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iTunes Music Store hits Billionth Download
SirWraith writes "In case anyone hasn't realized Apple has had a counter going up to a billion for a few weeks now. Apparently last night, they hit the mark. From ABC News: 'Apple says Alex Ostrovsky from West Bloomfield, Mich., was the lucky audiophile who downloaded "Speed of Sound" by Brit pop band Coldplay, giving the Cupertino, Calif., company bragging rights to the 10-figure milestone.
Thanks to a generous prize package from Apple, Ostrovsky will now use a $10,000 iTunes music card to keep those downloads flowing on his new 20-inch iMac computer, and listen to his favorite tunes on one of the 10 60GB iPods.'"
$10,000 / $0.99 = 10,101.01, so he's going to have to pay $0.98 of his OWN MONEY if he wants to actually claim that .01 of a song.
DON'T BELIEVE APPLE, if they offer you $10,000 open your eyes and see it's a SCAM to get YOUR MONEY!
Hardly lucky. He paid for a Coldplay song and is probably comatose now. No number of iPods will wake him up.
This leaps to mind when I found out that the Billionth song was a Coldplay song:
David: You know how I know that you're gay?
Cal: How? Cuz you're gay? and you can tell who other gay people are.
David: You know how I know you're gay?
Cal: How?
David: You like Coldplay.
"Leo Fender was in a 'state of grace' when he designed the Stratocaster." -- Paul Reed Smith
A thousand billion bits of music or one bit of bad writing style?
They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security - Ben Franklin
Assuming an average mp3 size of 5mb, that's 12000 songs to fill up just one of those ipods. He'll only have to win about another dozen $10k cards to complete the task!
Do you think people were actually trying to be the 1 billionth? I mean, once it was a few thousand short were people buying a lot of songs to try and be the billionth? It seemed to pay off for one person if they were. Our local TV news agency said that the winner got "a 20 inch computer".
One Billion x $0.99 cents = $990,000,000.00
I know they gave away free songs through Pepsi and others. But still... That's a good return for little effort right there.
So there were 1 billion instances of Apple's marketing machine working, who cares. Wake me when something really interesting happens.
Downloadable music isn't a viable music model.
This happened Wednesday, winner announced Thursday, hardly news on Friday.
My other sig is extremely clever...
I think the term 'audiophile' does not fit here. Audiophiles buy expensive HiFi equipment and don't listen to 128kbit AAC from the Apple store. Especially as many people can hear the encoding artefacts on good equipment. But I must admit that I cannot hear the difference with the crappy earbuds that came with my iPod.
it's hardly surprising digg posted it first, their stories don't need to go through the same moderation process stories do on /. as they have a different news system which promotes stories more quickly. However on digg you can't expect to have any kind of decent conversation (ignoring rabid OSS fanboi's etc) so it balances out somewhat.
Go to digg for the latest news, come here to chat about it.
Promote Charity on Myspace, Show Your Colours!
Seriously, that is not a troll.
James P. Barrett
ROFFLE? What are you, the Hamburglar?
I'll *NEVER* hear the fucking end of this now.
... and I cannot stand to hear any it. We've been over this many times. Including a whine-cry-fest because I wouldn't subject myself to hours on end of her tittering friends AND Coldplay on a concert night.
... god fucking dammit ... was fucking Hendrix or YoYoMa or ... jeeze, just about anything too much for the winning song?
My gf loooooves Coldplay
So now, my heavy iTunes-Store using gf will gloat and yammer on, Coldplay this, Coldplay that, iTunes' Billionth this and that
Fuck. At 7:56, my fresh, new, cripsy Friday is fucking. Thanks Apple, thanks a lot.
Listening to a mainstream (shit) single of a mainstream (shit) band hardly makes you an "audiophile".
Improve at backgammon rapidly through addictive quickfire position quizzes: www.bgtrain.com
When will Slashdot hit their 1 Billionth Dupe?
Beyond the iTMS certificate, the iPods and iMac, the prize includes a 4 year scholarship created in the winner's name to a "world renowned institute of music" selected by Apple. So, while all the loot he gets is nice, he's not the only winner. Actually, given the price of tuition, he's not even the biggest winner.
