Sunday, September 26, 2004

Subscription Music Services becoming more popular?

I've been enjoying Rhapsody since I first subscribed to it even though it's a pretty bare bones application. I've got a laundry list of complaints about the functionality & non-musical content provided. I had hoped Rhapsody would improve this pretty soon, but I think the may be forced to get moving now that several companies are coming out with their own subscription services. MusicMatch was bought recently by Yahoo for their subscription service, Yahoo is apparently working on integration of such services with their instant messaging client. That would definitely be a very cool thing. In the meantime, even more players are getting involved in the game. According to this NYTimes.com article many companies are gearing up for similar services. Hopefully this competition means that everyone will provide better and more useful functionality. Afterall, the music is a commodity, the differentiator will be the ease of use and the extras which are provided.

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