Inside Music MediaJerry Del Colliano

Why do I get the feeling that Jeff Bezos is an egomaniac?

You need his new music service Amazon Prime Music like you need another cable company.

Amazon Prime Music launched the other day and if you are paying $99 to Bezos for expedited shipping when ordering from Amazon, you also get a lot of things you don’t need or want for free.

Bezos’ new streaming service offers music that is more than six months old from Warner and Sony and nothing from Universal.

How the hell do you go to market with this sorry service when there are so many better ones out there (i.e., Pandora, Spotify, YouTube)?

Just what music lovers really want – no new music.

This guy is nuts.

Bezos, fresh off of playing hardball with the book publisher Hachette, is now dabbling in more things he ought to stay out of.

Bezos withheld Hachette best sellers while he ground the book publisher for lower prices.  Such a bully.  Apple, on the other hand, allows publishers to set their own prices.  (Full disclosure:  I own Apple stock so factor that in to what you just read if you’d like to).

Amazon is the next iteration of FedEx meets Macy’s.

Amazon is nothing when it comes to books, music or even video.

For some reason Bezos needs to be your streaming music service more than you need Prime Music.

Jeff, you had me at $99 for next day delivery.

Then there’s Honda.

Honda announced that it is cutting back its primetime TV ads to launch its own streaming music channel in cahoots with Clear Channel (Full disclosure:  I think Bob Pittman is a snake oil salesman so you may want to factor that in to what you just read if you like to).

Honda needs to sell cars.

You use network TV if you want to reach older car buyers.

And yes, they need a new way to sell cars to younger buyers.

First, they could get them a job and help them pay their student loans before trying to get them to buy a new Honda.

Millennials are chronically unemployed or underemployed thanks to the economy they have inherited.

Many like a bus more than a car.

But if you want a Millennial to buy your Honda, sponsoring a concert isn’t going to do it.

In fact, the Honda music channel will lay an egg because it’s just another conglomeration of computer driven music with no reason for being.

Young people love concerts.

They just don’t make car-buying decisions at them.

And when they buy a car, they will look at the dashboard entertainment center before they look under the hood.

Millennials are like their grandparents – not their parents – when it comes to being fiscally responsible.

If I went into the lingerie business because I have a website with thousands of subscribers, would that make me smart?

Would anyone care?

They’re paying me for media information not underwear.

Here’s the problem.

Just because big companies have budgets and power does not make their next idea worthwhile.

Honda should concentrate on making a better car with the things young people like and the word will get around.

Amazon should stick to shipping.

I should stick to writing not lingerie.

The lesson of contemporary America at this point in time is that we all need to better understand the 95 million Millennials coming of age so we don’t come up with stupid products and services that they just won’t support.

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