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?'"

Comments

And where is Sony?

[curmi]

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?

No you don't

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

Re:Song prices

[NaruVonWilkins]

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.

I don't like the subscription model

[Infonaut]

I personally think the subscription model is superior.

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.