Charge of the six million ‘song’ brigade!

Having been undermined by a half and criticised by the other, Napster has finally removed the ‘Kick Me’ sticker off its back!
The pioneer of online music has something new to offer. With intentions to put a ‘new’ footing in the music industry, Napster Inc, flagged off its online MP3 download store on May 20, 2008. Clearly Napster believes in what Chris Gorog, CEO, Napster Inc. puts as, “Unlimited Music Model is what consumers would move towards eventually”! The online giant proudly claims a collection of 6 million tracks – 800,000 more than the second-largest Amazon MP3 shop. Napster also claims to have the largest catalogue of independent labels.

In what it calls as a direct challenge to Apple’s iTunes, the huge collection is compatible on any portable music device including mobile phones (including Apple’s iPod and iPhone). And of course it must be mentioned that every song on Napster’s MP3 store is DRM-free, which only menas that it can be easily transferred to an unlimited number of computers and devices and will play in just about every music software program known to mankind.

Apparently this whole offer comes with a plus as even soundtracks without IPRs are available here, which gives Napster fans some fun to explore lesser known talents. Though iTunes, the biggest retailer of music in US accounts for about 70% of all music sales, Napster is steadily positioning itself to compete by making easily downloadable soundtracks compatible with Apple’s gadgets and services. All its MP3 songs purchased on the Napster web based service are synched to its customers’ iTunes library. This sends a clear warning signal to Apple officials who would have written down Napster long time back. At the present moment, the MP3 store can be accessed using a browser or with a software downloaded for Windows, Mac OS or even Linux. However, Napster wants to jump the queue in this regard too as Napster also plans to open an online streaming service using which the users will not have to bother about installations.

But there are challenges nevertheless. Firstly, the Napster website is slow to load and doesn’t work in Apple’s Safari browser. Secondly, Napster has to work on the poor user interface front. The random order in which search results are displayed make it extremely unfriendly and the prices which are hiden behind tool tips make the overall image all the more shadier. Finally with tracks priced at 99 cents and albums at $9.95, the prices are clearly not the best in the market (Amazon beats it hands down in this regard).

Having surpassed Amazon in size of collection and having thrown sand in the face of Apple with its DRM-free format, Napster finally seems to have gotten rid of the ‘kick me’ sign on its back.

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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008

An IIPM and Professor Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist) Initiative
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