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iTMS Sells 100,000,000th Song
Macslacker writes "At 10:26 PM PDT on Sunday, July 11, Apple apparently sold its 100 millionth song at the iTunes Music Store. While the contest may now be over, congrats to Apple for a job well done."
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But what was the track?
the contest was annouced, Apple is the real winner here, i bought 20 songs I would never of bought. I've had itunes for ages and never used it.
The counter is still running for those who didn't download the 3rd party counters, even after the comp, they are still selling song by the thousands. its already very nearly gone over another 100,000 songs already, it just doesn't stop!
Jonathanjk.com
.. to Apple! It's good to see that some are able to look new ways when it comes to distributing music, perhaps other contents, like movies, can be distributed in the same manner in the near future.
Unfortunately, the 100,000,000th song sold was Hanson's "Mmm Bop", causing embarassment for everyone involved...
In all seriousness though, I really like ITunes...even though it costs $0.99 per song, I can put if up with it because i'm guaranteed a near album quality version of the song each time i download...there were always quality issues with Kazaa or Naptster or Lime Wire...plus, the transfer is much faster then those ever were...
I look at it this way...i can download 20 songs for $20, and burn my own CD...sure, now the CD costs me approximately what it would in the store, but it's garaunteed to have 20 songs on it that i like...
"Facts are meaningless. You could use facts to prove anything that's even remotely true." - Homer Simpson
Let's start simple: the iTunes Music Store is not a good value for customers. Apple says many users are buying whole "albums" for $8-$12 each. That's less than the $16 store price, but used CDs at Amazon or ebay cost $5, and those come with liner notes. If you don't care about liner notes, you can burn the CD from a friend for 25 cents and send the musician a buck. In both cases, you end up with a real CD, and you can always use iTunes to rip it onto your computer or mp3 player. And you don't have to deal with restrictions on how you use it.
Apple says iTunes is "better than free" because it's "fair to the artists and record labels." That's simply not true. First of all, Apple gets 3 times as much money as musicians from each sale. Apple takes a 35% cut from every song and every album sold, a huge amount considering how little they have to do. Record labels receive the other 65% of each sale. Of this, major label artists will end up with only 8 to 14 cents per song, depending on their contract. Many of them will never Artists Get Ripped Off. even see this paltry share because they have to pay for producers and recording costs, both of which can be enormous. Until the musician "recoups" these costs, when you buy an iTunes song, the label gives them nothing.
So why does iTunes give artists such a raw deal? Because it's the exact same deal that artists have always gotten from the big five record companies. Despite huge new efficiencies created by internet distribution --no CDs to make, no distributors to store and ship them, no CD stores to build and run-- artists receive the same pathetic cut. That is the disaster of iTunes. Instead of using this new medium to empower musicians and their fans, it helps the record industry cartel perpetuate the exploitation. Apple might say it's not their fault: after all, they didn't write the unfair record contracts. But when Apple supports and profits from an obviously unfair system, while telling customers that it's "fair to the artists", they are just as guilty. For years, Apple Computer has built a reputation for straightforward business. So if Apple honestly believes that the iTunes system is fair for artists, we challenge them to display the artist's cut next to each song and let their customers decide.
iTunes is just a shiny new facade for the ugly, exploitative system that has managed music for the past 50 years. Thanks to peer to peer filesharing, we finally have a chance to break the major record label system-- but every iTunes user who pays 90 cents on the dollar to middlemen props up the old regime and delays the day when corporations finally lose their stranglehold on music. Now that's something to feel guilty about.
Now, I don't claim to agree with all of these criticisms, but it does bug me how fawning and sycophantic many /. editors and posters are towards
Apple.
What are the record companies going to do with their $75 million cut?
I still haven't bought even one song. Primarily because Apple will not extend this 1/10th Billion dollar business to my country, but also due to the fact that I get great soundtracks by ripping the music from video games.
:E
Why don't apple make video game soundtracks. If the soundtrack to one of your favourite games was available for $9.99 would you get it. I would but then I'm a bit of a freak. Still game soundtracks, film soundtracks, TV show soundtracks. Maybe Apple could offer ambience tracks as well. $0.99 for a dawn corus track, or the sound of New York at rush hour. Whatever tickles your fancy, and your wallet.
I hearby copyright and patent all these ideas. Anyone using, disseminating, talking or even thinking about them will be sued. Have a musical day!
May the Maths Be with you!
...when DRM was generally considered a bad thing here (remember "fair use"?). Now people get blasted for being "ungrateful" if they criticise Apple's use of DRM (just read some of the comments to this story).
