Brian's Brain

Continuing onward from iPod Predictions: Lend Me Your Brain!

1)Move a significant portion of the customer base to a subscription model a la Napster To Go based on Microsoft's Janus DRM. Part of me thinks this'll be really hard, and that by the time Microsoft and its partners get a significant enough portion of the customer base comfortable with the idea of not permanently owning the content they listen to, Apple will have its own subscription service up and running. But I acknowledge that part of my reluctance is a 'generation gap' phenomenon; after 38 years, I'm well trained on the idea that you buy music at a record store, but today's teenagers aren't brainwashed to the same degree. Frankly, I own very few DVDs; my wife and I love the Blockbuster Online rental service, so why does music have to be any different? And maybe I'm further down the path to a music rental future than I'm consciously acknowledging; we do, after all, subscribe to Sirius Radio.
2)'Hook' consumers on the ubiquity of WMA format support; not only in digital audio players, but also in cell phones, PDAs, computers, DVD players and network-connected multimedia appliances. Right now the only way to play iTunes content through your home theater stack in the livingroom is via an Airport Express widget; an expensive kludge. And the rollout of the Motorola-branded iTunes phones is indefinitely delayed. Then again, Microsoft Smartphones haven't exactly set the world on fire, and even I don't listen to music on my Pocket PC anymore.
3)Finally, raise the bar on required player features to include not only audio and still images, but also video. Microsoft's sure trying hard to kick-start the Portable Media Center idea in conjunction with partners like Creative and Samsung, and Archos has had its own MPEG-4-based products for several years. But none of them have really taken off. I remember being pitched on the PMC concept at CES a few years back; I didn't get it then, and I don't get it now. Maybe if I spent several hours each day riding the subway, I'd find one useful for catching up on episodes of 24 and House. But as it stands, most of my travel takes place on Amtrak trains and airplanes, both of which are perfectly appropriate places for laptops. I can use freeware such as DVArchive or WinReplayPC to transfer stored program content from my ReplayTV to that laptop. And, unlike with a PMC, I can watch DVDs on that laptop, too.

You've now read my State of the Audio Industry Address, as of 5:15PM PST on Monday, March 14, 2005. I strongly suspect that my perspective will shift at least a little bit by June 9, both in response to the information the vendors I've contacted share with me, to my hands-on experience with hardware, software and services as part of my research, and to your comments. So have at it, willya? Thanks, I look forward to you all showing me just how dumb I really am ;-)