20070926

Amazonia

Quick thoughts on Amazon's new mp3 download service:
-- Great! *Finally* I can download songs without DRM, stupid player requirements, fear of getting ripped off by dodgy russians or told that my purchase was illegal
-- User interface needs work: why can't I sort by title, artist etc?
-- Selection is disappointingly poor: struggled for half an hour to find a song that I wanted to buy to test it out. Went from my initially obscure selections (Ooberman -- Shoorly Wall; Mercury Rev -- Observatory Crest; Tunng -- Bullets; Peter, Bjorn and John -- Young Folks) to the ubiquitously annoying (Rhianna - Umberella-ella-ella) and didn't find any of them. For shame, Amazon, for shame. iTunes (which I refuse to use) had at least half of these.
-- But they do have the digital only album of David Devant and His Spirit Wife, so I can finally get this. Yay!
-- Only I'm now too tired to worry about this, so I'll do it tomorrow. Instead, you can get some free mp3s from the bands old website.
-- I want there to be somewhere where I can buy a song that I want when I feel like it, and not be encumbered with FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and DRM). So please fix this Amazon. Oh, and $1 seems like a lot to pay for a song, when I usually buy second hand albums for $1 from Amazon marketplace or PREX.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Ha. We inadvertently saw The Vessel performing solo a few weeks ago.