slotMusic: Another Band-Aid on the Wounded Music Industry
This week SanDisk announced a deal with the four major music labels to distribute music via memory cards that fit into mobile phones, pocket PCs and other ubiquitous portable devices. Although one can appreciate the efforts of a failing industry, somehow this offering, named slotMusic, doesn’t strike me as their lifesaver.
The disruption has already taken place: digital music downloads, whether free or paid for, are where the present and future lie. Consumers are no longer craving physical media – they are quite pleased with just the music that goes straight from the internet into their iPods. Second, and also in-line with iTunes’ offerings, people prefer only to buy the songs they like instead of the entire album - a limitation of any physical media when profit is the ultimate goal. Finally, those individuals who are tech-savvy enough to use their phones as an MP3 player are already getting their music from the internet instead of Walmart.
One aspect of this product that I do applaud is that all slotMusic will be DRM-free. In other words, the record companies have finally realized the public’s demand for unlocked music, allowing consumers to freely copy the music onto other devices.
It’s only a matter of time until record labels realize that DRM-free music is the gateway to the only show in town: digital downloads. Profit margins are dwindling, so perhaps instead of fighting downloads, record labels should lower prices and turn to increased volume as their only viable alternative.
