So everyone and their brother knows about this, in October, Radiohead, in a surprise move, released their album exclusively on their website, inrainbows.com. People could pay whatever they wanted for the album in mp3 format.

I was one of the people that attempted to download it on the first day. However, the server was absolutely slammed. They were obviously not prepared for the amount of traffic that they got. I paid about $10 for the album, I say "about" because payment was accepted in British Pounds. I was sent my download link in the mail, clicked it, and the server timed out. Clicked it again and then I was greeted with the message saying something like "You've already downloaded this album".

Damn.

Being the resourceful Matt that I am, I logged into the USENET and found the full album immediately. I didn't feel bad about downloading it this way since I'd already paid my money. In fact, I didn't even have to use the bands costly bandwidth, so everybody was happy.

It's a fantastic album by the way.

I'd call myself a longtime Radiohead fan, I first saw them on the Arsenio Hall show performing in promotion of their album Pablo Honey. The next day, I had my mom take me out so I could buy the CD. One overlooked factor in why the band probably did the free pre-release is this: The album would've leaked anyway. Radiohead's last three albums (Hail To The Thief, Amnesiac, Kid A) were all leaked onto the internet MONTHS before they were officially released. I'll admit, I downloaded them, but on the day of the release, I gladly shelled out my money for an album I loved from a band I admire. So part of the early "free" release was an exercise in pragmatism.

Better to give people an opportunity to easily pay for something AND receive lots of free press, than only having a leaked album. Most early downloaders are likely big fans of the band. The casual listener doesn't really care about a pre-release anyway.

Now that the album is officially out, what does the band think of the album sales?

The New York Times had this to say about it:

"Mr. Edge [Bryce Edge, one of Radiohead's managers] said that sales of 100,000 copies of the album this week would be “almost certainly less than the number we would have achieved if we hadn’t” offered it as a digital download. But the band still came out ahead, he said, in part because it attracted so many fans to Radiohead’s Web site, where it collected e-mail addresses from fans looking to acquire the album."

The album is the top selling CD in the United States this week, the second week of January 2007. It seems this experiment has worked for now. However, Radiohead was in a good position to start with. They already had plenty of money and had a huge following. Also, they weren't under a record contract with anyone, so the cd was essentially theirs to do with as they pleased. There aren't lots of major artists out there lucky enough to be in that position.

Hopefully more artists out there will try this "pay what you think its worth method". It surprised me actually when I was buying the album from them. I found myself thinking about the value of music, about what I really think it's worth. In the past, the consumer is always told what the album is worth by the artist or record label. Now this time, it was up to me. I think that its a healthy thing for consumers to think about.