News

Napster Starts Layoffs

Wednesday, January 25th, 2006 at 11:40 AM - by Staff

Napster just finished laying off about ten percent of its workforce, according to Digital Music News, indicating that the online music subscription service may not be performing as well as it previously stated. The former employees were all released from the programming and marketing divisions.

Top management is apparently advising the remaining staff that the layoffs are not part of a larger trend, and that Napster will not be liquidated. Prior to these layoffs, however, the company also denied rumors that it was planning on eliminating part of its workforce.

Napster uses a music subscription model that requires users to pay a monthly fee, or lose their music. The iTunes Music Store (iTMS), in contrast, sells songs as individual downloads that users pay for only once. Many music listeners prefer Apple's model since they get to keep the music they purchase, and aren't required to pay monthly subscription fees.

Pressure from the iTMS success has already pushed several players out of the online music market, and analysts are speculating that now Napster is feeling the heat.

The iTMS ranked as the number two online music reseller in December.

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fartheststar said:

member since 04 Jan 2004 with 222 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Jan 25, 2006 1:44 pm

Quote:
The iTMS ranked as the number two online music reseller in December.

Do we yet know who was #1? Is it really Barnes and Noble?

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Jan 25, 2006 2:30 pm

Napsters rent it or lose it policy is no good and never was. Paying over an over for music that you could have just payed once for and never have to check in every month to keep it like with ITMS is the better service. So this is no surprise.

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tuscmat said:

member since 06 May 2004 with 35 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Jan 25, 2006 3:07 pm

Let the consolidation begin. Napster and Real will combine their digital music delivery and proclaim they'll be the ultimate winners in the segment. And pigs will learn to fly making paper airplanes.

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Jan 25, 2006 4:00 pm

Okay, I'm naive about about how subscription based services work. What happens to my library of thousands of songs when the service I'm subscribing to goes out of business???

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Steve W said:

member since 22 Nov 2002 with 482 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Jan 25, 2006 4:46 pm

Guest wrote:
Okay, I'm naive about about how subscription based services work. What happens to my library of thousands of songs when the service I'm subscribing to goes out of business???

The service, by design, requires you to contact them every month to prove you've paid your bill. If there's no place to contact, the program used to keep track of the downloaded files assumes you're behind on the rent and makes the files inaccessible. Basically, your library is locked; you can see it but can't get in. Bottom line: You've wasted all that money renting music.

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Jan 25, 2006 5:17 pm

What's funny is remembering all the Wintrolls who used to bray that "the Napster name + subscription model = the death of iTunes."

Hahahaha, yeah right. Dumbasses.

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algr said:

member since 07 Aug 2003 with 296 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Jan 25, 2006 6:07 pm

Okay, what about music you paid by the song for? After Napster dies, can it be transfered to a new PC when your old one is replaced? Will burning it all to CD and rerepping it work? Or would that be considered piracy since it bypasses Napster's copy protection?

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A guest said: (hide)

Thu Jan 26, 2006 9:09 am

The original post and comments imply that the only model for Napster is subscription music. This is not true at all Napster has the same model as iTMS for buying music without monthly fees, but Napster has the additional service of a subscription model, which I greatly enjoy. The winning difference is iTMS has a superior interface, hardware, and broader selection music and better aggregate content (Essentials, iMix, Books, Video ...). Also another plus is there is a single vendor to deal with for both hardeware and software; Apple where Napster is a partnership between many hardware vendors and MS DRM. I wish iTMS had a subscription service it's really no different than an on-demand cable service to a library of movies or the local library of books. Some things I buy some things I borrow.

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Dreadnought said:

member since 01 Jan 2005 with 162 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Thu Jan 26, 2006 12:30 pm

I've said it before - I'll say it again. eMusic, eMusic, eMusic.

Same stuff as iTunes, but cheaper. $9.99 a month gets you 40 tracks a month, no DRM, no burning limits. Straight MP3 - player and platform independent. Redownload at will.

I'll buy my classics from iTunes, but for music genres I'm interested in experiencing for the first time, eMusic is the way to go.

I've discovered the wonders of Israeli rap, and Morroccan Rai. Andean flutes and Cape Breton fiddlers. Punk, alternative and Zappa. The complete Naxos catalog for my classical needs. 1+ million tracks from thousands of independent lables.

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gslusher said:

member since 13 Nov 2002 with 2088 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Thu Jan 26, 2006 6:28 pm

From the article:

Quote:
Top management is apparently advising the remaining staff that the layoffs are not part of a larger trend, and that Napster will not be liquidated. Prior to these layoffs, however, the company also denied rumors that it was planning on eliminating part of its workforce.

Shades of Enron.

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