Tuesday, January 8, 2008

How Stupid Can You Get?

I read yesterday that Sony was going to join the DRM free MP3 fray.

I was very excited. Since Amazon started offering MP3 downloads I haven't bought any DRMed music. Since iTunes started selling Music, I've encouraged my wife to only buy music online.

Finally the king-of-DRM Sony was going to give up and start offering DRM-free music.

Then I read this.

In order to buy Sony DRM free music - wait for it - you have to go to ... A STORE.

What!?

You have to go to a store to buy a card that has a scratch-off code. You then have to scratch that code off, and then can only download one of 37 albums.

Not individual songs, just whole albums. I suppose that it reduces the environmental impact of those CDs and packaging, but really!?

How stupid can a company be? Oh well, I should have expected that with Sony.

1 comment:

Russelldad said...

"Oh well, I should have expected that with Sony."

Don't beat yourself up. Sony has consistently surpassed the expectations of mere mortals with creative ways of making products frustrating, nay... annoying, nay... infuriating to use or consume.

This may be their crowning achievement and as such you can not expect to have foreseen it. They are masters of a business universe we can not hope to comprehend.