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back to article Amazon warns you have 30 days before Music Storage files bloodbath

Amazon says subscribers to its moribund Music Storage Service have 30 days to claim any song files they have stored on the service or lose them forever. The Bezos Bunch says that, on April 29, new subscriptions to Music Storage will be cut off and current subscriptions will be allowed to run out. When that happens, those who …

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        1. Malcolm Weir Silver badge
          Reply Icon

          Re: Too expensive for Amazon

          @Adam JC £3 is about the same price you'd spend on a MoccaChoccaLatteFrappaChino

          Ha! No it isn't!

          It's *less* than you'd spend on a (single) ...

          3 0 Reply
        2. Alumoi Silver badge
          Reply Icon

          Re: Too expensive for Amazon

          That equates to £3 a month (Less than the cost of a single album). I listen to the service almost all day at work and also whilst doing service calls in my van..

          £3 + internet access + maybe going over you data plan, say around £20 per month or £240 per year. How many CDs/song could you BUY with these money?

          1 1 Reply
          1. Charles 9
            Reply Icon

            Re: Too expensive for Amazon

            Data plan is a sunk cost because it was obtained for other reasons (say it's a listed business expense). And more plans have no data caps in order to keep customers. Sunk costs and no data caps takes out the two chief concerns. A "no need to listen again" takes out the main reason for downloading.

            0 0 Reply
          2. Adam JC
            Reply Icon

            Re: Too expensive for Amazon

            If we're going down that route, you can start factoring in how I dropped my TV license for Netflix.. that's £150/year better off. I also don't solely use my internet connection at home for Spotify, so a moot point. My data plan is 20GB (Of which streaming is actually not taken out of this allowance, bazinga!) and I don't solely use my mobile phone for Spotify.

            0 0 Reply
        3. Lucasjkr
          Reply Icon

          Re: Too expensive for Amazon

          The future of subscription based everything makes me want to wretch. Seriously.

          I had Apple Music (and I still do turn it on from time to time, if I want to hear a bunch of stuff to decide what to buy), and even in the short time I had it initially, I kept adding stuff to my library, and then a month, two months later get greeted with "this song is no longer available".

          This isn't an Apple thing.

          Years ago, for a brief moment, the entire James Bond movie collection was on Netflix. I actually still watch them all at least once or twice a year, even if its just in the background, and was like "yes! I don't need these DVD's anymore, that's awesome!", and then sure enough, it all get taken down from Netflix, some re-appeared on Amazon.

          On youtube, I'll see something i like, and find that hte owner took it down later on, or Google took it down at the request of something else.

          Even more recently, It's Always Sunny was taken down from Netflix. I think it moved to Amazon or Hulu or whatever. So now, I need two subscriptions? No, I bought it.

          Point is, by buying into these subscription services, we're forced to only be offered what's in each of theirs limited collections. Sure, they might seem vast, you only find out their limited AFTER they remove something that you thought you had and wanted. And then it'll hit you that you're paying perpetual license fees and you're not even sure if the content you want will be included in it...

          11 0 Reply
          1. Anonymous Coward
            Reply Icon
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Too expensive for Amazon

            " Sure, they might seem vast, you only find out their limited AFTER they remove something that you thought you had and wanted."

            Amazon gave me a free month's trial of their Prime subscription. Looked at what came with it - and checked out the films in various categories. Nothing I wanted.

            A bit like our local Public Library. It's good - if you only want to read the latest pot-boiler novels and celebrity outpourings. One book I was recommended was hard to buy - and had to be obtained via the Public Library interchange service. There was one copy in the UK - in a library warehouse somewhere. It cost me a relatively high fee for it to be extracted so as to borrow it for a maximum of three weeks.

            I find more choice on the charity shops' DVD shelves - to add to my 2000+ collection. Lots of non-mainstream things there - and some are quite interesting.

            1 0 Reply

        4. This post has been deleted by its author

      2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge
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        Re: Too expensive for Amazon

        "and presumably the musiians end up with a few pennies too."

        I fear you may be getting into fantasy land with this.

        18 0 Reply
  2. razorfishsl

    They want to clear the space for business users.

    0 1 Reply
    1. Phil Kingston
      Reply Icon

      I'll doubt storage space is really their concern. Probably more that it's either not cost-effective to keep the service going, they don't have a more glamorous roadmap for it, didn't see the take-up they forecast, they're concerned about some aspect of regulation, or they simply can't be arsed any more.

      5 1 Reply
  3. JakeMS
    FAIL

    Eh

    This article is the first I've heard of Amazon's Music Storage service.

    I mean, I know they sell MP3's and such but I had no idea you could store your own with them!

    I guess in this case lack of users may be to blame if there are others like me who had no idea it existed.

    But having said that, most of my music is in FLAC so I wouldn't have been able to use it anyway.

    5 1 Reply
    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Eh

      That makes me wonder. When I buy CDs from Amazon they also supply an MP3 rip online. Possibly those will now disappear? Not that I ever use them.

      Edit: Autorips of purchased CDs are not affected.

      "Note: These changes only impact music you’ve imported. Music purchased from Amazon (MP3s or AutoRip from CDs) remains securely stored for playback and download."

