourself from the outside world: iPods have about 6 different transmitters if not more, support from 7 major car manufacturers, 3 audio manufacturers, and there are numerous other kits for car connectivity, they have Airport Express, they have stereo docking kits from all the major audio players... The iPod is the most connected audio player out there. Just because you want to buy outside of that ecosystem and claim FairPlay is locked, does not mean the iPod or iTunes isolates you.

[sbono13 @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

"As for Apple, nothing is preventing them from offering subscriptions." Except the ipod shuffle... no clock on that device = no way to enforce expiring DRM.

[Matt @ Dec 19th 2005 1:21AM]

I've just joined the new Yahoo Music service trial. I am definitely psyched that it is 192kbp even if it IS WMA. But one problem, it keeps telling me I can't transfer the songs to my Creative Nomad Zen Xtra. It says I don't have the Device License to transfer. Whats up with that!?!? Anyone else had this problem?