Slashdot Mirror
Apple Introduces iTunes Music Store, iTunes 4, new iPod
The store also offers exclusive music, music videos, and other multimedia, all in the main iTunes window. iTunes 4 will be available now (along with QuickTime 6.2), and the music store will be available today. It is Mac-only now, but will be available for Windows by the end of the year.
As a compromise to help prevent piracy, you must change your playlist every 10 CD burns, and you may share the music with only three other Macs (you may modify the list of computers that the music may be shared with at any time). There was no word on the technology used to handle this DRM.
The iTunes playlist sharing allows sharing of playlists, and the streaming of music from one machine to the other, though copying is not supported ("that would be verboten," Jobs added).
The new iPods will be $299 (10GB), $399 (15GB), and $499 (30GB). The dock holds the iPod upright, and has a line-out. The FireWire port is now on the bottom of the unit, and the buttons have been moved up higher, just below the screen, in a row. The improved screen features a backlight. The new units will be in Apple stores on Friday.
Its about time someone started selling music the way people want it... one song at a time. Even better that its from a cool company like Apple.
Reality has a liberal bias
this is such a painfully obvious compromise, why has the music industry been such a grinch about it?
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Will artists be able to place their music on the iTunes Music Store on their own, independently of a recording company?
If so, then this could be absolutely huge for independent artists. :)
I thought an average CD was $16. That's 16 tracks. Not out of the ballpark. Plus, I thought the biggest complaint was having to buy a whole CD for just one to two good tracks. That's only $2. What's the problem with that?
-BrentArtists like Brittney, who have 1 hit and then poop out 12 extra tracks to fill a 11$ CD, will now only get 1$ income. :-)
If made-up artists want to sell as much as they do now, the overall quality will have to increase
Applemusic guarantees quality poop all the way
When will I end this grieving ? When will my future begin ?
With a broadband connection and a decent speed burner...MOST people could have the song downloaded and burned to a CD BEFORE you get your keys in the ignition.
SO you say? Well, you could be listening to the song ON THE WAY to the grocery store.
Add to the fact that its likely that you would have to stand in line at the music store AND, oh yeah, you would still be paying $10 or up for that physical CD.
Oh, and you go to the grocery store EVERY day, too, right???
Really, this isn't more convenient???
(BTW, I am saying all this given the facts that I don't have ANY of the things mentioned-high speed ISP, burner, or an Apple. But IF I did, I would find this DAMN convenient)
---"What did I say that sounded like 'Tell me about your day?'"---
Maybe I'm missing something, but I didn't see anything that would keep people from:
So how is this any worse than having the CD?
Isn't that the whole thing with P2P? Each of us has unique friends that have unique friends that have unique friends...
If I stream a song to my friend, and he streams it to his friend, and so on we are just passing the song out to the whole net for the price of $1.
Someone will design a P2P software that only allows you to share your music to your select 'friends' and it will cause a network of P2P nodes that will become the Napster of the future. On the surface, it will look like a much more local version, but the big picture will show us that its just as big as the original.
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
I don't have to go to the mall. I don't have to buy an entire CD for one track. I see it, I click on it, and (with broadband and 99 cents later) it's mine a mere seconds later. I can burn it. I can stream it (albeit limitedly, with AAC.) There are significant advantages to this system - it's not just about reducing cost, although that too is a factor.
However, you are correct regarding the purchasing of tracks by length: I think Apple should have released the service allowing individual tracks purchased at 99 cents, and entire albums at $7.99, because basically, music falls into two camps: one where I'd like the entire album, or where I'd like a single, or several tracks that pique my interest. This current offering addresses the latter; I imagine they'll introduce the former as soon as they can.
concrete5: a cms made for marketing, but strong enough for geeks.
Wow, there sure a lot of whining flamers around here today. What apple has done is really tremendous. They have introduced sexy hot hardware, and at the sametime produced a service which fundamentally changes the business model for popular music. Big labels will no longer be able to charge $18 for a Britney Spears CD with, at most, one listenable song on it. If that song really is any good, they will get $1. If not they will get $0. This has the potential to change the entire basis of how artists are signed, produced, and promoted. We should be excited!
What? The typical "new" cd that gets released on the market is about $15-18.00 and probably contains anywhere from 10-15 songs. That works out to about $1.00 a song when you average it out.
I mean, common... you spend $1.00 and have the song for good. In some places, you can't even buy a bottle of soda for that cheap anymore.
