Tag Archives: android

Digital Music is Dead, Long Live Digital Music: The Case for Spotify

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Back in the 1990s, there was Napster. I mean, the original Napster not the shadow of a brand that is part of the Best Buy electronics offering.

Napster effectively eliminated optical media by making people realize that the digital format was the only long-term, effective, space-saving way of having music that was portable.

Sure there were MP3s before Napster, and yes, some people had decent libraries of music that they carried around on their portable MP3 players. But Napster made it mainstream by making it easy for anyone to find any music they wanted and download it.

It was illegal and rightly so. There was no way to monetize the music underground economy and intellectual property belongs to someone. So Napster got sued. A lot.

Someone along the way suggested that perhaps a more amenable for Napster to provide digital media to fans and give the record labels a reach around at the same time was the unlimited music for $9.99/mo. Napster balked saying no one would pay that kind of subscription fee.

The lawsuits became so much that the music service had to shut its doors. In an attempt to resurrect themselves just a year or two later, they finally adopted the music subscription model but it was too little too late.

Other music subscriptions came along such as Rhapsody but never gained any kind of real market share. Rhapsody is still open and charges a monthly fee but it just never gained the traction needed.

Spotify Arrives!

In 2008, a new music service, Spotify, launched in Europe. The model was of the subscription type where consumers could pay a monthly fee for the ability to stream any music in their catalog.

The service gained huge popularity in Europe while consumers in the United States clamored for access. Month after month, year after year, the rumors surfaced that Spotify was preparing their U.S. launch and it never came… until last week.

In the meantime, consumers have been inundated with cloud-based web apps. They use Gmail from the web, Facebook for interactions with friends and family, Twitter for persistent real-time communication. Consumers have lost their desire to want to own their own data, and as such, the droning drumbeat of Spotify in Europe as a music subscription service is now arriving in the U.S. past the tipping point of data ownership needs.

That’s a long way of saying – people don’t care if they own their music anymore if they’ve got everything they need in a music service that doesn’t provide ownership.

The Case for Physical and Owned Digital Media

Through the years, I’ve always been a proponent of having my music in a digital format as opposed to a streaming service. I’d rather buy the album on iTunes or Amazon MP3 and know I have it than just stream it from somewhere.

I’ve wanted to play music on demand and not have to rely on a faux-radio service like Pandora to get it done. I like Pandora. I pay for Pandora. But I can’t listen to the songs I want to on demand as part of their licensing agreement with the labels.

I like having dick-measuring competitions about how big my music library is. The bigger it is, the better I am. I must be a more serious music lover. Or so I’ve felt.

With the ownership model, I could take my music everywhere. Hell, even cars have iPod jacks in them so that 50GB library can be taken on the road. I could go for a run and listen to an assortment of playlists for just such an occasion or I could have my library with me for when I need to drum up an impromptu karaoke song and can’t remember how the song starts.

I thought.

In fact, I thought until last week when Spotify launched in the United States. Now… I don’t care about my digital music library. Every argument for it has been shattered into a million small (yet suitably sharp and jagged and “hope you’re wearing sandals so you don’t cut your feet”) pieces.

Spotify is the Music Messiah

At one point, I thought it was important to take my music with me wherever I go. I still do. Spotify has apps for every major mobile device (and if you don’t have a mobile strategy in anything, you lose) and they all tightly integrate with the web service and related desktop apps for both Windows and Mac. Everything is synced. And you can listen to music offline!

At some point I was very concerned about how big my music library was. I feared a catastrophic data loss that would wipe out my years of music collection, purchasing and playlist assembly. Of course, there were backups but that took forever over a network or to an external hard drive.

Spotify solves this by integrating with all your DRM-free music on iTunes or other music player, importing them, making them available in the cloud or offline. It also eliminates the need to have music library. Who needs a music library when every major label is signed on to provide their catalog to the service. I have the entire music world as my music library. My dick, by definition, is therefore bigger.

But the real killer in Spotify is the ingenious social aspect. Sure, you can have a lot of music. Sure, you can have playlists. Sure, you can have subscription models. Sure, you can have mobile availability.

Spotify put the biggest teenage-era “I love you” method in digital format by allowing the mix tape to be replaced by playlists… that are sharable with someone, some service or the world.

Queue up your Bieber-esque bee-bop feel good technosailor dance-esque songlists… the mix tape has gone digital!

