VOTE: Should Spotify & Other Streaming Music Services Also Sell Downloads?
Spotify just stopped offering it’s users in the UK and Europe the option of purchasing paid downloads. (full story here) U.S.users have never had that option. Should Spotiify and other streaming music services also offer paid downloads?
Do you even buy music from iTunes any more? I thought it was just a rental, with Apple continuing to hold the rights to the music that you’ve ‘purchased.’
In its current state, no… But in the future, perhaps.
In a perfect world, they would link to physical purchases. Or at least not be such a closed off garden (i.e. they could at least link to an artists website).
Rhapsody already did that.
Rdio has always sold downloads.
There should be a 3rd option to choose from in this poll:
NO – users that want to buy downloads can do so via a link to the artist’s own website.
It’s kinda depressing to think of Spotify being the middle-man for download sales. Like some monstrous Walmart of music.
Good riddance!
This feature was always for show only, to please naive artists & labels who thought that a streaming subscription service was a “Discovery” vehicle, leading to MP3 Consumption (whether purchased or stolen, not important). NEWS FLASH: streaming IS the consumption as well, not just discovery.