Here's the thing - that may be what they do.

What's the big stink nowadays in digital music distribution? DRM - especially backups. If BestBuy did this right, they could sell a "warranty" for their songs - for $49.99, you can protect say 1000 songs. That way, if they are deleted or lost or whatever, you can simply use that warranty to recover them!

While the readership here at /. might see through this obvious scam, Joe Sixpack sees it as a good deal. Consumers are already used to warranties on their physical goods, and with a little bit of clever marketing I can see consumers getting taken advantage of with a "warranty" ploy.

But here's the rub: we have been raging against lock-in and recoverability for quite some time now - enough to alert the less technical consumer. BestBuy comes out with a warranty on music, and markets it right, the consumer sees the problem as fixed and buys stuff from BestBuy.

I know you were joking, but really a music warranty could be a viable business model. Let's hope it doesn't happen...