James Delahunty
7 Feb 2005 21:52
Napster has been awarded the Super Bore title for it's advertisement during the Super Bowl by viewers. Napster claims that its new Napster-To-Go service allows unlimited downloads for a monthly subscription of $14.99. However, these "unlimited downloads" are not what they seem, in fact they will "disappear" as soon as you stop paying your monthly fees. Napster’s ad claimed that it would cost anybody $10,000 to fill their iPod up with music tracks and only $14.99 a month with Napster.
Napster's service does have one good feature however; it will allow you to transfer your music to a number of Napster-compatible portable music players. But a claim that it takes $10,000 to fill an iPod just has the consumers laughing. The most music found on iPods comes straight from an owners CD collection or MP3 they already have stored on their computer (maybe MP3 they downloaded from Napster years ago eh?). Napster vowed to spend $30 million promoting its "music rental" service; maybe they should rethink that idea.
During the Super Bowl companies paid about $2.4m for a 30 second advertisement spot and of all 55 spots, Napster trailed in last. Music rental services don't sound so appealing to consumers; because it makes you think of a future where you have to pay royalties for every time you burn a track, transfer to a portable device and even for playing it. But don't worry eh? Even if you just listen to 1 second of the track, you'll only be charged for that second. Let's hope Digital Rights Management software and music industry greed will never lead to that.
Sources:
The Register
USA Today - Full ad rankings.