Which Online Music Service is Best?
By Dave Salvator
MP3 technology was the catalyst to one of the biggest revolutions in the media business in nearly 30 years. When cassette tapes became popular in the late 1970's and early 1980's, the music industry did the now-familiar Chicken Little dance about its way of life being destroyed. The industry quickly co-opted that threat, turning albums on cassettes into a very lucrative business. In the mid-80's, CDs promised superior quality at lower prices, but we wound up only getting the better quality. Consumers never got the promised price break—album prices continued to climb. Those chickens would come home to roost soon enough.
In the late '90s, a confluence of the Internet going mainstream, widespread broadband connectivity, and greatly improved compression technology all gave the slumbering music industry its rudest awakening ever. MP3 music tracks became freely traded around the Net like so many baseball cards to the horror of the record industry. Worse still, the industry had no good legal alternative to offer the listening public. The original Napster MP3 sharing application was at the vortex of this storm, and the recording industry's attack dog, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), went on the offensive.
It's taken the music industry the better part of ten years to finally devise some legal alternatives to the P2P file-sharing networks, and now there are well over a dozen online music services legally offering a wide range of genres to satisfy most musical palettes. Aside from one service's downloads being three cents cheaper than the next, what sets them apart? Which one gives you most flexibility about how you enjoy your music? And which one really gives you the most of what you want for your money?
Test Criteria
There aren't really "benchmarks" that you can run on online music services, since their performance is for the most part qualitative in nature. We certainly looked into the applicable speeds and feeds on pricing, bit-rate of content, file format, and DRM technology used. We also wanted to explore the less quantifiable attributes, since they're the make-or-break part of these services. We focused on the following:
Music Selection
Does service specialize in particular genres, eras, or styles? How is the service's coverage through the last five decades ('50s to present time)? Is music from more obscure artists and independent labels available? We also looked for international artists from Latin America and Africa. Most services have music from popular artists like Jessica Simpson or Eminem, so we focused on more obscure artists, both present and past. We looked for music a wide variety of artists, some lesser known than others, including:
Jazz: Antonio Hart, Gene Ammons, Hampton Hawes, Brad Mehldau, Cyrus Chestnut, Roy Hargrove, Tim Warfield, Mark Turner, Jerry Bergonzi.
World: Youssou N'Dour, Milton Naciemento, Caetano Veloso, Gilberto Gil, Cesaria Evora, Gypsy Kings.
Rock/Blues: Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes, Ronnie Earl, The Paladins, Albert King, Little Walter, Kim Wilson, Jonatha Brooke.
Flexibility
Where can you play your downloaded songs? Does the service offer playback support in digital media adapters (DMAs)? Can you play your tracks on other PCs on your home network?
Portable Device Support
Can you play your downloaded tracks on your portable player? Are there restrictions as to which players are currently supported?
Platform Support
Does the service require a specific web browser (i.e. Internet Explorer)? Can you listen to downloaded tracks on non-Windows platforms? We used a system running Xandros OCE 3.01 with the Xine and VideoLAN (VLC) media players installed.
Family Style
Can family members get individualized profiles as part of a single subscription? Can you set up "allowances" where kids have a preset monthly spending limit?
Burn Baby, Burn
Can you burn CDs of your downloaded tracks? If so, how easy is that process?
Getting There
How easy is to find the music you want? And if it's a download-only service, how much previewing can you do before you download?
The Players at a Glance
Now it's time for a side-by-side comparison of the nine services we looked at for this piece.
Dave Salvator
posted by Moon Hawler @ 4:46 AM
2 comments
