Mephistos

I will begin with I probably knew better from the get go, but I was lured in all the same.  After all when I read the message of a fourteen day free trial with no obligations and thirty six credits it sounded pretty good.  I was, after all, in the market for a few songs here and there that I was wanting to get, just the single song, without purchase of an album of what have you.  Besides the small print clearly stated, no charge would be made so long as the account was canceled during the fourteen day trial period.

This is an offer that I have seen a few times from various places on both the web and in some locker software that I have used in the past.  This one offer that I actually took was offered through the interface panel with my Windows Media Player software.  I read the small print about four times before finally deciding to sign up and figured that I would sign up and enjoy the the free songs.  If I really liked it and felt like I could not live without it, I would perhaps continue with the minimum subscription, which was a good deal of twenty four songs for $11.99 per month and any additional songs at a mere $0.50, which is a good price compared to both I-Tunes and Amazon.

My slight hesitation at giving my credit card number was overruled quickly by my own reading of the terms, as noted at least four times through.  I could cancel at anytime in the fourteen days and would not be charged.

I made sure to explore the options well with in my fourteen day trial period, having been only about three days at most since I signed up sometime on Monday at this time.  I was quickly dismayed as I went through my accumulated list of one-off songs that I would like to have.  My first song I could not get the download button to work.  After several tries, refreshed and noticed at the top of the screen a message that said this song was excluded from download on “free” credits.   I was rather quickly irritated by this notion, but I had several other songs that I wanted to get so I could live with one being labeled as such.

After trying five songs and getting the same kind of message on each I was beginning to despair of finding any songs that were eligible to be had.  The next song was not eligible for individual purchase, but rather the entire album (of which maybe one other song I would enjoy).  A list of ten individual songs found another that was album only and a total of eight that were not eligible for the free credits.  The eleventh song, from a lesser known group, but still one of my favorites was fine.

I quickly deduced my best option was going to be use my free credits on the three albums I wanted from that group and cancel my account rather be tangled in such a quagmire.  At twelve credits per album and about seventeen songs each and all free it was a good enough deal and they are albums I had missed having for sometime.

Downloads all launched and started and then I noticed my credits instead of being zero as expected, instead showed twenty-four.  As I explored, I realized that it started my subscription automatically, at the exact number of my free credits.  I have proceeded with a canceling of my account.  After some hard searching and still no number, a strongly worded request for refund of my funds to my card that has been charged has been made.  I await their reply, though honestly I expect them to not refund it.   I think that is a superbly crappy way of doing a promotion for the record, but I should have expected as much despite my cancellation well within the fourteen day period.

So the whole reason of this blog is to warn others of such seemingly slimy tactics in advance and maybe, just maybe, influence one or two other people away from using eMusic.com as provider for such content.  As for me, I think I will stick with the Amazon.com for both those one off song purchases and the occasional album that can not be had otherwise for cheaper.

** – image is the eMusic company logo

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