Borders is opening a “concept store” in Michigan today that, the retailer hopes, will cause shoppers to return to the struggling chain’s stores; among the renovations is–perhaps unsurprisingly–a downsized music section, with the space being used for “several computer stations where customers can burn music CDs [and] download music and audiobooks onto MP3 players.” Borders’ library contains 2.4 million songs, although there’s no word as far as which labels are on offer. Still, it sounds like a somewhat decent idea as far as getting people in the habit of buying music again, right? And yet: A seven-song CD with art costs $9.99; and “the digital services don’t work with Apple’s iPod, something Borders says it’s working on.” [Ann Arbor News]
Borders Hoping To Get People Excited About Buying Music In Stores Again
February 14th, 2008 // 15 Comments
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I got a great idea… put vinyl in there, I might show up. Who the hell buys CDs anymore?
the digital services don’t work with Apple’s iPod
Oh good god. When will one of these businesses start off working with the goddamn dominant model instead of trying to create something from scratch?
They should put a Personics cassette machine in! Ahead of some retro curve or other.
A location about a half-hour away has been offering the music section kiosk/thingamabob since Xmas, and I usually see kids planted and browsing for music on the two or three monitors dedicated to music (as opposed to the family tree hub, or photos-while-you-wait! half of the circle). I haven’t had a chance to use the new system, since I tend to leave my house to get away from the computer, and I prefer to destroy the world with mountains of shrink-wrap and discarded in-store coupons, anyhow. The non-iPod friendliness and paying $10 for a semi-soft burn of the new Xiu Xiu just doesn’t cut the mustard, as far as I’m concerned.
As far as vinyl is concerned, that would seem like an outer-space type of scenario to whomever dreamt up this mortal kiosk. The whole allure of buying/browsing for music on the internet is to do away with intermediary sources and choice, and not be held by Borders-only formats and sleekly designed places to (gasp) sit down and do it all, in public (double gasp)!
And just to clarify, I’ve been tempted to peek over the shoulder of some of the takers in-store, but that seems like a breach of privacy.
Ya, why don’t I buy some compressed files when the uncompressed CD is right there. Why don’t brick and mortar stores leverage that?
and “the digital services don’t work with Apple’s iPod, something Borders says it’s working on.”
I hear they also have some ideas on solving this whole Israel-Palestine conflict, too!
How about lowering the price of CDs? That would bring folks back. Bookstores sell CDs at such ridiculously marked up prices it is surprising that they bother at all…
Wait, so who drives someplace to download music? Are they trying to sell to the homeless people who have a myspace that they only access from the library? Maybe to the poor kid who would always call my house collect from the pay phone at Burger King in elementary school?
@Chris Molanphy: that elicited lulz, I’m not even going to front.
@SuperUnison: I just love the casualness of the statement. Like, Yeah, y’know that whole Fairplay thing, the technology that the whole record industry can’t get Apple to license to anyone and that ensures the iTunes-iPod dulopoly, thereby preventing any other music seller from directly providing content to the No. 1 music player of all time? Yeah, just wait, we’re gonna figure that one out! Us and our friend Pablo here!
Too little + too late.
Besides, free always gets the masses.
@KemosabeK: I hope you guys are right, but I’ll believe it when I see it. Jobs is a renowned control freak (and I love him for it) — so if another retailer besides Starbucks is going to be given permission to pass tracks directly to an iPod, it’s going to be micromanaged to the hilt.
So is this for those people who don’t own notebook computers nor have access to the internet? Sounds like a profitable demographic, right.
@Chris Molanphy: In fairness, this comment is filtered through a quite-possibly-digitally-ignorant reporter. I suspect what Borders has is one of two things:
1) They may have one of those created-by-another-company “branded stores” that sells tracks in WMA-”Plays For Sure!”-or-whatever-it’s-called DRM’d form. Borders’ technology and strategy people or whoever’s in charge of this then means: “We’re negotiating with the labels to allow us to sell DRM-free MP3s. If they let us, and we hope they will, then the service will be iPod-friendly.”
or
2) They may be selling DRM-free MP3s, but iTunes works on the concept that you have a single integrated store-and-”library” on your computer with which an iPod/Phone/Touch is associated, and there is no way to add MP3s to an iPod “on the fly” and have them play through the portable iTunes interface. [The new ability to buy tracks wirelessly with the iPhone is doable because Apple rewrote iTunes to sync the library between the home computer and the phone computer.] Maybe Borders is saying they’re in talks with Apple to add hooks to the portable version of iTunes that allow you to “import” a non-protected track on the go.
Wow! Lots of cynicism here. I think DHMBIB got it right. The music labels themselves, with their irrational paranoia, caused the Apple dominance they now despise. Borders and other retailers (online and offline), can’t get music to the iPod because of the DRM. Now that the labels are finally seeing the light, Borders should be able to get rights to DRM free MP3 files that will allow access to the iPod. Based on his open letter to the labels last year, it seems that Steve Jobs also supports DRM free music and would be willing to open up the iPod platform. After all, that makes it easier to sell more iPods.
Why leave the house to download music for an iPod anyway? I could stay home and use iTunes.