So, the guy won $10000 to spend at the iTMS. Resale of DRMed music is... a little tricky (which is actually one of my main problems with DRM). But there was talk of Apple selling iPods directly through iTunes Music Store, and resale of iPods isn't really a problem... :)
If he's able to spend the $10000 on iPods, he should be able to get most of that money back through ebay.
I certainly would
It would have been something REALLY embarrassing. Like a Britney song. Or some of that American Idle (no typo) crap.
:)
Or imagine him DLing some Boyband junk. Or Tokyo Hotel. Oh, the ways of f..ing up when DLing music today are so numerous, you could get ridiculed for pretty much anything there is in the charts today.
At least by me!
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Hmmm, that sucks - hope they sell a whole song soon.....
It just so happens my billionth free music download was a Coldplay mashup.
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
What I would really like to see are these stats:
... how many unique users have downloaded these billion songs ... because I know people who have downloaded hundreds and some that have downloaded one.
...
How many people this represents
How many of these people are prize redemptions or giveaways?
How how many of these songs are validated on more than one computer and one iPod --- that would be really interesting to learn if people are still sharing
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
No audiophile worthy of the appellation would download an overly-compressed pop tune.
Ponder for a moment:
Everyone else - 100,000
Soul Amp (My Band) 6
Actually I am stoked about iTunes/Mp3 and iPods....as a indie musician, self producing with a home grown label, iTunes allows us to collect 65 cents per song. Direct to the the band...
Unfortunately without the big money for PR and payola (yes Apple probably takes payola too...despite claims otherwise, I think they call them marketing fees or "services") We are relegated to being just 13 songs in a sea of millions. Thus sales have been slow. But...that can change in a heartbeat as anyone who listens to music can see.
So...feel free to scope iTunes and search for Soul Amp...I need another guitar amplifier (VOX Ac-30 or Matchless) and a leslie for our 1958 Hammond M3 organ.
Also for people who refuse to pay for music until guilt finally takes hold after scamming every song ever recorded, we have tracks of tunes we are working on for our next disk on our website. Hep yer self...I say whay wait until a rash breaks out from the guilt of free downloading...by indie music from iTunes. The bands actually get the bulk of the money. 65 cents of 99 is pretty damn good. Most bands that get mp3 blogged are on iTunes.
http://soul-amp.com/
Apple says Alex Ostrovsky from West Bloomfield, Mich., was the lucky audiophile who downloaded "Speed of Sound" by Brit pop band Coldplay ...
There are audiophiles using iTunes? When did this happen?This is my post. There are many others like it. If you don't like what you read here, go try one of the others.
Sure, Apple decides to give away $15k, $20k or whatever it comes out to worth of stuff for the lucky punk who happens to download the billionth song - and a bad song at that.
Why couldn't they have put that money to better use like say...
Porting iTunes to linux?!?!
I mean come on! How long have we been asking for that? Wouldn't it be one little victory over MS if this application ran seamlessly on the only operating systems that can remotely be considered competition for windows (sorry BSD, I don't mean to offend) Isn't it always said that the enemy of my enemy is my friend? Now that money might not ahve gone all the way to building a working version (I'm no development expert, that's for sure) but it certainly would have helped.
I recently made a series of unsatisfying purchases from iTMS. First it was the album "Winters Pageant" by The Softies. Most of the album was fine, but the first track was messed up, having a 1/2 second or so blank spot shortly after the song started. I tried playing the track on multiple computers and my vPod and they all showed it. I complained to them, and to their credit they not only refunded me for that one track, but for the entire album purchase. So I can't complain in that regard, but ultimately I just want that track intact. They told me not to buy the track again for 4 to 6 weeks so they'd have time to fix it. I allowed more than 2 months to pass and bought the track again, and it still had the same problem. I complained again and again they refunded my purchase (this time just for the one track as that is all I purchased.) As far as the refunds are concerned that was fine, but what I really wanted was track 1 intact. I don't think I'm going to try buying the track again from iTMS, only to perhaps once again find it is messed up and again having to request a refund. They seem unwilling, or unable, to tell me when the track has been fixed.