-brain
Anybody with anything better than cheapo computer speakers or $5 headphones they got for free in a box of Cracker Jacks is able to hear an enormous difference. It is especially bad if you have high fidelity audiophile gear. For example, the vibration dampers and $1000 cables I bought for my Bose speakers aren't going to help that much when the source material is total shit.
If you have that much money to throw into listening to music, then Apple's download service is not for you, because you a) probably enjoy going to the music store rather than downloading music and b) can afford to buy an entire album at a time in case you happen to like it.
I thought we had decided that Apple wasn't going to do DRM? It sure looked like it, but then here we are, looking at Apple supporting and using DRM in one of its premiere applications. Do you feel betrayed yet?
You formed this idea in your mind that Apple wasn't going to get involved in DRM, and then "felt betrayed" by Apple when your fantasy didn't come true? Can't help you there, Sparky.
The only way that Apple could even begin to make this all acceptable would be to offer the music for $0.25US/track at 320kbps quality. Sure, it still won't really approach CD quality, but at least you won't be charged an arm and a leg for substandard music.
If you don't like it, don't buy it. You make it sound like Apple bought out and closed down all the record stores.
Apple has released a service for people who like downloading single MP3 tracks to listen to on their computer. There's no point in banging on your high chair like Apple just took away your zweiback. You're not the target customer, so just keep doing whatever you're doing now and don't worry about Apple.
ASA
All employees must wash hands before seeking equitable relief.
The problem is that people need to complain about something. If they were 25 cents a song, someone would chime in about how it was too expensive.
The problem is that a lot of the whiners who say that they'd buy more CDs if they were priced better, or that they'd buy more music if they could buy per track are just lying about it. What they really want is music for free, and they'll find fault with anything less.
Mod down posts with a "Free Mac Mini/iPod" sig, they're spam!
1. Does iTunes 4 break iCommune?
2. What copy protection - if any - is used to protect tracks downloaded from AppleMusic.com?
3. Does the copy protection affect tracks burned to CD as well as tracks copied to iPods and Macs?
4. If the tracks burned to CD are copy-protected, will these CDs be playable in standard CD players?
-MAL
Uh, there are other players that support (or will soon support) the .aac format. It's only a matter of time. And that argument is not terribly useful. You can't play VHS tapes on a Beta machine either, and I don't see anyone bitching.
# stream bought tunes to a SliMP3 or Audiotron
How many people have those? Not all of us can afford all this new shit. Don't you have a regular audio CD player? You can burn these songs to audio CD (no DRM there)
# play bought tunes on your Windows or Linux PC
Uh, Apple has already released the iPod for Windows. If the service takes off, I imagine there will be Windows versions in the future. And does your computer have a CD-ROM drive? If so, (assuming you RTFA'd), you can use the unlimited cd burning feature and burn to a CD.
# burn bought tunes on an MP3-CD for use in the car or a DVD player
You can burn to audio CD. I have yet to see a DVD player which can play MP3 CDs but cannot play Audio CDs. If you know of such a brand, I'd like to hear about it. Ditto for the MP3-CD in the car thing. Many of us don't even have regular CD players in the car, let along MP3-CD ones. And also, find me an MP3-CD player that cannot play regular audio CDs.
# switch to another client other than iTunes (e.g. Audion) for your Mac music experience
Well, duh. Apple's not going to invest money in helping someone else's business. And really, iTunes is an excellent client, with or without this feature. And it's free. What more do you need?
# broadcast bought tunes using Shoutcast
You can broadcast them with iTunes. Is that so terrible? You can also burn a CD, rip it to MP3, and broadcast those.
Seems like you're going out of your way to find arguments against this, instead of realizing that this is a compromise, and if it takes off, there will be far less clamoring from the RIAA for Microsoft-style DRM and crippled CDs.
There is no sig, there is only Zuul.
If it was 2/3 that price, then I'd definitely say it's worth it. But for now, I think they missed their own mark.
Heck, that's your perogative. I'd be willing to bet that most folks, though, would jump at the chance to download an album straight to their computer for less than the CD costs, without the added fun of having to drive/walk/metro to the record store and find it (or not) on their racks. You get album art with your download, and many people simply discard their jewel cases in favor of folders and other slim storage.
