[psmith2.0]

http://www.macminute.com/2004/06/02/subs

This kinda goes against everything, IMO, that makes the iTMS unique and work. You can always tell, with these types of articles from these types of people, that only ONE thing is being looked at, or paid attention to. One aspect, only. Not about music. Not about the experience and ease. The joy and hassle-free nature of it all. About the discovery and sharing. The true ownership of stuff you BUY.

Only the beans, and the counting of them.

What are your thoughts on this? Between allowances, gift cards, totally pay-as-you-go, WHEN you want, etc. how, exactly, would a subscription service "improve" the iTMS experience?

What if you don't buy anything for a month? You still have to pay? What if you go over? What if you let things go dormant and inactive...do you get hassled with "come on back" offers? Do you truly own the stuff? What would it do to any licensing/usage arrangements already in place and being appreciated and enjoyed?



Anyone here actually longing for this, and seeing this as the true "missing, magical piece" of the iTMS?

What do you think the chances are that the guy who wrote this has ever used the service (or any other service)?

Is it safe to take these types of articles, and others like them, and toss them into a "uh, yeah...whatever" pile, with all the other "Apple should..." stuff written by "in-the-know" business types over the years? Have any of them ever really been remotely right about anything, when writing about Apple?

I'm trying hard to remember...

I mean, here we sit with this tiny little 3-5% sliver of the pie, and so many people who don't even like our flavor constantly saying how "Jobs should do this..." and "Apple needs to do that..." to "survive". I look around, and the only "surviving" (and innovating) I'm truly seeing in the tech world IS Apple, and they don't seem to be taking many of these guys' advice to heart. So what does that say?

Can all the things analyst and bean counters would say about a larger, more widespread company like Microsoft, Sony, etc. apply to Apple? Always? Just seems a lot of cookie-cutter solutions, written by cookie-cutter writers, applied to a company and situation they, most likely, know nothing about.

You can always tell when a Mac person writes a business-oriented article...and when a non-Mac person does. The former usually tends to make a bit of sense and strikes a chord. The latter? Well...

[DMBand0026]

Please, no subscriptions! I'll admit, I'm an infrequent buyer at the iTMS, but I do plunk down my hard earned dollar every once in a while for one of those songs. Not having the ability to just go and buy whatever I wanted as frequently or infrequently as I wanted would just make me mad. I don't want to have to pay for something I don't use, and I know that if I had to subscribe than I would end up not doing it at all because I wouldn't use the store as much. I've bought about 25 songs since the store has been in operation...not a lot, but I like the idea, and I love the store the way it is.

[psmith2.0]

Yes, me too. Two hugely different perspectives, I guess: the actual USER one and the business perspective. The two rarely seem to coincide, do they?

If Jobs took the advice of all these pundits over the years, would WE be happier and better off? Would things be as nice as they are now (which, I think, we sometimes take for granted). I'm just asking...

[DMBand0026]

When was the last time an industry "analyst" or "expert" was correct? Jobs is the marketing guy here. He never went to school for it, but I don't really believe that you can teach that kind of stuff in school. Jobs sold us on the store and that's why it's so popular.

The reason the analysts come in and write stuff like that is because of what you said, the beans and counting them. They are interested in one thing, lining their pockets, not in the concerns of the consumer. They only become interested in the consumer when they decide to stop shelling out the dough.

The store works, we've all seen it, most of us use it. Even those that can't use it want to. It's just that good. The analysts looked at the store, realized it wasn't broken, and promptly began to search out a way to fix it. That always happens to Apple. They have never been popular with the media.

[Paul]

What I would be interested is a 12 hour or so "stream whatever you want" option for $5-$10 so you could test out new music (any any of thee 700,000 tracks that you wanted) for the full legnth of the song rather then 30 seconds...

you would still have to pay 99¢ to download any tune you want but for a limited amount of time you could listen to any song on the iTMS without restriction...

It would be useful for parties and the like where the host doesn't have a great collection of music, but has a fast connection to the iTMS and his guests want to be able to pick their own music...

I would pay the $5 every once in a while...

[InactionMan]

I think the problem is that they (MS, Napster, Rhapsody) are trying to convince people to consume music in a way we have never done. We have always bought music. That is pretty much how we have been conditioned to consume it and so far they are doing a poor job of unlearning us.

And the problem is that the way people consume music does not fit into a subscription model. I've had some albums my entire life that I listen to on a semi-regular basis. I don't want to pay any price per month for the right to listen to that album.

To me, the subscription model works if the content changes. Fine, I could constantly download new music and change what was on my iPod but the actual content of that Doors album I bought ten years ago and still listen is still the same. If you like a particular magazine you might subscribe to it and every month you expect something different from it. Same with newspapers. But not that album you bought a few years ago.

In order for this to work, people would have to view music as completely disposable. Listen to it once, through it away and get something new. But that is not the way people have ever treated music.

Sadly, this post made a lot more sense in my head. Something got lost on the way from my brain to the keyboard. Happens a lot. Here's hoping it made a modicum of sense.

[psmith2.0]

No, it was perfectly said and dead-on. And pretty much sums it up nicely.

The analyst who wrote the article above - and anyone else who doesn't "get" Apple and the iTMS and seems bent on offering "fix it" advice should be forced to read your post so maybe they'll get a clue and realize exactly what makes buying music different from magazines and whatnot.

You nailed it, and I agree 100%.