Contentinople - Erin Barker - News Bits: SanDisk's SlotMusic Cards

Written by Erin Barker

Monday, September 22. 2008 at 11:59 AM EDT 1 comment

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SanDisk Corp. (Nasdaq: SNDK) announced SlotMusic MicroSD memory cards today to worse reviews from the blogosphere than Jerry Seinfeld's Microsoft commercials. The cards, which carry full albums of DRM-free MP3s, will be sold alongside CDs in stores like Best Buy and Wal-Mart.

The New York Times has reported that they will sell for $7 to $10, but Tech Crunch's Michael Arrington seems doubtful since "the retail price of the SanDisk microSD card alone is currently about $8.50" and "included with every purchase is a USB converter, which adds more to the price." The Wall Street Journal predicts a $15 price.

Gigaom said the cards are "destined to fail," pointing out that consumers seem to be moving away from "physical media."

The Silicon Alley Insider's Peter Kafka, however, concedes that it's "maybe not the worst idea we've ever heard," explaining that the cards could work, not as a CD replacement, but as an accessory for cellphones and other low-end hardware.

In other news:

ABC Inc. has updated its online full episode player from Move Networks Inc. with a redesigned interface and true full-screen capabilities. Unfortunately it appears to have lost the range of different screen size choices that we had appreciated so much.

At the Emmy Awards last night, some award winners seemed to be feeling anxiety about their shows' online presence: "30 Rock is available to be viewed on NBC.com, Hulu.com, iTunes, Verizon phones, United Airlines and occasionally on actual television," 30 Rock writer, creator, and actress Tina Fey said in one of her four acceptance speeches. (30 Rock has some of the most popular shows on Hulu LLC and other sites, despite lagging in broadcast ratings.) "Love TV and fear the Internet," Barry Sonnenfeld said simply after winning his award for directing Pushing Daisies.

Tags: ABC, DRM, Hulu, Music, NBC, Video

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Total Bust. DRM-Free DOA says Steve Jobs and Edward Bronfan
Christopher Levy
Rank: Caliph
Monday September 22, 2008 12:13:10 PM

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Not to pee on SanDisk's Picnic but this effort will bomb. Consumers can barely get their phones to answer calls and now SanDisk want's them to use their phone to play MP3's?

This coming from the company that lost nearly $20Million on the TakeTV effort with the FanFare store?

It's one thing to recognize that the entire DRM-Free movement is a total failure. It's another to just pile on more expense and wasted effort trying to push the sale of memory cards. From Steve Jobs in the New York Times this past week: ""The iTunes market share is just growing since they started this."

"DRM on the download business hasn't really moved the needle frankly, growth trends haven't changed DRM or DRM-free," Bronfman relayed during a recent interview at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia Conference in New York.

I wish the DM's at Companies like SanDisk would actually recognize the reasons the music industry is failing and address it. Until someone forces Apple to license FairPlay, the entire DRM-Free movement, whether it be OTA downloads, On MiniSD Cards, Free on CD's or any other mode, is DOA.

[Both quotes from Paul Resnikoff’s DMN at:

http://digitalmusicnews.com/stories/092108parting/view ]

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