It’s the End of the World as We Know It… And I Feel Fine

Spotify will undoubtedly continue to evolve. Launching in the United States gives them a much larger audience to tap into for feedback and expectations. I would like to see the social integration tighter and more obvious, but all in good time.

Rarely does a game changer come along. A lot of people think they have the game changing app… but it never happens. This is, in fact, the revolution that we’ve been waiting for. I no longer even think about my iTunes library, Amazon MP3 purchasing or other digital media. Everything I need is right there in my dick-sized music library.

Photo by Cerebro Humano

Verizon iPhone Raises New Predicaments

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For as long as the iPhone has been out, I have been opposed to it. Not because of the iPhone per se. In fact, it’s a great looking device with intuitive design. But over the years there have been fundamental flaws that have prevented me from buying it. These flaws, in my mind, have been:

  • Doesn’t allow native apps
  • Apple tries to control too much
  • Not open source
  • AT&T-only
  • Lack of like-kind competition
  • Antenna/reception issues
  • Crappy mic
  • Crappy camera

Photo by Witer

There are other concerns I’ve raised but the reality is, most of this has been resolved now.

For instance, the iPhone 3G introduced the App concept. They’ve put a better mic and camera in. The antenna situation for the iPhone 4, well… that still exists but at least there’s a lifehack to prevent it.

Some things won’t change. The OS will never be open source like Android. That’s probably not a deal-breaker for me. Apple will still try to control how app developers and users use their device, but whatever.

Here’s the thing that changes the paradigm and makes me re-examine my suppositions… Verizon now has the iPhone 4 as of this morning. Presumably, this means no more silly lack of coverage in major metropolitan areas like NYC and San Francisco. Supposedly, that means that events like Inauguration, ACL Fest and SXSW won’t be dark as a result of weak coverage.

And of course, that bodes well for AT&T and their network load as well because, perhaps up to half of their iPhone customer base will migrate to Verizon. Their customers have been clamoring for this day.

But now what do I do? With all of the paradigm shifting, I’m now placed in an awkward position. Should I buy the Verizon iPhone or not?

Updated: I should add… no one knows yet how the iPhone will behave on Verizon’s network. My recommendation is to treat it like all Rev A Apple Hardware… don’t buy it on Day 1 and don’t wait in line. Let the idiot early adopters work out the kinks before jumping in. You’re already probably in a contract so just wait a few minutes.

I’m Pro Choice. I’m Android.

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We in the tech world are a fickle bunch. On one side of our brain, we scream about openness and freedoms. We verbally disparage anyone who would dare mess with our precious Internet freedoms. Many of us, especially in my WordPress community, swear allegiance to licensing that ensures data and code exchanges on open standards.

Yet one thing stands out to me as an anomaly on this, the opening day of pre-orders for the iPhone 4.


Photo by laihiu on Flickr

Ah yes. The iPhone. The gadget that makes grown men quake in their shoes. The thing that causes adults to behave as if they left their brains at the door. At one point in time, I called this behavior “an applegasm” and identified the Apple store as the place where intelligent people go to die.

And it’s not only the iPhone. It’s the iPad too (I bought one 3 weeks after release and only because I needed it for some client work). In fact, it’s any Apple device. Apple has a way of turning people into automatons controlled by the Borg in Cupertino.

Don’t get me wrong. I love Apple and I love Apple products. However, there is a degree of hypocrisy (or shall we call it “situational morality”) that comes into play here. There is nothing “open” about Apple products. Sure, Steve Jobs famously points out that Apple encourages the use of open web standards like HTML5, CSS3 and Javascript, but the devices are nowhere near open.

In fact, the devices are so closed and guarded that strange things like lost stolen iPhone prototypes make huge news. There is only one device. There is only one operating system. There is only one permitted way of designing apps. There is only one carrier (in the United States).

And the open standards, web-free, maniacal tech world that is ready to take off the heads of closed entities like Microsoft, Facebook and Palm, whistle silently and look the other way when it comes to Apple.

In another few weeks, I am going to be eligible for an upgrade with Verizon Wireless. As a longtime BlackBerry user (I refuse to give money to AT&T ever), I will be investing in a new Android-based phone. I won’t be doing this with any kind of religious conviction about open source. There is a legitimate place for closed source in this world. I’m doing this because the culture of openness (which supersedes the execution of openness, in my mind), allows for more innovation and creativity.

