Online music: Rhapsody reaches 1 million subscribers, finally

Rhapsody, the longest-running subscription-music service, announced that it had finally crossed the 1 million subscriber threshold.

Before you cue the cork-popping, bear in mind that Rhapsody launched almost exactly 10 years ago, so its growth isn't setting land-speed records. And three years ago, Rhapsody and rival Napster each reported having about 750,000 subscribers. The two companies are now combined, thanks to Rhapsody's purchase of the fast-declining Napster in October, but the total is far less than the sum of their erstwhile parts. So the announcement doesn't exactly herald the dawn of a new era for subscription music services in general or Rhapsody in particular. The total number of people who pay for on-demand music services online is still dwarfed by the more than 21 million who subscribe to Sirius XM. And in a country of more than 110 million households, 1 million isn't mass market. Nevertheless, Rhapsody President Jon Irwin insists that the new total is a real milestone.