This Is SO the Future

Now at some CompUSA stores, instead of buying software from a box on the shelf you can go to a single kiosk to buy any of hundreds of titles. The software is stored on the kiosk’s hard drive and a CD is burned when a customer makes a choice. No more wasting shelf space (and cardboard) with boxes that just get thrown away.

This will probably only work for software titles people know of in advance; it’s still nice to browse through physical items (i.e., read the boxes) in a store if you don’t know what you want. But if you come looking for, say, Easy CD Creator and you know that’s what you want, who needs the box?

A long time ago I suggested that music ought to be sold this way, and I still do. Why don’t music stores sell you a CD with 10 songs of your choice for the same price as 10 songs the record label chose? Hmm.