Thu Dec 27, 2007 9:04 pm

Well... the fact that some tracks are 89 cents and the more popular tracks are 99 cents reflects exactly what the labels said they wanted, flexible pricing per track. It was only Apple that said, and who knows how accurate they were, that the labels wanted to charge outrageous prices. Also, without knowing what the label's cut is at Amazon compared to iTMS it is impossible to know which is giving them a better deal. Not all songs are at that price too, just the majority of them. So it appears that Amazon is of a like mind with the labels on the fact that not all tracks are of the same value. Heck, they don't sell all books for the exact price, or even the exact same price per page. It's not really possible to say that the labels didn't get what they wanted, at the very least, they now have distribution options. And with DRM free mp3s at low prices, consumers definitely win out in this battle.

Fri Dec 28, 2007 12:22 am

LOL @ the previous poster.

Look at the statistics of users who actually buy their music online. Most don't even buy much online. They get the biggest chunk of music from their CDs. This whole Amazon/iTunes/Microsoft store/fill-in-the blank argument is moot. Yes, at some point this whole situation might change, but right now digital music is simply a filler for people who want one song but don't want to buy the entire crappy album by the most recent "pop-princess-diva-going-psycho-on-tabloids-but-had-that-one-good-song." Instead artists who want to sell albums actually have to, GASP, make the entire album worthy of the consumer's money.

With iTunes, Apple seemed to want to get people downloading songs and paying a reasonable price for them, all while getting the benefit of a craptacular number of mp3 player/computer sales. Guess what? They did just that. At this point Apple could just give songs away, get rid of DRM, and STILL benefit from the fact that most people own an iPod and know the iTunes name. The average user could give 2 cents about which company is selling the newest greatest type of song. They just want to get one or two songs to mix in with their already burned-to-mp3 cd collection for their iPods. People are VERY slow to change. Just look at Microsoft's grip on the OS market. Regardless of arguments for or against their OS, the average user knows the Windows name so continues to use it. Same applies here. As long as Apple doesn't do something really dumb, they are going to be able to coast for a while. Knowing Apple, they will come out with some new reason to want their products in the next year at which point their competition will follow and eventually catch on re-igniting this whole argument again.

So goes product development.

Fri Dec 28, 2007 3:27 am

http://www.digitalpodcast.com/podcastnews/2007/06/23/itunes-is-number-3-in-music-sales/

That is a link to an article about iTunes being the third biggest music retailer now. HOWEVER, if you look at the pie chart for Q1 2007 you will see that even after these many years and many battles, digital downloads are STILL only 14% or so of music sales. And if you do some research around the web you will see several other NPD reports, among others, that indicate a large chunk of digital sales is still singles.

I'm not saying that digital downloads aren't making some money. Only, that the slice of pie they are fighting over compared to the CD is pretty slim yet. So Apple's success is mainly the integration of both digital music AND digital player. These other folks are simply chasing the music portion. Apple could give up half or three-quarters of the music portion and - as long as people continue to associate mp3 players (amusing since iTunes doesn't even use the mp3 format) with Apple, iPod and iTunes - they'll continue to thrive.

Fri Dec 28, 2007 4:11 pm

1/3) Well, even Apple non-DRM files cannot be played on every player. Not everything supports AAC, MP3 is has much wider support. Not just on little walkman style digital music players, but on CD players, car players, etc. MP3 data CD car players have been around for, man, I don't know but I know that my friend had one back in 2000. So, just because of the format that Amazon is using the files have a greater reach.

4) The DRM in Rhapsody and Yahoo Unlimited Music (not sure about Napster honestly) is different, it is subscription based. People aren't told that they "own" file when that file is heavily restricted in what it can do. However, I agree that all of these DRM schemes suck.

It isn't the best thing for the iPod brand that there is another online store for purchasing tracks to own that has an even longer proven track record and reputation than iTMS. Not in music sales, but in online sales it is a bigger name. Heck, people go there to buy iPods instead of going to Apple. But it is not the end of the world for the iPod either. The fact that the files are supported on more devices than iTMS non-DRM files does make them a more valuable file, so it is a threat to the iTMS. So while AmazonMP3 is a better value for the music, when it comes to walkman style devices, people can use anything that they find to be their player of choice, including the iPod, Creative, Sansa, Cowon and others with Amazon files.