I'll bite. Slashdot is not a single entity. There are what, about 790,000 registered users, right? Ok, so why would all those people have the same opinion. Some of them won't have a problem with DRM, some will hate it with all their soul, and some (probably most) Won't mind it until it interferes with what they want to do. Since ITMS doesn't interfere with what most people want to do with their music. Most people don't care about it.
I would personally rather that a music store with minimal DRM become popular, rather than have a "1 copy, rent your music" model become prevalent.
Let's make a difference
Personally I think the most valid criticism is that Apple describe iTunes as being fair to artists whereas in most cases the artist only makes a tiny fraction of each sale. Yes, this might be due to the artist signing a dumb contract with their label, but its Apple's choice to describe this as "fair".
Downhill Battle have a nice suggestion on that page I linked to, iTunes should clearly indicate the amount of each sale that goes to the artists. That way consumers can choose to support record labels that give artists a fair deal over those that don't.
yeah yeah, if you want to bring down a system there's no point targeting the new online equivalent of the CD store. You think HMV has any say in how artists get remunerated? That's right, and neither does Apple (though I'd love to see them set up a direct agreement with a few big artists - no record company at all).
Anyway, you have your grievances, fair enough. Mine is quality. I want lossless, not some shitty lossy encoded MP3/AAC/OGG, etc.
It's the first time in music production history where the quality of what's on offer (as in, technical sound quality) has gone backwards. I'd pay up to double if I could get lossless files.
-- james
This isn't a flame on Sanity, but just some thoughts on the points that were made.
I agree that the iTMS doesn't change the situation for artists, but given the resistance from the overall recording industry to the model that iTMS has been so successful with I still think it was a big step.
In terms of the used CD thing. Hey, nobody is forcing you to buy from iTMS. I still think it's a good deal once you factor in shipping costs (or local sales tax). Plus there's the instance gratification thing. Apparently others agree or they wouldn't have just sold their 100,000,000th song.
Anyway, Apple isn't the bad guy here. The RIAA and recording industry are! Apple's just trying to make a buck by selling iPods (after operating costs they really aren't making anything off of the songs).
Finally, I don't feel the least bit guilty about buying from iTMS anymore than I'd feel guilty buying a CD. In fact those buying CD's are doing more to prop up the "old regime" IMHO. Short of a full boycott of buying music, I don't see how any purchases under the current model wouldn't "prop up the old regime."
Once you lick the lollipop of mediocrity, you'll suck forever!
In fact, you yourself can have a free copy of that 100,000,000th song here.
So if Apple is selling free music, do they get to pocket that money, with no music labels to pay off? Or was the song free to download, in which case why didn't anyone just sit there downloading free tracks all day trying to hit that 100,000,000th download?
That's like saying, "Boy, I love these new TV's, but several thousand dollars is just too much. I'll go steal mine from the storage truck behind the store. Maybe if they lower the price to a few hundred I'll actually buy one."
The options shouldn't be 'buy at a low price' or 'steal'. They should be 'buy at a low price' or 'don't buy at all'.
1. When the record companies sold their 100-billionth CD, they probably celebrated by jacking up the prices - not by giving stuff away.
2. If You'll look at the prize - it's no biggie in terms of money (it's not even a car). It's all worth less than 15K, yet it's something that most people lust for - the coolest laptop, 10,000 songs, and the best MP3 player...
Now that's what I call a cool company.
- MPEG-4 audio and Video (file sizes probably around 200MB.
- Watch on 5 Macs / PCs, or burn to DVD using iDVD.
- Watch trailers from iTMS.
An iPod like device probably wouldn't be useful attached to this service, but an OS X-based PVR would.I am TheRaven on Soylent News
I love iTunes. I've sold many, many more songs on iTunes than I ever did on CD (over the 'net).
On the other hand, when I try to describe DRM to people, they kind of blank out and say "uh...ok", and move on.
DRM hurts small artists because it confuses people. Small artists desperately need the impulse buying that online distribution allows, and confusion or second thoughts destroy this impulse buying.
So....
Apple: Thank you!
But:
Apple:
* Make the DRM optional...I don't care about it and it hurts sales.
* Let me pick a price. I'd love to lower my lesser-sold songs to say, 60 cents to try to get them out there.
* Improve the 'community' aspect so more people have exposure to different music
* 128 bits? Yeah that's why I spent my kids college money on production.
Fix this stuff,t hen we'll really love you....Heck we might even have some loyalty when those sub $100, 40 gig competitor devices come out.
Well, perhaps not 500MB, but 650MB rips from a non-compressed source done with the right options look as good as typical MPEG2.
No, they don't. They are acceptable to watch, but nowhere near as good as the original source or as MPEG2. You point me at such a rip and I will point out the artifacts in seconds.
