Commentary: Napster to Go -- Do Hedged Bets Equal Innovation?

Now, more than a year after Napster 2.0 was launched, it is morphing into Napster To Go, to allow music from its subscription catalog to be played on select Windows-based portable MP3 players. Yet, for all the surface similarities to the iPod/iTunes combination, Napster still suffers from three mortal sins that have plagued subscription models from the earliest days of this debate.

The first mortal sin reveals itself on the Napster Web site in the form of an asterisk, attached to the statement: "Now you can fill and refill your compatible MP3 player with your choice of over a million tracks without paying $.99 per track." The statement sounds intentionally like Napster’s original modus operandi ("songs for free") except in this case, the asterisk indicates that to keep the songs, one has to maintain the subscription indefinitely. What Napster’s ads don’t say is that the subscription, over the life of a typical user, would cost almost $10,000. During that subscription period the customer would not own the music, while iTunes users who own their music—despite deceptive competitive marketing spin to the contrary—can listen to it on the iPod, CD players and other MP3 players.

It’s safe to assume there are going to be some really unhappy Napster subscribers out there when their subscription inadvertently runs out in the middle of a business trip or extended vacation, rendering their music useless until the subscription snafu is corrected. In essence, no subscription service has answered the "is the sky really falling" question that music subscription consumer research has shown to be a non-starter.

Another mortal sin that caused significant heartburn in the early days of "subscribe vs. buy" was the need for the end user to have the proper player loaded on the machine. Napster requires an initial download of a jukebox program, just like iTunes; it also requires the use of an underlying media player (Windows Media Player 10)—again similar to iTunes, which relies on QuickTime for its music playback functionality (even if QuickTime is never seen by most iTunes listeners). Unlike an initial iTunes download, however, which includes both the player and the jukebox, Napster is relying on users to also download Windows Media Player 10, which currently ships on only a few machines. In fact, it may not ship on Windows machines for long, with the advent of the Windows XP Reduced Media Edition that is meant to comply with legal demands to strip certain elements from Windows XP and thereby create a level playing field for competing media players such as Real or QuickTime.

A third mortal sin in the "subscribe vs. buy" debate is lack of platform choice. To use Napster To Go, the software that allows Napster subscribers to play their music on a compatible portable MP3 player, the user must have Windows XP and Windows Media Player 10. Not only does this limit those on alternative platforms, such as Linux and Mac OS X, but it also limits Windows 98/Me/2000 users from enjoying portable playback of music that they've subscribed to.

The fact that Napster has limited users' options by requiring a perpetual subscription and offering reduced OS and player configurations calls into question the whole model, especially since Apple's Steve Jobs realized that locking iTunes-purchased music into one platform (his own) was not in the market's best interest.

Napster's reincarnation from illegal download "service" to legal subscription service makes a good story. But can Naptser figure avoid the three mortal sins that have plagued the subscription model?

Time will tell, but even Napster itself isn't willing to go the subscription-only route. Tucked away on Napster’s website—despite all the hoopla about the evils of paying for songs for your iPod—is mention of "Napster Light." This offering allows customers to purchase songs and albums just like, well, the iTunes Music Store. If Napster isn't ready to believe its own message about the vagaries of purchasing music and the blessings of subscribing to the Napster service for portable music playback, who will?