Expanding choices
LawMeme is critical of Listen.com's new service:
Listen.com to Offer Dollar-a-Track Burn-Your-Own CDs
Starting this Monday, Listen.com's Rhapsody subscription music service will offer users the ability to burn unlimited CDs on a pay-as-you-go basis for 99 cents a track. The deal covers music from Warner and Universal.
Much as LawMeme appreciates the lip service being paid to consumer choice, a few unpleasant facts remain, not least that of price. Over at Amazon, LawMeme can buy The Eminem Show for $14.99. This same CD, weighing in at 20 tracks, would cost $19.80 through Rhapsody (not even counting the $9.95 monthly fee). The Who: The Ultimate Collection? $20.99 in stores, but 35 tracks at 99 cents a pop works out to $34.65.
Our friend is missing an important point. If I have to pay a premium price of twenty dollars or so to get twenty tracks of music that I want on one CD, unaccompanied by the stuff that I don't want, it may be worth it to me. It may be too high for others, compared to the price of standard CDs. But I like the fact that the market will now let each of us have it the way we prefer.
11:11:12 AM 
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