A short time ago Amazon.com launched their DRM free MP3 Store offering over 4.5 million tracks from every major record label, and now after just six short months they are securely seated in the #2 position in digital music sales hot on the heals of iTunes. This undoubtedly makes Steve Jobs blood boil, which obviously makes me smile since everyone knows Steve Jobs is a complete asshole. The fact is iTunes as an experience sucks… because you don’t get what you pay for, the right to use your files like YOU want.
Every since I bought my first generation iPod 5 years ago I’ve hated iTunes with all of my being. It always amazed me how much people took the sub par files from that service and were more than willing to fork over the $.99 a song even though they truthfully didn’t own the rights to those songs. The only time I’ve ever used iTunes to buy music is when I had gift cards and/or free songs from promotions. I’ve downloaded countless albums illegally (even after buying the physical album) just so I can have the files in DRM free digital format.
I used the Amazon MP3 Store for the first time about five months ago, and I’ll be honest… I’ve purchased more music since then I have in the past 5 years, combined. I’ve been one of those people that has hated CDs as physical media since 1998, every since I fired up a warezsite and purchased my Acer 2x CD/RW drive the purchased CD was a dead format to me. I always wanted to burn the songs I want from the artists I want in the order I want. I own well over 500 CDs yet the only CDs you’ll find in my car have CDR written all over them.
It looks like the music industry may finally be waking up to the call that Americans, hell people in general want the right to do whatever the hell they want with the music they buy. If you give us easy to use, high quality MP3 download service people WILL buy the songs they want if for no other reason then saving them the hassle of trying to find a high quality copy through the various illegal channels. However, the labels may be about five years too late to save their fate.
In the end iTunes, Steve Jobs and the record labels can kiss my natural black white ass. Oh, by the way… make sure you go buy Nine Inch Nails Ghosts I-IV from the store, 36 songs with high quality album art for only $5 bucks. You can’t beat that with a stick.
From Yahoo News.
Leave Your Response
You must be logged in to post a comment.