eMusic cRaps Out

365:20 .. Lost in Music
Originally uploaded by fwumpbungle

I subscribe to eMusic. Its cheap and has a fairly decent catalog. But when I logged into my eMusic account the other day I got the following message:

"We are excited to announce that in early July eMusic will begin rolling out a major addition to our music catalog. "

They went on to tell me that because of the new additions to the catalog, major label artists such as the Dixie Chicks, Michael Jackson, Simon & Garfunkel and Yo Yo Ma, I would still pay the same exact price for my membership, but would be receiving 120 fewer downloads per year.

Nothing against Michael Jackson, but eMusic is tripping. I belong to eMusic because I love that I can find lots of drm-free indie, electronica and experimental stuff on eMusic. And at such a low price it makes risk taking easy.

But the recent addition of the Sony music catalog has forced them to charge more (or charge the same for less.) 120 songs less for the same price? 12 albums less per year? An album a month less so I can download Simon and Garfunkel's Greatest Hits?

Let's say I was annoyed.

But they knew I would be, so to compensate for the loss of said 120 tracks per year, they had this little temptation to dangle before my ears:

"To celebrate the addition of all this great music we're giving you a 10-track booster pack (good for 30 days), free! The booster pack will automatically be added to your account in early August."

So to celebrate the loss of 120 tracks, they were going to compensate by giving me 10 tracks. (free!)

I did the math:

+10 free tracks - 120 tracks = -110 tracks.

For my money, the eMusic eQuation doesn't add up.

Update: Here is a letter about the changes from eMusic CEO and Chairman Danny Stein and subscriber comments: http://17dots.com/2009/05/31/more-of-the-good-stuff/