In a world where album sales are not what they used to be, corporate music giants such as Universal Music Group and Virgin Media are working to at least mitigate any losses. Their solution? Offer music fans the opportunity for unlimited downloads and streaming at a flat monthly rate (Very doubtful that they would take a Radiohead approach on this one).
Universal was hoping to already offer the service, but due to some conflicting opinions with partners EMI and Sony, the launch date for the service has been postponed. There are those pesky legal debates getting in the way, such as, “What exactly does ‘unlimited’ mean, anyway?” and “That rate is far too low. Can’t we charge more?”
The Guardian has reported that this current arrangement (ten pounds per month for unlimited downloads) seems unlikely, and it’s more likely that these corporations would cap the number of downloads to a few albums per month at the ten-pound price level. (Note: The debate over this has primarily taken place in the UK, hence the presence of “pounds” in this article)
These large music corporations seem to maintain the fear that people will subscribe and download as much as they can during their month of subscription, which, they believe, will keep the customers from buying more music in the future. But as The Guardian reports, other companies who offer a similar service have claimed that few customers download huge amounts from their service. It seems as though Sony and EMI have little to worry about.
If this service ever comes to fruition, it will be interesting to see how such a service will shape the future of the music industry.
