subscription servicesGoodeReader had a good little write-up this morning on a piece of news that slipped past my radar: Apple is a giving the axe to their free single-of-the-week promotion. Jillian Koskie speculates in her analysis that Apple may be shifting away from a download model into a more Spotify-esque subscription service.

I think that is entirely likely. It seems like the entire content consumption model is moving in that direction, across all media industries. I’m not sure it’s a good thing, necessarily—there are definitely some anti-consumer bugs in the whole ‘Cloud’ system. For instance, when I upgraded my iPad, I had to pay again for at least three apps I was sure I owned already. If a creator removes their app from the store, it will not be available for re-download via the Cloud, and it seems a few of them then go on to release a Version 2 app—which is identical—but for which pre-existing users like me have to pay again. And I have purchased one album in my life from the iTunes store, and it’s gone now…

I am more careful with my books, and download them all to Calibre for safekeeping. But even that can seem sometimes like a chore I could see myself letting go of someday. It’s one of the few tech chores I have which actually requires my computer. If I skipped Calibre and just downloaded straight into Dropbox, I could go all-tablet…

I think that for (relatively speaking) old folks like me, there is still an ingrained desire to own. But I can see that changing, and fast, for the kids. There are so many subscription services that kids already use—our school alone uses Reading A-Z, Tumblebooks, Dreambox for math and a handful of others. And the consequence of that will be that content will become a lot less precious. If you never owned it in the first place, why would you be affronted when it gets taken away? One album disappears, but they get a new one to take its place. A book you read already is no longer available? Who cares? You’ve already read it. You’ll just read a different one. They will get used to just logging in, consuming whatever content happens to be available, then logging out and waiting until next time. There will always be SOMETHING to read or watch or hear…

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