I listened to the entire interview. I think the system they're proposing could work.

That said, I think Zack Zalon is glossing over a lot of the pain it'll take to get such a system running. I mean, it's good that Virgin Digital is pushing in this direction, but even Zack says that the biggest problem is infrastructure and support in portable devices. I'll be very suprised to see if this launches in any other capacity than the "Virgin Digital Media Player" on Windows XP only by year's end. But it's a start.

It's a pretty exciting idea. Just yesterday I was jonesing to hear an old 80's tune. I didn't want to own it, just listen to it. If such a system as Zalon describes were in place, I could listen to it right then. That would be like liquid crack to me! [Linked Image]

I don't get Zalon's beef with Apple iTunes, though. He mentions that Virgin won't be doing anything for the iPod because Apple's locked down in some proprietary format. And yet the first rollout of Virgin Digital is built on top of Microsoft's DRM silliness, which only works on Windows. Excuse me? Who's locking down what here?

Besides, I'm betting that within two years, Apple will be all over this model anyway.

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Scott Andrew and the Walkingbirds
Lo-fi DIY acoustic pop
Hear it: http://www.scottandrew.com/main/music