Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Radiohead gets it, apart from the UI

In a move reminiscent of Prince's CD giveaway, Radiohead are selling their seventh album without the help (or hindrance) of a major label. On http://www.inrainbows.com/ you can purchase the download version from October 10, or pre-order and pay now, an activation code will be sent by email.

The smart move is to leave the pricing open, i.e. the user chooses the price s/he feels appropriate, plus a 45p credit card fee. I chose £3.33, which is about 5€. The nice thing is that I'm pretty sure that the artists will get my full 5 euro, rather than between 6% and 8% of a 15€ CD.

A box set is also available to be shipped, at a price point of £40.00. This is great for fans, not casual listeners like me.

Not so smart is the website layout. These guys should stick to the day job of making music, and leave website design to professionals.

There is no word on the file format. My assumption is unprotected MP3, if not I'll be majorly disappointed.

This is a great example of artists taking control of their commercial models back from the labels (who have bungled every digital initiative so far). Music as a digital good is not only a saleable product in itself, but also a means to market concerts, physical CDs, DVDs, t-shirts and whatever. Watch out for more.

1 comment:

Anne Marie Cunningham said...

Agree awful website. It is so jumpy! And it keeps telling me I am only allowed one download and then shows that I have nothing in the basket anyway! So I can't manage to order it at all.