So instead I used the original album refund to buy a different album, Neutral Milk Hotel's "In The Aeroplane Over The Sea". This is a great album, and there were no such technical problems with the tracks, but, my god, is this album ever ruined by the inability of iTunes and the iPod to play the songs without gaps! Like no other. There are numerous seamless transitions between songs. At least they are suppose to be seamless. When listening to the iTMS versions you get heart-stopping gaps. Setting a 0 second crossfade slightly helps, but not much, and the iPod can't even do that. Unlike had I purchased a CD, I couldn't use the "Join CD Tracks" feature of iTunes to join my iTMS purchased tracks as a means to get around this issue. Again I complained and requested a refund. I requested that they give me my cash back, as opposed to crediting my account, because I wanted to buy the album on CD now, but they didn't do that and instead just credited my iTMS account for the album. I ended up then using the credit to buy an album that I knew didn't have seamless transitions between tracks, and I'm basically happy with that purchase, so all is well in that regard. I also then ordered a copy of the CD of "In The Aeroplane Over The Sea" from an online store and happily used the "Join CD Tracks" feature of iTunes to join tracks 1-2, 4-5, 6-8 and 9-11, so those seamless transitions would be intact. Now I've got the album in a form that plays like it is suppose to in iTunes and on my iPod, something iTMS is completely incapable of.
So, Apple treated me fine, but I'm completely turned off to iTMS unless I can be sure the album does not have seamless transitions between tracks. Even then, I'm wary of the possibility that one or more of the tracks may be messed up, and that Apple wouldn't fix them, or at least that it is not possible for me to know if and when they fixed them.
--- What?
Isn't there a limit on how many devices you may put your itunes songs on? Isn't that limit lt 10
I got a kick out of it at least.
Too bad I have no mod points.
Poor guys owning razorback servers probably hit the mark long ago. And instead of fame they got closed.
Oh wait.
my sstream of consciousness
The interesting thing is that people don't realize how bad they have it. iTunes has opened the door for independent musicians to finally market their streams online, but iTunes suffers the problem of serving the mass market. In short, they suck, because the industry sucks. They have to offer DRM to appease the suits. They force people to install their crappy software for the privilege of being told what they want to listen to. They have started the revolution, so thanks for that, but we'll take it from here..
david
http://www.bitworksmusic.com/
odd tunes for odd times
BitWorksMusic.com -- odd tunes for odd times
the billionth song was Coldplay i.e. someone cool (i suppose still) and "hip", what a shame it wasn't Uncle Pete's Rog Tog Bimbo Rambo Band or some horrific 70s country music. I mean, that would not have looked as cool in the press release would it? ;)
I am familiar with several individuals that tried to time the purchase and down load of several iTunes with the on line counter. I wonder what was the exact time of the winning purchased? A couple of forums I read stated that the song was purchased in the mid or late afternoon. The story says evening. Inexact science at best!
...that I haven't purchased a single one.
I do love the sample's at the iTunes store though. It makes it easier to decide what songs to acquire thru cheaper means.
Jobs anounced last month that they've sold 42 million iPods, so they've sold on average less than 24 songs per iPod. Even the lowest capacity Shuffle holds 120 songs. If we assume an average capacity of 2GB (500 songs) per iPod (the majority of sales are probably the cheaper low capacity units), less than 5% of the aggregate iPod capacity is filled with iTMS songs.
This seems to contradict the oft repeated claims that the iPod ties you to iTMS, or that iTMS is a major contributor to the iPod's success.
he still only was the 111011100110101100101000000000'th visitor in binary, which is not very exciting
Apple does not make money on iTMS.
Apple DOES make money on iPods.
TODO: Something witty here...
Is the idea to make a ring of iPods around your waist? How very Luke Skywalker-ish!
Word is that Mike Myers has been hired for the next macworld conference, presumably to appear onstage and exclaim
"One BILLION DOWNLOADS"
Or not.
When the posters fear their moderators, there is tyranny; when the moderators fears the posters, there is liberty.
"Speed of Sound," by Coldplay.
Figures.
Fucking Coldplay.
It really bites some folks asses that most folks just flat out don't want to listen to some no-name indie band doesn't it?
