Yesterday, I compiled my list of the five most welcome products for digital audio that came out in 2009. Today, I'm following it up with my list of the year's five biggest digital audio duds.
An image from the infamous online commercial for Songsmith, Microsoft's reverse-karaoke software.
(Credit: Microsoft)Zookz. The breathless pitch got me interested: a mysterious online service was getting ready to compete against subscription-based download service eMusic. But where eMusic limits users to a set number of downloads, this mystery service would offer unlimited music and movie downloads. How could this be? Wouldn't users just download all the material they wanted then cancel their subscriptions? How could content owners let this happen?
The trick: Zookz was based in Antigua, and according to the company, this meant it wasn't subject to those silly little things known as U.S. copyright laws and royalty rates. Unfortunately, the country of Antigua didn't agree, and days after the public beta launched, Zookz disappeared into the digital ether with a promise to refund subscribers' money.
Jango Artist Airplay. I liked Jango's online radio service back when it launched in 2007. This year, in what looked like a desperate bid for new revenue, the company launched a service called Artist Airplay, in which bands could pay for placement on appropriate Jango stations. While Jango's CEO tried to tell me this was a reasonable new marketing opportunity, I saw it as a new form of the old pay-for-play deal that beginning bands often fall for.
With regular marketing, everybody pays more or less the same amount for the same class of services and the music sinks or swims on its own merits. With pay-for-play, artists buy exposure. There's only one problem: the resulting conflict of interest drives discerning listeners--including people who might actually pay you for your music--away. Jango Artist Direct may not be as stark as those pay-to-play "showcases" and "band battles" where all the audience members are other bands and their friends, but I believe it's better for beginning artists never to start down this slippery slope. Then again, I thought users would never be ignorant enough to click on search advertisements in massive numbers, which is one reason why Sergey Brin and Larry Page are multibillionaires and I'm not.
Vevo. As long as we're talking about Google, let's talk about YouTube, which the search company owns. It's a great source for music videos, and its APIs have formed the basis for music-finding apps like Muziic and TubeRadio. Users love it. Unfortunately, the companies and artists who own the copyrights to many of those music videos don't love it--the videos are expensive to produce, and the ad revenues from YouTube and other online video sites are scanty to nonexistent. Google is also lukewarm about music videos on YouTube, finding that the cost of policing copyright and complying with take-down notices is more than the money they can earn from selling ads.
In December, two record companies--Sony and Universal--joined together with Google in a new joint venture, Vevo, to address the problem. This was supposed to be a back-end business-to-business kind of deal, where YouTube users wouldn't know (or care) that certain videos were actually being provided exclusively by Vevo, which would sell short video advertisements to run before them. Unfortunately, the glittery launch party drew undue attention to Vevo's own site, causing its servers to buckle under the load. The entire episode left music fans scratching their heads.
Songsmith. The idea wasn't all that bad. Karaoke is fun. Making music on computers is fun. So why not, reasoned some Microsoft researchers, create a program that fills in audio accompaniment as users sing. Unfortunately, the $29.95 price and unbelievably mockable promotional video turned Songsmith into an Internet laughingstock. Later videos featuring Songsmith's accompaniment to the vocal tracks of songs like Queen's "We Will Rock You" and Van Halen's "Running With the Devil" highlighted the silliness.
CMX. In August, reports broke that the four major record labels were considering a new type of "digital album" format that would include album art, lyrics, and extra content. There was just one problem: Apple was already building its own competing format, code-named Cocktail and eventually released as iTunes LP. I think the entire concept of a digital album is weird anyway: I'm not convinced that lack of album art is a big reason why users are buying singles instead of albums. (The real reason is the Chumbawamba factor, or the fact that a lot of albums contain only one or two good songs.) And iTunes LP doesn't exactly seem to be taking off, although some of the extras--outtakes and videos--are actually quite valuable. But creating a competing format that wouldn't be supported by Apple? That's just plain dumb. To be fair, we haven't heard anything about CMX since iTunes LP launched. Here's hoping this product is killed before it's ever born.
A couple of weeks ago, my favorite free music-streaming site, Grooveshark, began rolling out version 2.0. It's currently available to paying VIP customers only, but I managed to finagle a pass and can report that it's a solid upgrade, although nothing groundbreaking.
