[Sigia-l] Buy or rent?

[Manu Sharma]

More on pay-per-download vs. subscription model of music download.
News.com reports:

"According to sources at major record labels, Jobs himself sent top
music executives a link to a blog explaining how to turn copy-protected
songs from Apple rival Napster into unprotected, freely burnable music
files. The story rippled through label circles Tuesday, as executives
tried to understand whether any actual damage had been done to the
service."

Steve Jobs, Napster nemesis
http://news.com.com/2061-1027-5578827.html?tag=xtra.ml

--------

"Blogs were buzzing Tuesday about the resurgence of an old technique
for recording music on a computer, reapplied to Napster's
all-you-can-eat subscription music plan. Using software freely
available from America Online's Winamp division, it's possible to turn
Napster's copy-protected downloads into unprotected files that can be
burned by the hundreds or even thousands freely to CDs."

Napster hack leads to free downloads
http://tinyurl.com/6tvk7

Manu.


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Listera" <listera at rcn.com>
To: "SIGIA-L" <sigia-l at asis.org>
Sent: Thursday, February 03, 2005 4:34 PM
Subject: [Sigia-l] Buy or rent?


> As you may know, a slew of companies have failed to make any dent in
Apple's
> dominance on digital music download business. Now that Microsoft's
Janus
> platform is available to transfer DRMed music from PCs to mobile
devices,
> companies like Napster are looking to 'subscription' or 'rent' of
digital
> music as a differentiator against Apple's iTMS, which so far offers
straight
> purchases only.
>
> Some people may not even be aware of the fact that when you stop
paying your
> monthly fees to these subscription services, your 'rented' music
disappears.
> One would assume this doesn't get much mention in the $30MM ad
campaign
> Napster is undertaking:
>
> Napster Unveils Portable Service, Anti-iPod Campaign
> <http://snipurl.com/ci76>
>
> Question: I'm aware of some such 'subscription' services like digital
tech
> books or developers' tools, etc. Has anyone worked on or know of any
> subscription services (where one loses his digital assets upon
unsubbing)?
> Anyone aware of any study of user preference on buy vs. rent for
relatively
> small online purchases?
>
> Ziya
> Nullius in Verba