For example, consider The Eagles' Greatest Hits, 1971-1975. Music store: Probably $12, $10 or $8 if you get lucky and find it on sale or used in good condition. Time from "I want" to "I hear", an hour, best case scenario; more likely a day or two--gotta find time to go out and get it, Sam Goody is all out, etc. Online with Apple: $9.90. Time from "I want" to "I hear": a minute or two until iTunes starts playing your first downloaded track to maybe an hour if you're stuck on dialup.
I'd say they're dead-on the mark. Most people buy music to listen to the music; concerns such as highest CD quality vs. ACC, special features, and a physical cover really just don't matter to most folks once you get rid of the the marketing machine that tells them it does.
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
You can't afford the luxury of music, so you steal it. Nice.
Can't wait until someone steals your wallet because they felt that pizza was too expensive to pay with their money.
You, are a fuckwit.
The porn industry is one of the most lucrative on the surface of the planet, some claim it's the only way to make money, and a lot of it on the Internet.
Yet there are no organisations to protect the rights of the producers. No MPAA, no RIAA, ever heard of someone going to court for pirating porn? Didn't think so.
In this industry very big corporations are in competition with very small and innovative business and both are pirated like crazy both non seems to suffer.
There's a lesson to be learn here, maybe the pron industry is the way to go for the whole entertaiment industry: Less regulations, more diversity, very lax fair use and aggressive competition between big and small producers.
Je t'aime Stéphanie
But, I'd never be interested in BUYING a song in a lossy format.
like, say, a cd? (or do you really think a cd is a lossless format?)
For $1 a track I can see $100 being wasted REALLY quick.
and without this service, that same $100 will buy you 7 cd's (at 14.29 per cd)
everyone who thinks they'll be able to get their top 100 favorite tracks by buying only 7 cd's please raise your hands... anyone... anyone... bueller...
$0.99 a track is a bit steep IMO even for a master track but for a DRM encumbered, non-standard compressed format it simply is not good value for my money. DRM with a crappy format moves the decimal point on what I'm willing to pay at least one digit to the left.
g 4aac/stan dard.html
Well, nobody said you had to listen or pay. But don't spread FUD, please.
1. The file itself is not DRM-encumbered. iTunes places the restrictions on burning, streaming, etc. They are not built into the file in any way. There are plenty of other tools you can use to manipulate the files, because...
2. AAC is a standard compressed format:
http://www.vialicensing.com/products/mpe
Personally, I think Apple has gone a lot further than anyone else to put high quality music in people's hands at the right price and deserves some credit for that.
And one of your major beefs is a straight-up dream (at least for the foreseeable future): face it, no company wants to pay for the bandwidth of potentially hundreds of thousands of users making downloads of uncompressed audio.
Free yourself. Everything else will follow.
Their marketing people now have two problems.
Apple? Marketing problems? Hello?
128k AAC is still better than 128k MP3, but how many people are going to believe that when most people assume that a 2ghz Pentium is faster than an AMD processor running at a lower clock speed?
Lots. Even if the target-audience cared about bitrates, they're still the ones who bought (say) a 1GHz iMac vs. a 2.5GHz Dell.
Second, who is going to pay 99ï½ for something they can get for free on Gnutella?
The people who have no idea what Gnutella is, or where to get it, or how to use it, but really want to hear that one song...
Sure, some people will pay for the convenience of downloading very simply from the iTunes Music Store.
I will not be one of those people.
Nor do you need to be for this to be successful.
I've been boycotting the music industry for almost three years now, and this doesn't look compelling to me. Anyone else agree?
I agree that for someone who has been boycotting the music industry for 3 years, that this wouldn't be too exciting. Oddly enough, a lot of people haven't been boycotting the music industry, and will be quite excited by the proposition of getting the "1 or 2 good songs" that they want.
-dr.badass
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
You miss the definition of "luxury". i.e. something that which if you did not have, you could still survive. Music is a luxury item on most peoples budgets. Something that comes after food, shelter, healthcare, etc.
If you are too poor to afford food, and you steal some to survive, ok...you might get off in a court of law.
Music, OTOH, is not necessary to the essence of life. If you cannot afford to purchase it, then don't. But why do you think obtaining it without payment is OK?
Postulate this..you've finally graduated from school, and started a career as a writer. You get ALL of your icome from selling books.
I go down to the library, check out one of your fine writings, and proceed to make 100,000 copies of it. I then distribute these copies, for free, far and wide. Put up a website, letting any and all get a copy, either electronically, or an actual hardcopy.
I , according to your thought processes, have not 'stolen' anything, because you, the writer, still have it.
You, of course, get no proceeds from my efforts. Your actual book sales go waaaaay down, and your personal income suffers greatly. Eventually, you have to give up writing as a profession, because you get nothing back from it. You have to go get a regular job, and have no more time for writing.
What would you do? Say "Ah well...who needs to eat? I'll write anyway, and let my readers have it for free."
Yeah, right.
Depends on the album.
Dark Side of the Moon for instance goes for $15. "Aha!" you say, "I'll just buy the single tracks separately!"
No.
You can't. They deliberately prevent you from buying two tracks from the album, just to get you to pay an inflated price.
What does this mean? It means the camel's nose is already under the tent with respect to playing with the prices. Soon we'll see certain singles going for $1.50. Then we'll see certain singles you'll have to buy in combination with other singles. Then finally we'll see singles you have to buy the whole album before you get to listen, and we'll have come full circle.
No, the answer to the problem of music and computers is clear. Fuck the studios. The Internet has made them obsolete. We don't need them. The bands don't need them either. Let the bands sell their music direct on the Internet, let other web sites serve as portals to those band sites, and then let's do this dance again, this time without the fucking studios.
Charge a dime per song. The artist sees the whole dime, and not only that, more people would pay.
The artist wins. The listeners win.
And the rat fuck studio execs can go get themselves a real job.
Is this truly the only Earth I can live on?
Seriously. AAC was chosen as the sound track of choice for HD-DVDs (ok there are lots of standards. Some of them). While it's not quite there with Ogg Vorbis at bitrates as low as 64k, at 128k it's right up there with Ogg Vorbis, Mp3pro, WMA and the rest, far ahead of MP3.
Also, repeat after me: The big music companies will never ever release in a format that you can share freely. If they did, those files would be all over every P2P net as the "original" files. The fact that you can burn and reencode ensures one thing - that there'll be ten thousand ways to rip it to mp3/ogg, some good, some bad, but different.
As for value, picking songs at $1 is a damn lot cheaper than buying CD singles, which is what you could compare it against. For a full album, well doh they offer "quantity" discounts like everybody else.
So will I be a customer? Nope. No Mac. But if they can get their IBM PowerPC chip in there soon, maybe I'll reconsider and make my next PC, uh computer, a Mac instead of an AMD Opteron.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Bzzt. Wrong!
If there's an album with 14 good tracks on it available for $10, getting an account at the Apple Music store doesn't stop you from buying the CD and ripping it. If you see a CD and it has two good songs on it, the Apple store just saved you $7 off that $10 CD.
Then again, if you've been copying and not paying anything just move along, it's just another conspiracy by the man to suck money out from your too thin wallet.
You get ALL of your income from selling books.
... the same middle man who forced you into a deal with the devil to sell your book because that middle man has grown so large that they can wipe out any competition that would give you a better deal?
Suppose using your analogy, you aren't really paid directly by the sale of your books. Suppose there's a huge middle man who takes 99% of the profit from your books and pays you the difference, which allows you to break even or even lose money after the middle man charges you for paper, binding, and marketing fees. Are they stealing from you, the author? Or are they stealing from the middle man?
Like most things in life, this isn't black or white. This is a shade of grey. I'm in the process of replacing, through peer to peer downloads, all of the music I listed to in high school. It was all on cassette tape. They're all long gone now, all destroyed or lost one way or another. I also lost a significant number of CDs in a move. If I replace all of them with peer to peer, is that theft? I paid for them all. How many times do I have to pay before it's not theft anymore?
Disconnect your television. Do your own research. Draw your own conclusions. They're probably lying. Don't be a sheep.
Apple did an amazing job implementing this.
First off, full albums cost $9.99 no matter how many tracks. All you $.99 winers, notice this price ceiling drops the average track cost for many albums.
Second, the usability of the itunes interface is striking. It acts like your regular song library. You can search, browse by genre and group, etc., and it lists all of the songs. Choosing a song plays 30 seconds of it, and it starts playing immediately. Sound quality is very high. The itunes threading is, as it's always been, rock solid. You can download an album, transfer stuff to your ipod, burn a dvd AND listen to another album.
Prediction: This will be a success. In spite of a somewhat guilty conscience, I've spent my share of time on Kazaa and LImewire. This is a MUCH nicer experience. It's immediate gratification at its best. I'd much rather use this than buy from a store, where I can't listen to tracks and have to walk around to find the stuff I want.