In the Android world (which is quickly catching up to the iPhone world), apps are being created without the artificial restrictions placed by a single gatekeeper. There are more choices in phones. Don’t like this one? Try that one. There is a greater anticipation around what can be done.

Apple had to have its arm twisted to enable multitasking in it’s latest operating system. It had to have its arm twisted to allow cut and paste. It still hasn’t provided a decent camera, despite consumers begging for one. In the Android world, if Motorola doesn’t provide it, maybe HTC does. You have choice. Choice is good.

I’m pro choice.

Do Not Lock In To One Device Lest You Kill Your Company

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It’s funny. Comical even. A few weeks ago, I wrote that The iPhone is to Smartphones as IE6 was to Browsers. Most of the readers of that article agreed with me but almost all had a “but, but, but…” argument. This is because the iPhone is one sexy beast to users, even though AT&T can’t seem to support the iPhone, as we also noted.

This is a comical observation because my position was endorsed (if not directly) by Peter-Paul Koch who daintily comments that “[He] will shout at web developers who think that delicately inserting an iPhone up their ass is the same as mobile web development.” He goes on to slam the web development community to catering to the iPhone in the same broken-record way that web developers catered to IE6 ten years ago.

Photo by Matt Buchanan

And adding insult to injury, the Guardian also picked up that story and offered their own ringing endorsement for both Peter-Paul and my perspectives.

I just got off the phone with an unnamed entrepreneur who wants to build a product that, while looking to the future and planning to diversify over a variety of products, looks at Apple’s forthcoming iPad as the launch device. I will offer you the same advice I offered him as well as the same advice I offer to iPhone only products like Gowalla.

If you want to start on the iPad, fine. You better be damn sure you’re ready to diversify quickly. I don’t care if you put it on a non-touch device like, oh I don’t know, the web with a normal browser on a normal computer… do not disenfranchise users. Peter-Paul Koch notes, in the article I linked to above, that the iPhone carries only 15% of the worldwide mobile market. Yet it gets an insane amount of attention as if it was the most important product ever created.

Newsflash… it’s not. It’s not even close.

In fact, it’s still not a business class phone (with rare exception). And in fact, developers continue to ignore other platforms… like the BlackBerry.

Sidenote: It’s okay to have a mobile web interface but don’t lose the forest through the trees. Users will feel like second-hand citizens if you don’t pay attention to their needs.

Mobile developers: Think before you develop only for the iPhone or only for the iPad. Entrepreneurs: Think before you start a company or launch a product made exclusively, or designed with a business model only for the iPhone or the iPad.

The iPhone is to Smartphones as IE6 was to Browsers

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A few years ago when Apple stormed on the scene with their new, revolutionary phone that they called the iPhone, a moment in history occurred that would change the mobile space. It suddenly became possible for rich web browsing from a mobile phone. It became possible to listen to music in a natural way on your phone. Touch screens became the norm.

A year later, Apple announced their second generation phone, the iPhone 3G. With it, they opened up the ecosystem even more by allowing developers to build third party apps that could run on the iPhone. 50 million apps later, it is still the best thing about the iPhone.


Apple made some mistakes during this process, as it would naturally be assumed they would as a relative newbie to the phone manufacturing world. They took too long to open up the device to third party apps and when they did, they employed draconian and inconsistent rules that were undocumented, uncommunicated and, generally frustrating to companies building apps for the iPhone.

When their third generation phone, the iPhone 3GS emerged, there were some improvements (such as cut and paste, video and voice control), but the more frustrating aspects of the device remained unchanged. The iPhone still doesn’t provide a flash for its camera. It still doesn’t support Flash. It still can’t be tethered as was promised (at least in the United States under AT&T).

Worse, the inherent failure of the iPhone (undoubtedly expected to be it’s greatest appeal) is the restriction of the operating system to a single Apple device. I get why. But now let’s flip the card.

Google today announced the Nexus One, a new Android-powered phone that, in the words of Good Morning Silicon Valley, is “a worthy iPhone competitor“. Actually, that’s a tame phrase. Let me give you a piece of this article titled, “Google vs. Apple: There Will be Blood”:

No single device is going to “œkill” the iPhone, and that’s not really Google’s intent anyway, iPhone users being the heavy Web traffickers that they are. But Google does have a strong interest in fostering enough competition to keep Apple from dominating the mobile market, which is why it chose the strategy it did “” providing a strong and improving platform that could support multiple manufacturers offering multiple models to multiple demographic segments across multiple carriers. Google doesn’t need to tear down the iPhone; it just needs to make sure there are plenty of attractive alternatives for smartphone shoppers who for various reasons don’t feel compelled to join the Apple-AT&T axis. As an Android flagship, unlocked but initially aligned with T-Mobile, the Nexus One fits as part of that plan.

