Dang, I was hoping the record labels had finally pulled their heads out from between their legs. I’d buy music online if I could find an online store I like, which I haven’t, and this one sounds perfect, plus it would have been free. I hope there is actually something to this.
I don't believe that music has zero value, which would mandate a price of $0.00. Expecting professional musicians to produce quality music for nothing is economically unrealistic.
That said, bad music doesn't have the same value as good music either. Continuing to market all music as though it has the same value (same price) is also economically unrealistic.
The ideal model would compensate better music with higher prices, and allow copyrights to expire in a reasonable amount of time. Lifetime (and beyond) copyrights stifle creativity because they remove the incentive to create. If I can receive exclusive revenues for a protected work for ever, why would I ever want to create more?
If a music download site were to develop some way of pricing songs in a more market-driven way, more people would willingly pay for the downloads. Charging me the same price for the newest, most popular releases as for 40-year-old releases from obscure artists is offensive. Let the market work, and it will give incentive to artists to create better material.
For example, a song that currently sells like hotcakes could be priced at $2.00 to download, and the 40-year-old sentimental piece could be priced at $0.10 to download. That would be realistic.
Maybe they should be free after 10 or 20 years or something.