Reading some of these disparaging posts makes me wonder if some of these folks even know what Rhapsody is. The compelling aspect of Rhapsody is *not* the ability to "buy" and burn music from it at $.79/track. What I find compelling is that I sit in front of a computer almost all day and can listen to almost anything I want to listen to at home or at work, and when I'm not in front of a computer I'm often in my living room and can listen to almost anything I want whenever I want via the rhapsody->realslim->squeezebox conduit. When people come over we frequently spend hours exploring new music that they're familiar with but I've never heard. I can do this from my couch, and can listen to full albums and tracks in fairly high-fidelity.
Is this a complete replacement for buying cd's? No. But I can't afford to spend $50-$70/week on buying CD's as another poster mentioned he does. Mark said it well earlier: It used to be that money kept me from being able to explore new music, now it's just time. And I want to explore and enjoy new music. I want to have any music that I might feel like listening to at the ready. I like the ability to have some italian dinner music at the ready when the rare moment presents itself that I'd want that, even though I'd never want to spend any money on putting together a collection of that music. I love it when a visitor says "I'm in the mood for...xyz" and I can pull it up immediately. Rhapsody allows me to do this. I'm not being duped or swindled. I know I'm not buying the music and I know that if the company closes or changes policies then I won't own the music. I understand that and I still love the service. I pay for cable tv and it's quality is questionable and I don't own the programming for it (can't even choose the programming). Rhapsody (and napster and yahoo) are charging what I consider a nominal fee for a service that really enhances my life. And I believe that their streaming quality will only go up as money/technology allows. I still buy cd's. I'm not sure why some of the posters here seem so threatened by this business model. I'm not saying that you have to subscribe to this model, but please don't insult those of us who do by accusing us of being stupid or unable to appreciate good sound quality. I can hear the difference between Rhapsody and any lossless format. The difference is undeniable, but the fact is that I can still enjoy the music in spite of the (slightly) lower quality. And the music that I really care to keep around I'll buy (on CD). There's room in the market for more than one way of consuming music. _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss
