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iTMS Launches in Japan
ickoonite writes "The iTunes Music Store has finally come to the Land of the Rising Sun! After months of tricky negotiations, Apple has reached agreements with 15 record companies for the supply of around 1 million tracks, with per-track prices between ¥150 and ¥200. AppleInsider also has some blurb, and Apple has an (English) press release on the launch is here. The question now is: 'Where next?'"
You need a credit card based in Japan to purchase from the Japanese iTMS... stupid licensing laws.
Bigger news is that there are no Sony songs on iTMS Japan!
The story is that this is the current hold up in Australia. Sony/BGM in Australia won't allow iTMS Australia to use their songs unless Apple agrees to sell the songs in Apple's Fairplay AAC, Microsoft's Windows Media format, and Sony's own ATRAC format.
It looks like Apple Japan just went ahead without Sony on board. If only they would do that in Australia...maybe Sony BGM is just too big a monopoly in Australia to be able to do this?
That's where CCP (credit card proxy) comes in to its own. You get a CC registered to any of 49 major countries (including Japan) - 'major' is defined as any country whose economy uses credit/debit cards for >5% of all transactions.
A useful (if difficult to find) service.
Actually, that's about right. CD prices tend to be 3000-4000 yen (25-35 dollars). Remember that both cost of living and pay are higher in Japan - you can't compare directly to the cost of a song in another market.
The blame here should be on the labels/artists, not ITunes. ITunes sends out seperate contracts for EACH area they serve. If the label/artist decides not to sign their EU contract, then their stuff won't be available there, and that's their fault.
I dislike subscription services because they amount to extortion. Keep your subscription, or the music is effectively gone (rendered unusable). Assuming that I don't want to break the law, all the music I downloaded is useless to me if I decide to stop using the subscription service. Of course, iTMS files utilize DRM, but I can play tunes on five CPUs and unlimited iPods, as well as rip CDs. So although I don't have unlimited rights to do whatever I like with iTMS files, for my forseeable uses I feel like I'm getting a fair deal.
Beyond my general reticence toward subscription services, Yahoo's Music Unlimited doesn't work for me because:
1) I use an iPod. I don't think I'm alone in this.
2) I use a Mac. Y! Music Unlimited doesn't support the Mac.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
The Land Down Under doesn't have an iTunes store, yet, but they have lots of iPod users.
I really wanted to do things legal and pay for all my downloads, so I started using iTunes. Where I live (Netherlands), 90% of the songs I was looking for just missed. I expected there to be few Dutch songs, and there were. But, also many international songs that are there in the US version just miss. New albums are often not available in the local version, but are in the US. I switched back to eMule a few weeks ago, I just missed too many songs.
At least P2P won't make stupid regional stores that lack almost everything, the sound quality is just as good, I don't have to jump through hoops to put the music on my MP3 player, and it's cheaper. Pretty hard to see why it's so hard for the publishers to get a decent music download system working. I'm completely willing to pay for downloads, they just don't offer the option.
According to this: http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB112256752830098 846,00-search.html?KEYWORDS=music+&COLLECTION=wsji e/archive/ Gracenote (the company that finds out the info about a CD when you put it in your computer) has 50 million tracks in their database... So over 50 million songs...
The article, being from the WSJ, is for paid subscribers only, but its quite interesting and talks about much of the stuff relevant to this thread - i.e., why the services don't have all the music you want.
According to AnimeNN, Apple's US iTunes Music Store has expanded their collection of Japanese J-pop and anime soundtrack downloads at the same time the Japanese store was opened. I'm hard-pressed to find any additions, but then again, I'm not much of a fan.
Here's the free version.
As the article notes, Gracenote currently has 50 million tracks in their database, while current online offerings aspire to a mere 1.5 million songs. Clearly there is room for improvement.
However, one issue that the article doesn't address is how users might navigate the so-called "celestial jukebox". A large catalogue may be useful if one specifically knows the artist/album/song one is looking for, but browsing a catalogue such as Gracenote is impractical (especially since music can be relatively difficult to classify). I believe that personalisation will play a major role here - I'm still waiting for a comprehensive online service that provides recommendations on a par with those provided by Audioscrobbler. The iTunes store is very weak in this area, while Yahoo seems to have invested significant effort into this area (in terms of technology, it ties in nicely with their search personalisation). It will be interesting to see how important this aspect of the buying experience becomes as the depth of their respective catalogues increases.
Depending on the album, at 150 or 200 yen per song, albums can become quite a bit cheaper. For example, singles CDs, which typically cost anywhere between 800-1200 yen in Japan, are about 400-500 yen on iTunes. That's a nice discount! A 12 song album would be between 1800-2400 yen, which is also significantly cheaper. Jack Johnson's 14 track album was actually 1500 yen, which is a really good deal.
:) Well, they're just starting so hopefully things will improve, but it does give the impression that the Japanese market is even more hesitant to embrace an online download service than the US market was.
The unfortunate part, though, is that their selection is really just so-so. I couldn't find X-Japan, Tube, or Southern All Stars, all very big bands in Japan. I also couldn't find many newer favorites, like SMAP, Orange Range, L'Arc en Ciel, Aiko, etc. And anime fans would be disappointed to know that there really aren't many anime songs on there, aside from "Sonic X" songs.
While your explanation is good, what you're explaining is not "price fixing" (different suppliers agreeing to charge the same price) but price discrimination (charging different prices for the same good).
I'm the author of this piece about the iTMS and Australia. Sony is the hold out. I reckon, now that Japan has launched, Australia iTMS sans Sony won't be far behind. http://www.bulletin.ninemsn.com.au/bulletin/site/a rticleIDs/4DC115E462A7EF8ECA25702E0022FE20/
Here's a clue for you: listening to subscription service does NOT forbid you to buy the tracks you want to keep. In fact, Yahoo offers those for $0.79.