I’ve been a happy happy joy joy subscriber at eMusic since 2005. I wasn’t sure what I thought initially when Lee clued me into it (indie music being a new thing for me), but after that first month I was hooked. Took me a few months and then I bumped up to the annual subscription option. Until recently, my most recent subscription plan worked out to $16/month, which got me 90 tracks a month. Not bad considering the $0.99/track (or $9.99/album) you’d get at iTunes (not sure how their current pricing scheme works out, but it’s close enough for this discussion). The key distinction to me revolved around the subscription scheme instead of a-la-carte (so they’ve charge less but presumably can expect a steady flow of cash coming in) and the emphasis on indie music labels. So the biggest complaint for many potential consumers (and the reason they left after their initial 30 free tracks) was the lack of mainstream/top 40/major label music. But eMusic filled a nice niche for those of us who were more interested in finding cool new music that was outside the mainstream. If you wanted mainstream stuff, you could always go to iTunes, Amazon, Walmart, Rhapsody, Napster, etc etc. But eMusic was fantastic for indie stuff. At the price point they were charging (especially for my “grandfathered” subscription), you could try stuff out even if you’d never heard of it, and even if you did end up with a fair bit of chaff, there was still plenty of wheat in there to make it a good deal. And it exposed indie artists to a much wider audience (I know I ended up buying physical CDs for a bunch of stuff I picked up on eMusic to support the artists I really enjoyed).
That was all until recently when they announced that they’d signed a deal to get access to some of Sony’s back-catalog (i.e., stuff that’s at least a couple years old), were eliminating all grandfathered subscriptions, and putting in a significant price hike for all. I believe just prior to this, you could get 50 tracks a month for $16. The new plan they plan on switching me over to as soon as my current annual subscription runs out is 35 tracks a month for $16. I can accept that they may need to cut back on plans like mine due to the incredibly low price per track, but such a drastic change makes me want to kick them to the curb as soon as my contract’s up and take my business elsewhere. Really seems like they should give existing subscribers the option to keep their existing plan (or at least the previous incarnation, before the recent hike) and restrict us to the indie labels. I really couldn’t give a rat’s ass about the major label stuff. As I said, if I wanted it, I’d go elsewhere. I came to eMusic for what made them different. But now that their wanting to be like everyone else. Guess I’ll need to find some place new to get my indie music fix. 
CEO’s blog post and the ~1500 mostly negative posts about this
I gotta say that an increase from 22.2¢ per download to damn close to 40¢ per download is a very steep price increase. I understand eMusic has to be a viable business etc. but I’ll bet that at most I’ll want about 3 tracks a year from the newly available labels.
Truth is, for years those labels have ignored my musical interests. Why should I now be expected to pay a whole lot more so that their releases can be available on eMusic? It’s not like you can’t find their releases in many other places, real world and online. Why should I support their desires to fatten their bottom line on recordings that they’ve mostly made their investment back on many times over.
I valued eMusic for the opportunity to check out, at very low cost, a lot of new recordings that generally are hard to find in the physical world. I really don’t give a fuck about being able to download The Clash or Sex Pistols via eMusic. They’re hardly what I’d call cutting edge music any longer. No one who’s opinion I respect would think that they were significant today in any way other than historical. Much as I like the music, they’ve become basically little more than consumerist fodder for those who haven’t kept up with the times.
I think that this new strategy is kissing the asses of the fat shits that are only concerned about money, not music; the same fat shits who damn near wrecked their business through their unfettered greed. It’s a serious stumble for eMusic in my opinion.
Obviously, the value I derived from the low-cost ability to audition a lot of music has now been chucked out the window. I can only hope that sufficient attention continues to be paid to the wide range of music that does interest me; the music made by musicians for those involved with music, not just product. If the availability or profile of worthwhile music is diminished with this change it will truly be a sad day for eMusic.