Not to mention such rips do not have a Dolby Digital track, with can be up to 200 MB all by itself.
By that rational Netflix can never succeed. After all, 3hrs is practically instantaneous compared to the joys of the plain old postal service. I suspect resistance by the MPAA is likely to be a far bigger hinderance to online movie distribution than any problems with the underlying infrastructure.
They would rig it somehow. I don't care how illegal that is, there is NO way that Apple would proudly announce that they're 100,000,000th song winner has never used iTunes, sorry all you people who spent tens to hundreds of dollars trying to win, you should have read the T&Cs. Not a vinyl cat in hell's chance.
"The dew has clearly fallen with a particularly sickening thud this morning"
Gee, I forgot all about that. However, Apple could get around that by simply spining off iTunes to a new company that does NOT use the Apple name. Remove the Apple name from the iTunes software and web site, incorporate iTunes, and there would be NO trademark violation.
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
Sorry, $1 for a tune that you enjoy enough to listen to repeatedly is not a rip off in my book. That's something that you can use over and over again, unlike the $3-5 starbucks coffee you're just going to piss back out. At least you can now buy on a per track basis, which was previously one of the biggest arguments against high cd prices.
You know my blood boils each and every fucking time I hear those worthless idiots from DownHill Battle referenced.
Its too expensive? $1 is the perfect price to demo an album and actually get a little sample of the full album. I generally buy one song from the iTMS and then if I like it I buy the full album. I use to download the songs from a P2P and then do the same thing or discard the tune, but I never really liked it. It felt too much stealing a car to see if I liked it or not (fuck off any asshole that references piracy is not theft). Sure, if I liked the car, I'd take it back in the morning and write out a check...if I didn't, well thats the dealers problem and I'll leave it on the side of the road. Oh yeah, fuck off anyone that points out minor flaws in analogies.
Past that, I buy the full album, used or not. If I can find it used, thats what I pick up.
As for artists getting ripped off?
Bull fucking shit. Do you believe everything crackheads like Courtney Love tell you? She is so fucked up that she never read her contracts, spent all the money and then wrote a bunch of articles claiming the industry was ripping her off.
I work in the backline for several major artists as well as quite a few up and coming artists. I get paid for my work. A lot of times, the new guys pay me to come in (well, through their lable) and I'll sit around for 8 hours while they try to write their album in the studio. Thats cool when you are fronting the costs, but when you are on someone elses dime, thats STILL going to come out of your pocket somewhere. Those 8 hours I'm doing nothing is still billable hours. If you showed up to work and your boss didn't have anything to do for you, you'd still get paid...
I'm never amazed by the number of guys that don't have a clue about getting in and getting done. My partner and I have worked development deals in the past where upcoming artists are set here for a few weeks to kinda get a feel of how things are done. The partner is kinda a grey hair in the industry and takes them under his wings and explains how things should be done and all that. Gets them ready to go back to the coast and have shit ready.
Still, these guys don't get the clue that this is costing them money and fuck around and then expect us to do all their work and we won't. I've got friends at the Matrix that can do that for them if they'd like, but quite honestly, they ain't good enough and don't have enough money to pay those guys (girls).
The label takes a risk and says for the next 7 years (or until you release the prerequired albums), if you wish to be a major lable musician (always sign your contracts in LA because it will limit the time of your servitude -- and ALWAYS go for a *SINGLE* album deal with opportunity of buyout or renegotiation). For the time of your contract, you know that the money the lable has given you will come out of your pocket. Make the best out of it. Don't be a dumbass. Don't hire limos to take you to and from the studio. Don't waste it on engineers and techs like me while you are wasting our time. We don't do this as a job, but because we like the art...if you aren't producing art, you *ARE* wasting my time. I don't care if its bad art or otherwise, be prepared.
Have a decent lawyer, and don't sign with the first industry lawyer that presents you with a contract. You have the option of bringing your own in from the street. My intellectual property lawyer that I use for patents in my technical life was FAR more informed about the contracts and otherwise than the one they provided me. He charged less, and was on my side. Never trust someone elses lawyer to help you out.
Even if you do, if you follow the contract to its letter, you can make a decent amount of change. The guys I'm working with now aren't living like superstars, but they have been pocketting more that I do at my technical job -- and I can guarentee you haven't heard of them yet.
So, when artists pick up 10% of the gross, th
The options shouldn't be 'buy at a low price' or 'steal'. They should be 'buy at a low price' or 'don't buy at all'.
Following your analogy: if I don't buy at all, the record label gets... nothing. If I steal, the record label gets... nothing! So what's the difference?
