You can listen to the radio for free if you just want to listen to music you know. Some people actually like to go back and listen to the music they buy more than once. iTunes has the biggest music library out there. Not just 500. You can rip a CD from many programs not just iTunes. Mossberg was just giving an example of 500. Many of the subcription models also require you to pay again if you want to make a CD. This is what is really a rip off with those services. You could have bought it already without paying the subcription price with iTunes.

You can listen to the radio for free if you just want to listen to music you know.

Right, so the people who only buy music they know on iTunes are wasting their money, since they could just listen to it on the radio.

Some people actually like to go back and listen to the music they buy more than once. iTunes has the biggest music library out there. Not just 500. You can rip a CD from many programs not just iTunes. Mossberg was just giving an example of 500. What? iTunes has more than 500 songs? You're kidding! Geesh, yes, we know it has a million songs. Nobody here was stupid enough to think its just 500 songs, and there's 1 million people who've bought all 500.

But you CANNOT rip a CD of iTMS music from any program other than iTunes.

Many of the subcription models also require you to pay again if you want to make a CD. This is what is really a rip off with those services. You could have bought it already without paying the subcription price with iTunes.

Man, you people really live in the world of the ignorant, don't you. First off, in a subscription model, you don't "buy" the music, so you're not paying again to burn it, you're paying to buy it, then do what you want.

More importantly, your concept of "you could've bought it without paying the subscription" is completely true. But guess what. None of the subscription services forces you to have a subscription before you buy. You could just go to Napster and buy the freaking song. So, subscriptions are an optional service.

Now, why would someone want to use it. Let's try to go over this again, esp. for you "No one wants to rent music" and "subscriptions are dumb" neanderthals (although I don't know why I try, since there's no explanation that will make you understand - you're like the "world is flat" people who won't believe its not, even with satellite images. But just to try, I'll try to make it easy to comprehend.)

First, you're right, you could just buy the song and then burn it. But that assumes you want to burn it to CD at all (most of my music is just on my computer, I haven't burned all my iTMS stuff to CD, mainly because I rarely if ever listen to CDs). But, this all assumes you KNOW you WANT the song to begin with. Sure, some people know what music they want and just buy that (a lot of my collection is made up of purchases like that). Then again, wouldn't you like to know whether an album from one of your favorite artists is worth buying? Don't you hate getting an album and then determining it sucks, and you'll probably never listen to it again (and if you say you've never bought music that turns out sucks, you either don't buy but a CD a year, or you're lying).

But also some people also just like to try music the DON'T KNOW. You know, new artists, new genres. Unknowns in so many different ways. Why? I don't know. Mayb

Wait, but that's not all. If you're into current music (and some people are, esp. that teenage crowd with mom's money to burn), you want to listen to all the current c*** that's out there. But it is mostly c***, stuff you wouldn't want to hear next year or ever again (hey, its Wham! and Debbie Gibson all over again!). But if you bought the music, you're screwed, doubly. Because now you've wasted $10 on "Wake me up before you go-go", and you'll now use it again.

Hey, but get a subscription, you can listed to all this trash you want, because its what people are listening to, and then you can just throw it out when you're done. No wasted money, because you got to listen to it when you wanted for as long as you did.

Finally, its all about how much music do you normally buy. If, in the course of a year you buy 12 albums, yes, you'd be stupid to get a subscription. However, if you normally buy 5 albums a month, there's no way to say that you'd be saving money just getting a subscription ($50 a month vs. $5 or $10 or $15 a month). In fact, for each month you would buy CDs, you save enough to pay for at least 3 more months of subscriptions (or 4 more months, or 9 more months, depending on your subscription price). So, after one year of CD buying, you still have saved enough for another 3 years of subscription buying. After several years, you will saved enough to pay for the subscription for as long as you live.

Oh, and since you have the subscription, guess what. You're not limited to those freakin' 5 CDs a month. Nope. You can listen to whatever music you want to. Yeah, how about that. Actually being able to listen to an entire music library worth of music for one price. On iTMS, you'd have to spend $1 million to do that.

And, yes, you can spend some more money to actually ''buy" music you really like so you can burn it to CD (if that's what you want), but then you still save, because you've bought what you really really like, not just what you think you like.

Oh, and for IP Freely, Most people do not download "Tons of stuff"; they purchase their favorite stuff. Only people who are into "Flavor of the month" do silly things like that, and most people do not want to pay for the privilege of listening to "tons of stuff". That's why subscription do not work; people want to pay for thing they want, not the potential to listen to "tons of stuff."

To say "Most people" is a nice thought, but who did this survey? And who cares if 'most people' do only want to buy. That means some people want to subscribe. If some people do, then there's a market. If there's a market, then it can work.

And, in my view, there's a lot more people into the 'flavor of the month' then you give credit to. There are a lot of people with thousands of CDs. There are people who are into new music. Again, esp. the teenage to mid-20's crowd. The college cro

All of which explains why the subscription services are stagnent and the ITMS is booming. Argue all you like.