Japanese pop-artist Ayumi Hamasaki just announced that she will be releasing her newest album "Next Level" via a USB flash drive. The drive will feature tons of multimedia content including all 13 tracks off of the album, 6 music videos, album art, and lyrics.
The cool thing about this limited edition, custom USB drive is that the album and multimedia content only takes about about 800 megs of space on the 2GB drive - leaving plenty of space for fans to use this as a regular flash drive as well. (Picture after the break)
As you can see, the drive is pretty flashy, and I'm sure will cause some conversation
via: TokyoMango, Ayumi Hamasaki
I think this is a great option for artists looking to make
an impact in the digital age of music. A big complaint with purchasing music
from iTunes or similar services is that you miss out on the album artwork, which
in some case can make just as big of a statement as the music itself. I am
excited to see how this sells, and to see if major labels in the US
The only thing I can see holding this back is the price
point. Obviously it will be a little bit more expensive than a CD or digital
download of the album. Maybe that means paid sponsorships or endorsements in
the multimedia content to bring down the cost to consumers? Maybe albums in the
future will function more like magazines - in order to deliver unique, quality
content at an accessible price point, the user will have to deal with some ads.
It could be a big pill to swallow initially, but as long as the
"sponsors" are kept unobtrusive,
I think it could lead to some interesting outcomes in the future.
How would you feel about your albums being 'ad supported' in order to get more quality content? Leave your comments below, lets start this discussion.