Grooveshark's selection of free songs compares favorably with big commercial download stores like iTunes and Amazon MP3, and the improvements in version 2.0 are mostly geared toward helping you sift through search results more efficiently. For instance, now you can organize results alphabetically by song, artist, or album, and with one click you can add any song to your Grooveshark library, which makes it available on future log-ins without forcing you to run another search. Other than that, my favorite improvement was a slider bar that lets you fast-forward to any point in a song--a feature that we've long taken for granted on iTunes and most other commercial streaming and download services, but which didn't quite make the cut the first time around.
The new Grooveshark 2.0
So is it worth paying $3 a month to get these new features ahead of everybody else? I'd say yes--especially since most all-you-can-eat streaming services start at around $15 a month--if it weren't for Grooveshark's questionable legal status. The last time I asked the company about this, it responded by saying it was pursuing many different revenue streams---artist promotion, advertising, mobile subscriptions (if Apple approves Grooveshark's iPhone app as it did with Spotify, that would be a huge win), API licensing, and these VIP subscriptions. It also claims that it's been able to keep costs low. But there's enough question whether any of the recent crop of music start-ups can survive given current usage patterns versus licensing fees--never mind one that seeks to undercut big and well-established players like RealNetworks and Microsoft on streaming subscription prices. So, until the big labels and publishers give Grooveshark their explicit blessing, I'd advise caution--remember what happened to Zookz.
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That didn't take long. Friday evening I blogged that the government of Antigua had issued a terse press release claiming that it had nothing to do with unlimited-download site Zookz. The Zookz legal team responded with an equally terse note saying that it didn't need the government's approval, and that its service was perfectly legal under its interpretation of a recent World Trade Organization (WTO) ruling.
It looks like the authorities won this round. This afternoon, Zookz disappeared from the Web. According to a statement by the company's director of communications, the site is "temporarily not operating due to circumstances beyond [their] control" and the company is "returning all membership fees paid to date by our existing customers." The release and the Zookz Twitter feed both express hope that the site will be back up again soon. I wouldn't hold your breath--legal threats, followed by a takedown and an offer of refunds doesn't sound like a viable long-term business to me.
I'm curious to hear from any customers--how many songs did you download, and did Zookz refund your money as promised? Post in comments and let me know.
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Another reminder about music sites that sound too good to be true arrived in my in-box Friday.
Earlier this month, I blogged about Zookz, a new site currently in beta testing that allows users to download an unlimited number of MP3 audio files or MP4 video files for a single monthly fee ($9.95 for audio or video only; $17.95 for both). This seems to be an amazing deal compared with similar services--eMusic, for instance, offers a limited number of downloads for a monthly fee, and all-you-can-eat subscription services like the Zune Marketplace disable some portion of your downloads if you stop paying your subscription. Zookz has no such limitations.
The company claimed it could do this because it's based in Antigua, which isn't subject to the same restrictions as the U.S. But apparently, the Antiguan government doesn't want to have any official association with the service. According to a press release that I and some other bloggers got Friday, "The Zookz.com web site is not operating under the authority or with the knowledge of the Government of Antigua and Barbuda." It continues, "Zookz.com is not authorized by the Government of Antigua and Barbuda, or by the World Trade Organization, to offer entertainment downloads in contravention of international law."
I asked the company for their response, and they basically told me that they don't have to have the permission of the Antiguan government or the WTO. According to a statement from William Pepper, legal counsel for Zookz: "In December of 2007, the Appellate Body of the WTO confirmed the award of $21,000,000 annually to Antigua. This award imposes sanctions that allow the nullification of the TRIPS obligations for Antigua." If that lost you, he continues, "Zookz is the property of Carib Media Ltd. a company registered and conducting business in the State of Antigua and Barbuda, West Indies. Therefore there is nothing that requires Zookz to seek authorization from the WTO or the Government of Antigua to transact its business."
I'm not versed in international law, but in my experience, when lawyers start firing press releases back and forth, it doesn't bode well for the long-term survival of the businesses involved. As I blogged last week, if you want to check out Zookz, do it now.
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