In 1974, Rolling Stone music journalist Jon Landau boosted a then little known musician’s career by declaring, “I have seen the future of rock and roll, and its name is Bruce Springsteen”. Fast forward to 2009 and the future of rock and roll isn’t a person. It’s not even a band. It’s an online music service called Spotify. It isn’t just a game changer for the music industry. It’s a first glimpse of the future of all home entertainment.
Spotify is a music streaming service without the need to buy songs to listen to them. It’s basically Apple’s iTunes, except it’s free. 4 million songs are available and it’s legal since major music labels - Universal Music, Sony BMG, EMI Music, Warner Music – are shareholders. Spotify is an attempt to beat music piracy and it seems to be working.
There is a catch. Australia doesn’t have access to Spotify’s delights yet. The UK, France, Spain, Finland, Norway and Sweden are the current lucky countries. The USA and China will soon have access. However, it’s easy to bypass this tricky geographical problem.
I’ve been using Spotify and it‘s terribly addictive. Remember when you used to make mix tapes for friends, lovers and friends you desperately hoped would be your lover? Spotify allows you to build music playlists and share them with friends/lovers/others who can marvel at your impeccable taste in music. Playlist links can be sent via Twitter and/or Facebook. You can even allow friends to add or delete songs on shared playlists. Recently, Apple approved an application allowing Spotify music to stream directly to iPhones.
The future is now. Some luddites will cling to vinyl records. Some may even persist with CDs. But the majority will listen to music this way once it goes mass market. To be commercially viable, it’s likely all users will eventually have to subscribe. Reliability, convenience and legality means most won’t begrudge paying the approximate $20 monthly subscription Spotify’s premium service costs. I’d certainly subscribe if it was available in Australia.
We won’t own music but will be able to listen to anything any time we want. Movies will be next. And, if Rupert Murdoch and rivals are able to build a similar single point user friendly ‘pick and mix’ delivery system offering a compilation of their individual content, people may be willing to pay for online news. Unfortunately News Corp’s own foray into a similar music system – MySpace Music – is frustratingly clunky so you have to wonder whether they could build a seamless and intuitive integrated online news service that people would be willing to pay for.
However, if the notoriously antagonistic music labels can work together to sell their collective wares surely media companies can see sense in a little collaboration? Better to get a little money from most readers than no money from all.
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