Your argument is flawed because copyright violation is not analogous to stealing physical property. You're assuming a zero-sum game, but when information can easily be replicated, that no longer holds true. Record labels inflate album prices by attempting to enforce artificial scarcity. This doesn't work. The whole multi-billion dollar entertainment industry is built an a foundation made of thin air.
You guys do know that the albums are available for 10 bucks no matter how many songs there are, usually? I never get single songs, because yeah, it is a ripoff. But ten dollar albums? Score!
P.S. Please tell me where I can buy new albums for under ten dollars. I looked online at that ASDA store, but last I heard, you needed more dollars to equal a pound. Is Apple overcharging in Britain?
I disagree. I often see counterpoints moderated as well as the "group think" posts. In fact, I don't buy in to the group philosophy and often play devil's advocate myself and am surprised when I see anti-OSS, anti-libertarian, pro-copyright, pro-patent or (gasp) pro-Microsoft posts I've made modded quite high. In fact, I've had several modded down to -1, and then modded back up again.
Which is why I like Slashdot. It's a good mix of well thought out critical posts and repetetive bandwagon posts. There are some great minds in here. Also, many optimistic idiots.
Hey freaks: now you're ju
Is there any reason practical reason (bar the one stated below) why Apple can't act as a music label and start offering to distribute music for small bands/artists? Does a label, even if they are indie, need to be invloved when Apple can just cut out the middleman?
There are no distribution costs, bar bandwidth. As long as a band has a decent amount of talent they should be able to get published by ITMS.
But yes, I know all about the Beatles sueing Apple over trademark infringement...
"What can I say? I'm the queen of java."
subduction.net
It looks like the 100,000,000th song was an electronic track from Zero 7 featuring (uncredited, unfortunately) my absolute favorite rapper, MF Doom.
It kind of highlights the good and bad of iTunes. Good: this is a remix off an EP I can't find on Amazon, I've never heard it before and I wanted it, clicked buy and for $3 it was mine right away, no shipping, and here's a nice image of the band along with a detailed description of their music in general. Bad: this album never ONCE came up when I did searched for MF Doom in the past and there's no liner notes, no way for me to tell who that masked man is if I liked the flow and wanted to hear more of it.
iTunes still offers a more convenient browsing, sampling and delivery system than any other way to purchase music, if you can get over the (largely irrelevant) fact that it's a DRM wrapped 128 kbit AAC. I say largely irrelevant, because none of these (compressed audio, DRM or the fact that it's got DRM) affect your ability to hear or purchase the music, which is what I want to do. I know I'm not buying perfect CD quality audio -- but then again, buying a CD these days could mean copy-protected audio with no personal backup or mixology rights. The way I listen to music, that's far less acceptable than DRM or compression.
Incidentally, I bought $45 worth of music last night at 1:00, hoping to "snipe" the 100,000,000th song. Didn't work, but I did end up with some awesome Dylan albums I didn't already own, each of which would be $16-$18 at Borders.
Hey freaks: now you're ju
I can burn as many CD's as I like from any ITMS song, and if I get tired of what restrictions there are I can use Hymn to strip away the DRM.
Napster is far more restrictive in terms of use (and not consistnat either with some songs having different restrictions), and what does it matter if I can use it with ten sanctioned devices if they all suck? It's like saying I can have a free breakfast and giving me ten flavors of cement to choose from.
You'll also find out just how "free" Napster is when they go bankrupt and the licencing servers go offline... What is the path to un-DRM Napster songs?
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I read an article on the New York Times criticizing Apple for not offering lossless songs. The Apple representative said they felt most users would automatically download the lossless songs thinking that they're better, then not understand when the songs took a lot longer to download and you could only fit a couple hundred on the 40 Gb iPod which apple said could hold 10,000.
That said, that fact that iTunes and the iPod now support lossless does indicate the potential intent on Apples part to offer music in that format. They'd just need to figure out a way around that whole user confusion thing.
You forgot one:
(I know that's the one I really want to know the answer to...)
Yaz.
re-read my entire comment, I admitted that they may now be making a small profit per transaction and that they probably make something on volume. However I don't think they are making that much and most of the profits are probably going back into the product at this point, whether that is into more servers or bandwidth or advertising. The fact is that Apple's entire portion of the sales was only $35 million for 14 months, for a company with tens of billions in the bank that's chump change. What Apple gets most of all out of iTMS is that their brand is once again in the forefront of peoples minds, and THAT is very valuable to them, so they would run iTMS even if it cost them some money at this point, just like the trailer site (which also goes to promote Quicktime and thus encourage people to buy producer licenses for QT).
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.