Vodkapundit - Anything Free Is Worth What You Pay for It

Anything Free Is Worth What You Pay for It

Posted by Stephen Green · 13 June 2002

When it comes to music, I'm a serious guy. I own hundreds of CDs, all purchased legally. About ten gig of my hard drive is devoted to MP3's, most of which are legal rips from my own collection. I've burned more CDRs than I can count, and am continuously improving my mixes. Sinatra, Prince, Steely Dan, Beethoven -- I love and own it all.

But there were gaps in my collection, gaps not worth spending fifteen bucks just for a song or two. Then came Napster.

I had a love/hate relationship with Napster. There was much to love – hey, free tunes! But there was just as much to hate. A partial list:

No one had what you wanted. No master index/catalog. Poor search function. Piss-poor rips done by amateurs. Lousy file-naming conventions. Uploaders logging off in the middle of your download. Tag info woefully inadequate.

Now comes word that two major record labels will make much of their catalog available for download for 99 cents a song and ten dollars per album. Some say that’s too much. Fifty cents is more reasonable, but free is still better, they argue.

Listen up: Free isn’t always better. And, if the record companies would fix a simple majority of the problems with Napster I just listed, then I would gladly pay a buck a pop to download all those old songs I still love but only half-remember.

Imagine being able to type in the two line you remember from some AM oldie, and having the record company present you with a flawless MP3 of the song you hadn't heard since seventh grade. Or presenting your kids with good music from you childhood, without all that embarrassing filler. Imagine cover art, lyrics, and credits encoded into each track.

I'd buy that for a dollar.

Comments

Stephen,

The record companies are trying to solve those problems for consumers like you. The main obstacles for doing so have been (1) It is REALLY hard and
(2) Change is really scary

To take the features you requested:

No one had what you wanted. [Product has to be digitized. All the "go forward stuff is digitized, and big projects are underway digitizin the back catalog. Guys that used to work for me are working on this as we speak]

No master index/catalog.
[The majors have these]

Poor search function.
[A great search function is harder than you might think, but they have *good* one]

Piss-poor rips done by amateurs.
[Quality is a major advantage of getting it from the source. The majors really care about this]

Lousy file-naming conventions.
[Obviously not a problem for the majors]

Uploaders logging off in the middle of your download.
[This problem has been solved]

Tag info woefully inadequate.
[This, along with the "great search" issue falls under the category of metadata problems. The trouble is that the real "tag info" (commonly called "label copy" in the biz) is best captured at the studio when the original recordings are made. This has been a HUGE problem historically. Each of the majors has a multi country task force wroking on cleaning up the back catalog's "label copy." this is painstaking research, and quite expensive.

I cover some of this ground in my "Does Music want to be free" post in the Music Biz category at my place.

-- mmd

Posted by: Martin at June 13, 2002 01:55 AM

While on this topic, I'm also willing to pay for some things that you can't get with amateur crap. If I buy some classical collection or a Puccini opera, I want the notes that come with the CD, and I'm willing to pay $15-25. (Besides, it's not going out of style at my house, so again, the money's worth it.) It'll be tough to provide the notes if the only delivery mechanism is electronic. Yes, PDFs or what-not are fine for some things, but I like the printed notes as they come now.

For some catchy tune I hear on the radio, or for some oldie-but-goodie that may be older than I am, an MP3 download is fine. I don't need all of the CD embellishments.

What I'm worried about is that I might not be able to get the classical stuff one day, because there's not enough market for it in actual hard product form. Is that likely to happen? Just wondering.

Posted by: Craig Schamp at June 13, 2002 05:32 AM

Stephen, if you want an MP3 file of "Afternoon Delight" by the Starland Vocal Band, just say so.

Posted by: davidmsc at June 13, 2002 06:11 AM

And a strong finish with a Robocop homage!

Posted by: charles austin at June 13, 2002 08:05 AM

You'd buy that for a dollar? That's because you're only part man, and part machine.

Regards,

Posted by: Tom Maguire at June 13, 2002 09:28 AM

Unfortunately, the downloads that they are proposing will be in a proprietary format. The music companies still don't get it.

Posted by: Donny at June 13, 2002 09:52 AM

I was with you until you said MP3. As far as I'm concerned, it has to be .WAV (or .SHN) or it's not worth it.

Posted by: Aiken Drum at June 13, 2002 04:12 PM