A Mobile Music Store That's Not Particularly Mobile

from the not-much-of-a-point-then,-is-there? dept

Tue, Oct 5th 2004 12:42am — Mike Masnick

Where do they come up with some of these things? Years back when Amazon launched a WAP interface to let people order books online, it seemed like quite a niche app. How often were you likely to be in a situation where you absolutely needed to order a book right now, before you can get to a computer, only to wait 5 to 7 days for delivery? Sure, it might come in handy in a few very specific circumstances, but it sure seems like a niche application. It seems AT&T Wireless is using a similar line of thinking with their latest not really mobile music download offering. While there are almost too many mobile music efforts to count underway (with varying degrees of success and failure), AT&T Wireless (in its last days before being subsumed by Cingular) is launching one of the more pointless ones. It's not actually a mobile music download service at all. Instead, it just lets you order music that can be downloaded to a computer at a later time. Yes, that's right. If you're so desperate to pay your $1 to download a song before you even get back to the computer it will be on, you can do it right now and... um... then do nothing until you get back to your computer anyway, where you can download it. The advantage of this over actually buying it when you get back to your computer is... wait... it's coming to me... nope... I have no idea. At best, this is maybe a tool for the ultra-forgetful (talk about your niche target marketing). However, let's face it, if you can't remember the song you wanted to buy by the time you get back to your computer, you probably didn't really want to buy it anyway.

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AT&T Boy, 5 Oct 2004 @ 4:34am

Just a way to burn money
This is just a way to burn money before the big takeover, and a way for some middle manager to employ his buddies.

It also lets the oh-so special developers play with new technology.

Bunch of bozos.
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bob, 5 Oct 2004 @ 5:19am

Forgetful niche market
Au contraire, oh young one! As we boomers age, memory is the second thing to go (presumably the spammers provide plenty of treatments for the first). This makes hanging on to artist names, song names, book titles, etc. difficult even when not challenged by the overload of stimuli required to pander to those of short attention spans. What's that you say? Make a note on the PDA? Well, gee, that's a pretty new-fangled doohickey, is it not? What's wrong with a simple notecard? Now, where did I put my pen...
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Beck, 5 Oct 2004 @ 5:54am

Re: Forgetful niche market
But how will you remember later that you need to download the song on your computer?
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