I got a press release.
It said: “Nokia’s ground-breaking new music service, Comes with Music launches today, giving Australians access to unlimited music from over 4 million available tracks.”
Well - not all Australians.
I love the low cost subscription, unlimited download model. It’s potentially a brilliant way to re-engage music consumers with paying for music.
But the fact it’s only on a Nokia 5800 means I won’t be able to use the service because I’m locked into an existing plan. I’d imagine there’s lots of people like me (the target audience for the 5800) who are locked into iPhone plans and won’t buy the 5800 as a result.
The fact that there’s no Mac OS X support means that even if I had the 5800, I couldn’t use the service.
Cheap, unlimited subscription services = smart move.
But Nokia’s ‘Comes With Music’ needs to be a more truly universal proposition.
Anyone on any phone should be able to get a Nokia ‘Comes With Music’ subscription.
Those with the 5800 could get benefits others couldn’t, but otherwise, anyone can get access. Imagine the marketing coup that would be for Nokia - thousands of customers accessing their branded store every day paying a small subscription fee for unlimited music.
That’s the big idea that ‘Comes With Music’ could have been.
Would you use a service like that?
Just for the record, this was the most usable phone ever.
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Stephen 03.23.09 at 10:00 am
I agree 100%…. That WAS the most awesome phone of all time. The only one that wasn’t ready to give up the ghost before the 24 month plan ran out!
Amanda 03.23.09 at 10:42 am
But is it Nokia driving these restrictions or the record labels?
Nick 03.23.09 at 11:05 am
Hey Amanda, I’d be thinking it was a record label restriction thing - but that’d be a guess. Wonder if any Nokia representatives would like to clarify?
Chris Fullam 04.07.09 at 3:39 am
I’ve been using a subscription service for about 5 years now. First with Yahoo Unlimited (which is dead now), and now using Rhapsody. I thought this would be the future, but it hasn’t seem to catch on. I think it’s great if you actively seek out new music, because it allows you to experiment for a fixed cost. However, if you are just a casual music fan, it doesn’t seem to have any appeal.
Then throw in the issue you speak of - with compatibility of devices and it makes it more of a problem. iPods don’t play nice with the subscription services so you are forced to buy through iTunes.
Nick 04.15.09 at 3:50 pm
@Chris Fullam - True enough. I was on emusic for a while but after three months of forgetting and rushing my purchases I just cancelled. Great service but not great enough I guess.