10/02/2010
» Warner To Quit Free Music Streaming
What’s interesting here is that Warner are specifically saying the freemium (most don’t pay, some do) model isn’t working out for them - which every article I’ve seen looking at the ‘economics’ of a Spotify, say, predicted. They’re looking to go the subscription route. The gamble is that enough people are now used to Spotify-type services that they’d accept the default for those services is pay, not free.
The whole thing reminds me a bit of the “free ISP” game in the late 90s - all those brands like Freeserve coming along, creating a massive market for net access and then it quietly going away, replaced by broadband, which everyone accepts you pay a monthly fee for because they’ve got so used to it. I think the music industry is looking to go the same route. No idea whether it’ll work or not - if anything it seems to me Warners is moving a little early, but this is all top-of-my-head stuff, not things I really care enough to think hard about.
Link posted at 09:30
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