Some recent late-night scrounging on eBay has me really interested in the value of purchasing mp3s versus physical media. I rarely buy music digitally—I desire the physical object, whether it’s a cassette, vinyl, or otherwise. Lately, I’ve been filling in the gaps in my music collection, and have (re)bought albums I previously had scattered over several types of dead or dying or lost and borrowed media. It’s led me to the conclusion that it’s not economical to buy older music digitally; instead, it’s much cheaper to buy a used version already in circulation.
I started thinking about this when I bought up a whole bunch of Megadeth and R.E.M. In every instance, buying a used compact disc from a “buy it now” seller on eBay was far cheaper than purchasing the album on iTunes. Prices for R.E.M.’s early catalog wavered from a low of $6.39 (for Document) to a high of $7.87 (for Murmur), with an average of $7.04—almost exactly $3 “off” of the purchase of the full album on iTunes. (The prices for putting together the Megadeth catalog were about the same.) Over the purchase of five R.E.M. albums, I “saved” about $14.79.
Of course, there’s transaction costs associated with this process. You don’t get an immediate delivery of the music. You still have to rip it yourself if you want a digital copy. The cd could be damaged already or damaged in delivery or shipping. You might not ever get it.
But if you do—and all these cats had those 99.35% seller satisfaction ratings over a zillion transactions—you get the physical object coupled with a wide open license (you can rip the cd a million times; iTunes only grants you a nominal license that could expire or be revoked, and hard drives are lost, crash, or stolen, although those are the nightmare scenarios).
Still, it seems cost effective to continue to buy used media and exhaust it first rather than going fully digital. There is a drawback if you care about the artists involved—they don’t make any money off the transaction at all. I’m not sure if R.E.M. has ever sold me an album new—there’s always been hundreds of battered cassettes and rounded-corner LPs available for scrounging.
This doesn’t work for every artist. You can get one of the Beatles cds for $12 to $15 new in a store; there weren’t really any on eBay for less than that. In a lot of cases the prices were about the same. For instance, Bruce Springsteen prices were equal to or higher than iTunes or normal stores (about $8.50 for Born in the USA—but normally much higher than the $10 you’d pay at a chain store). So were the Replacements (about $10 for the Let It Be reissue, which is chock full of bonus tracks).
Then there’s always the great yard sale. Putting together an R.E.M. discography was spurred on by my friend Chris Nolan selling off their later records—which I snagged for $2 a pop. It may be worth digging in the actual and virtual crates for a few more years to get a true music bargain.
Good piece! I’ve discovered that I also have the tendency to forget about music I’ve downloaded, especially the stuff that I dl to round out the download allotment on the eMusic subscription that I keep forgetting to cancel. I tend to invest/engage more strongly in the music I have a hard copy of, even if I rip it pretty immediately.