Here is what I would like to see happen before I would be willing to buy all the music I currently want from the record companies.

1. Individual tracks must be sold for a reasonable price, such as 50 cents to $2 per track
2. A complete catalog of albums must be available from all the major labels as well as as many minor labels as possible
3. There must be more than one company with a complete catalog available to promote competition, which improves quality of service and reduces prices, benefitting consumers
4. There must be no limits on how many tracks an individual can purchase in any given timespan
5. Tracks must be in a non-proprietary format (like Microsoft Windows Media) that can be played without special software on non-Microsoft operating systems such as Mac, Linux and BSD
6. Tracks must be available in both a lossless compressed version of the original CD data, such as FLAC, as well as lossy compressed 192 kbps (or higher) MP3 files
7. Files must be have guaranteed perfect quality, i.e. no skipping, hiss, distortion or anything that differentiates it from the original
8. Tracks must be playable with no time restrictions, play count limits and cannot require continued subscription to a company's service to be playable
9. Tracks must be completely transferable to CD, DVD, portable players or any other storage medium for either backup or playback purposes
10. Record companies must pay a more reasonable percentage to the artist than they currently are paying
11. Artists must either retain copyright to their music or have their copyright returned to them from the record company after a reasonable period of time, such as 10-20 years