      0 0 Reply
      1. Michael Strorm Silver badge
        Reply Icon

        Re: Eh

        @AC; "When I buy CDs from Amazon they also supply an MP3 rip [..] Not that I ever use them."

        Same here. I was informed- without asking- that I had those, even for CDs I'd bought some years prior. (#) Never used them either; anything I wanted ripped, I'd already done so.

        (#) It's also notable that some of the CDs they did this for had been bought- and given away- as presents for other people, so I'd have thought I wouldn't have the "right" to the rip anyway?!

        1 0 Reply
  4. F. Svenson

    Avid user.

    I am an avid user of the service. It's been around for a long time. It's allowed me to have one app for all of my music. Much of my music is not available on Unlimited, and using the service also allowed for the Echo to play it. Now that it's going away, I don't know how you get from a CD you own to streaming back if Amazon doesn't sell it to you again.

    Definitely unhappy.

    0 0 Reply
    1. Sampler
      Reply Icon

      Re: Avid user.

      I don't know how you get from a CD you own to streaming back if Amazon doesn't sell it to you again.

      Almost like that's their business model...

      8 0 Reply
  5. pPPPP

    DIY Cloud

    I know it's not for everyone but this is a techie website so here goes.

    If you want your music available from anywhere, get a small server (a Rapberry Pi 1 is sufficient for this and uses very little power). Put a minimal Linux distro on it (I recommend Arch). Install MiniDNLA (a.k.a. ReadyMedia) and OpenVPN. Plug in an external drive with all of your media (unless it all fits on the internal SD Card) and point MiniDLNA to the right place. Now install the OpenVPN client on your phone (having opened up the relevant port on your firewall) and you will be able to see your MP3s on many MP3 player apps, wherever you are in the world (you probably want to use a fixed DNS service). You can give OpenVPN keys to your friends and family if you want so they can share your music. Nobody else can get to it; certainly not large corporations.

    Anyone with reasonable Linux skills can set this up. It won't take more than a couple of hours of your time. I use my set-up for a lot of other things too (like backup) but the point is there is no need to give your data to someone else, especially if you have the competence.

    18 1 Reply
    1. Charles 9
      Reply Icon

      Re: DIY Cloud

      Now provide a suitable solution for Joe Stupid that also works with Amazon devices. And just because YOU'RE not willing doesn't mean your relatives won't deride you for hating Amazon.

      0 4 Reply
      1. pPPPP
        Reply Icon

        Re: DIY Cloud

        Where did I say I hate Amazon? The only thing I really don't like about it is the fact that my wife keeps buying stuff and I have to go downstairs to answer the door when things arrive (unlike her I work from home). But hey, I use her prime account too. Oh yeah, I'm not keen on their tax dodging but they're hardly alone in that respect.

        As for Joe stupid, they can do what they want. If they want to throw their money at shiny stuff and pretend they're computer literate then I'm not going to stop them. My post was aimed at the average user of this web site, who generally understand computers. I think I made that quite clear. If it's beyond your abilities them don't do it.

        6 0 Reply
        1. Anonymous Coward
          Reply Icon
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: DIY Cloud

          @pPPPP

          "My post was aimed at the average user of this web site, who generally understand computers."

          Are you sure about that? there seem to be an awful lot of Apple users here...

          5 3 Reply
          1. Joe Werner Silver badge
            Reply Icon

            Re: DIY Cloud

            Simon (the BOFH) would also include OS/2 users in that list ;p

            0 0 Reply
    2. MrAnonCoward43
      Reply Icon

      Re: DIY Cloud

      Or you could setup Subsonic on your NAS / Mac Mini / whatever, pretty easy to do even for non techies I would imagine. Can then also use CloudFlare to get it working over https for free.

      http://www.subsonic.org - Not the best client interface but it works really well for me and you can use FLAC files if you wanted. The Android app has offline storage too.

      0 0 Reply
  6. dmacleo

    doesn't seem to affect amazon drive so files can just be moved to there.

    got the email, got nothing in there, but did the extend option just in case

    0 0 Reply
  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Interesting

    I bought an album on the service in 2013 and have no recollection of it, or of who the band are.

    2 0 Reply
  8. AndrueC Silver badge
    Meh

    I'm glad I continue to download my purchased music and run my own server. Good ol' Squeeze Server as I like to pretend it's still called :)

    1 1 Reply
  9. Notwork

    Shelves

    My kids laugh at me when I buy CD's but my music storage device is called shelves and I get them from the large storage provide called Ikea, if Bezos wants to come round and clean them up for me I'm fine with that, he can do the DVD's at the same time.

    0 0 Reply
  10. Timmy B

    grrrr. Pests....

    I use this to add stuff that's missing from the Amazon catalogue to my play lists. And I pay for music unlimited. I wonder if the monthly cost is going to go down now? I bet I can guess.

    0 0 Reply
  11. Duffaboy

    Kindle Books

    I was thinking what next down the line, would Amazon delete all my digital books that I've paid for

    0 0 Reply
  12. David Paul Morgan
    Go

    so on punch paper tape...

    ... in ASCII...

    1,83(hole)+2,54(gap)=4,37mm/Byte

    modern picture ~=1 430Bytes

    so

    1 430*4,37=6,25m of paper tape per picture?

    0 0 Reply

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