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This is interesting because it points to a common business strategy online these days, that is, build a network of users through free/freemium model and then, when there is a large enough base, change the business model to generate revenue. Quite a few internet businesses run on the investment income initially and only start pulling in revenue later on. Worth thinking about in term of the economy category (you all remember that you need to try to keep community, power, economy and identity in your head somewhere when doing your readings and other work in this unit?) - if we depend on these services for our music etc, are we thinking enough about the fact that these are not provided out of altruism but are commercial ventures and thus, the shape of the platform and network (and hence, our experiences) are determined by the profit imperative? Pandora also restricted its free service, moving to closer to the 'freemium' business model. At this point, it appears to be at a level that probably won't impact significantly on most. However, I'd like you to consider the implications of having a commercial service like this become embedded in your lives (and many many of the internet services we have are profit-based) against those larger questions of the unit (see the interpretive and critical perspectives in particular)--economic and political aspect