Stay on the ride...

Today only 2 months, 7 hours, 34 minutes, and 29 seconds until American Doll Posse hits stores. Today is already the last day of February, I can't believe two months of 2007 are already behind us. It doesn't feel like winter here in Florida at all-- it is 85 degrees outside, and it feels like summer. It's so nice--I have to tell you all about Rhapsody music service from real networks. Do not use this service to listen to Tori. I recently had a very bad experience with them. I signed up for a free two week trial online. I wanted to listen to Patty Griffin's new album, "Children Running Through" (which is absolutely fantastic and everyone should buy it or download it-- but don't listen to it through rhapsody). Well, anyways it was really easy to sign up for the rhapsody trial-- it's one of those where you have to give your credit card information, but if you cancel before two weeks your card will not be charged. So I put my info in, and go to the service, only to find out that my IS department blocks the site so I can't listen at work.

I figure it's fine so when I went home I got into the service and looked up Patty Griffin, and tried to put the music on my mp3 player, but it kept saying I had to pay 14.99 to transfer music onto my mp3 player. So I said screw that, and I just listened to the album online a few times. I couldn't find the tracks to download on Limewire, so I downloaded Ares which I hear is superior to limewire anyway. Limewire used to be good, but it got so bogged down with crap and viruses you can barely use it these days, so now I use Ares. Since I couldn't download from Rhapsody or transfer songs to mp3 I decided to cancel the free trial before they went and charged me. So I went to the website and tried to find out how to cancel-- no where to be found. It was so easy to sign up there should just be a button to unsubscribe and get out of it. After an hour of searching the Frequently asked questions-- (it's not in there-- although I bet it is a very frequently asked question) I searched the "Answers" section and finally found this form where it says, "Tell us why you are cancelling" and so I put "I'm went deaf and can no longer listen to music." They can't argue with that right? Well, the next screen is a phone number with restrictive business hours that you have to call-- and they put me on hold for an hour before I gave up.

I then googled rhapsody,-- and found out that they purposely make it extremely difficult to cancel because there are those who find it's easier to pay the 14.99 a month then go through the hassle of cancelling. I found a back door number that someone posted-- who also had a lot of trouble finding the number on the website. I called and immediately talked to some guy in India working all night in a call center. He asked me why I was cancelling, I wanted to say I went deaf, but that doesn't work so well on the phone. I said that I no longer wanted it, and I didn't like it. This wasn't a good enough answer, because Rhapsody assumes that the customer is an idiot and would like the service if they knew how to use it properly, but apparently I don't because there is no way I would ever want to cancel if I did know about all it had to offer. Firstly, I never intended to stay on past the free trial-- I told the man as much, and also told him I couldn't afford it-- he offered to extend my free trial another month.

I said, "No, just cancel it now." At this point he got defensive and said, "I am cancelling it, it takes a few minutes ma'am hold on and tell me the real reason you are cancelling." I had told him the real reason- save for I'd rather just go buy the album and have it, or download it for free from Ares. He kept me on the phone for about 15 minutes and kept asking me questions -- I felt like I was being bullied. Finally, an email popped up that said it had been cancelled so I hung up. But then I learned that a lot of people cancel adn their credit card gets charged anyway, so I'm definitely saving that email that shows when I cancelled. Now, I've made it my mission to spread how horrible and unethical the rhapsody business practices are. Not allowing people to cancel is ridiculous as one guy said to me after I posted on his blog about the experience-- it's the equivalent of walking into Virgin Megastore and not being allowed to leave until you explain why you are not staying. Today a survey from real networks customer support came into my email-- "How likely are you to use rhapsody again" -- Very likely, not likely, I don't know---- Answer: Not likely-- -which is an understatement.

I also put in the comments, that not only am I never going to use the service again, I'm also going to dissuade all of my friends from ever signing up for it-- it's like a deal with the devil-- or a cell phone company. I can't believe they make you sign a 2 year contract and renew it every time you want to make a change to your plan. Two years is a long time-- when I lost my phone back in november of 2005, and had to shell out $250 for a new one, plus they made me re-up my contract for another 2 years I made sure to change my plan to No roaming, because I knew I would be moving in the next two years and I wanted to be sure that I could use my phone-- so I didn't move until the next May-- I paid an extra $15 a month for "No roam" for 6 months that I didn't need it, but it's worth it to be able to change companies and have free will if I just wait until the end of this year-- two years is a long time -- how do prisoners do it?