Here’s what I’m listening to these days online: it’s been quite an eye-opener to me that I can actually buy music online like this! After all, I don’t EVEN live in the boondocks… I live in Asia where US companies don’t typically want to provide any online music experiences. So here they are:
#1: KKBox wanted my money, so I put down a subscription with them. And they made it so easy to pay: I could have paid in any of a dozen different ways, including just going to the local convenience store, and handing over my cash! This is a screenshot that includes some recently popular songs. The only caveat was that I had to set my default language on my PC to Chinese, which of course, broke one of my blogging applications. Never mind.
#2. Last.FM made it really easy, too. So I plumped to spend money with them. Nothing needed to download, but it works. And there are software programs you can use if you need to.
#3. I also put my money with Sky.FM who wanted it. Nothing to download here. Just play the stream in your favorite player.
It’s not that I didn’t want to give it to Emusic – they wanted too much with too many conditions attached, including paying for a catalogue that I couldn’t access – well done, Sony BMG!; iTunes wanted the money for the products (iPod, iPhone, iTouch, etc.) but didn’t want to provide the services to my country of residence; Pandora just shrank from the challenge of facing too many lawyers, without a good excuse.
I’m still looking at other replacements for Emusic now, but haven’t really found any yet… Suggestions?