And now it might be time to note that Google is winning this battle. Besides last years flop G1 launch with T-Mobile (I’ll be honest, the thing was a brick and ran on a very early version of Android so not surprised it really didn’t go anywhere), Verizon Wireless has just launched the Droid by Motorola and the Droid Eris by HTC. They are promising three Android phones in 2010. T-Mobile is now launching with the Nexus One and Verizon Wireless should get it this spring.

AT&T will not get an Android phone as long as they have an exclusive relationship with Apple.

The road to victory is very clear and Google has the advantage. Despite Android being open source, it’s patron saint is Google. Therefore, Google has distribution interest. The more Android phones that can be sold and made – of multiple varieties – on multiple carriers – possibly including Netbooks, the more they control the market. The more Apple fails to radicalize their roadmap with the iPhone, the more they lose the market.

Let’s go back a few years. The great browser wars of the 1990s were dwindling down as NEtscape was acquired by AOL then turned into a bastard half-breed of itself. Firefox, under leadership of the Mozilla Foundation, was blazing new paths in the browser market. Microsoft had largely cooled its heels standardizing around Internet Explorer 6. No further browsers were expected to be made. The battle had been fought, the war had been won. Microsoft ruled supreme.

That was what they thought. Meanwhile, Firefox kept making progress gradually stealing market share here or there like a rogue flitting through shadows snatching purses and wallets.

This opened the door to other browsers – Opera, Safari, eventually Google Chrome – to enter the marketplace. Microsoft realized they had sat on their heels too long and finally began building Internet Explorer 7. Internet Explorer 8 would soon follow. Internet Explorer 9 is around the corner. All of the sudden, when competition increased, Microsoft ran heavy and ran hard to keep up.

This is where Apple is going.

In about 6 months, if history teaches us anything, Apple will launch their 4th generation iPhone. Conventional wisdom suggests that the fat days of Apple and AT&T operating in lockstep are over. Conventional business wisdom suggests that the iPhone must radically alter the playing field with this release to stay competitive in the market. While the iPhone still has market share, so did IE6. While Apple sits back and does incremental enhancements and call them major releases, the scrappy Android will take market share if given the opportunity.

What are your thoughts on this extremely interesting business environment?

* Photo by ColorblindPICASSO

Can we Identify the United States as a Bad AT&T Service Area?

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AT&T has upped the ante on their service level. Seems they realize they have a really bad reputation of “Fewer bars in more places” and Verizon Wireless is taking it to them with their “There’s a map for that” ads. These ads caused AT&T to sue Verizon Wireless because the ads apparently misrepresented the truth (though AT&T never denied the ads validity – the maps are comparisons between Verizon Wireless’all-3G network and AT&T’s much more limited 3G network that complements a larger non-3G calling network). Subsequently, AT&T dropped their suit after it became clear they would not win.

So AT&T admits they have bad service back in September (video below) with “Seth the Blogger Guy” (LOLWUT?) and then sues Verizon Wireless for not being wrong (LOLHUHWUT?)

Now AT&T, according to Download Squad has released a new iPhone app to let users submit reports of bad service. Presumably this QA process will help AT&T beef up their network coverage in the areas that are lacking…. like the United States (LOLWTFWUT?).

Because really, if you can’t get reliable service at AT&T Park in San Francisco, the heart of iPhone zealotry, why not just mark the whole network as unreliable?

This jockeying comes at a critical time when Apple is deciding whether to renew their exclusive relationship with AT&T or to expand to other networks like Verizon Wireless who are preparing to launch their 4G LTE network nationwide. Meanwhile, Verizon is planning at least three new Android phones in 2010 raising the spectre of a holy war among iPhone loyalists and Android fans.

As my friend Jimmy Gardner says on Twitter regarding the multi-tasking ability that is making current Android phones so much more desirable than the iPhone:

From a former iphone snob … had u a droid you could check the traffic while listening to pandora At the Same Time

I’m just saying.

* Thumbnail image by Aaron Landry