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
legal, free, why not?
Is it just me or is "Speed of Sound" an ironic title to hit this magical 1 billion milestone with?
Cheesy Movie Night
About 60 cents according to CDbaby.com
Sound like a large percentage? Its not. Say you are dang lucky and sell 10 songs. That's what, $6 bucks? Enough for lunch for several months perhaps to write and record the song.
There is no money in the music business. None, period. Everyone can download as much music as they want for free off of myspcae and limewire. I have yet to sell even a single song. That is why I myself have chosen to give my music away for free. Its just not there. Its the big lie. Anyone who wants to argue otherwise can write their own music and produce it and show me a balance sheet that proves otherwise.
50cFF
http://rootpassword.com/
At least the story on Digg shows up before it does on CNN, unlike slashdot.
Slashdot is turning into "Yesterdays (or even older) news, for nerds that don't matter."
Yeah, you can tell there's Digg people in this particular thread by the quality of the posts...
Slashdot - where whining about luck is the new way to make the world you want.
Most probably he slit his wrists.
Hardly.
Have you ever considered the possibility you are a hard to please whiner who drives up the cost of everything for the rest of us?
For Sale, $10,000 worth of iTunes music... ...
Starting at $10,000.01
A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me at kick boxing. Emo Philips
http://wigu.com/overcompensating/2006/02/one-billi on-served.html
"Only two of 'em are any good"
Well, to the first, I've got an iPod, but all of my music comes of CDs I've bought. So, no, you're obviously not tied to iTMS if you have an iPod, even though people seem to be completely mistaken about that.
BUT, since I (and probably a lot of others) don't buy their songs on-line, that means that the people who are buying songs from the iTunes store are doing it in higher proportion. I would imagine the segment of people who would buy their music online do drive the sales of iPods as they buy the player so they can populate it from the music store.
Just because every single owner of an iPod doesn't seem to buy a lot of tracks, I don't think it's a leap to say that a non-trivial amount of iPod owners are motivated by the iTunes store.
Heck, the guy at my local convenience store was complaining after Christmas that he'd bought an MP3 player for his daughter for, and she hated it and couldn't figure it out. Another customer had told him you couldn't use an iPod without a Mac. When I corrected him, and said you could, he returned the MP3 player she didn't like and bought her a Nano. Last I checked with him, she loved the device, and was buying stuff from the on-line store -- because that was what she wanted in the first place. For them, the music store was one of the main reasons for buying the device, that and they had a bad experience with the other MP3 player they had tried.
For the people who don't want to go through the process of ripping CDs, or didn't already have a library of music ripped, I bet the iTunes music store is a huge selling point. It just doesn't have to be for all of the users for it to be a screaming success. The fact that they've sold one billion freakin' tracks says so.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Doesn't it seem like a very well-placed gimmick that Coldplay was the 1 billionth song downloaded. Don't they have some agreement with apple already? Seems a bit too convienent.
http://www.myspace.com/stolen_powerbook http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&i
So I wonder just how many credit cards he needed to max out to win? (mind you he comes from one of the richest counties in all of the US)
Thankfully his 2 million dollar house and seventy-thousand plus dollar mercedes benz makes him poorer than me.
iPods have been exceptionally well-marketed (to the masses, at least), and many people want them solely for the status they confer. I wouldn't be surprised if there's a vast amount of iPods actually sitting unused, and many more that hold a mere handful of songs.
My, that was a yummy potato!
For such a huge milestone, that's kind of a lame prize. Why don't they do something like give him free downloads for life?
FREE - Java, J2EE and Ajax Audiobooks for Software Developers - www.DeveloperAdvantage.com
I'd be happy to actually get paid ::something::::sometime:: in the twenty years I have been making music.
If I can get 1000 people to purchase 1000 songs of our tunes on iTunes that is $650 bucks that I didn't have...
If I can get 10% of those people to buy our CD from CDbaby that is another $500 we didn't have.
Music is such a difficult way to make money I have given up any expectation to be in the "black" in my lifetime. But you do what you must to try and set yourself up to actually make soem money. Actually for musicians this is the best time. Cheap technology, quality instruments and a public that has a continuous high demand for NEW music. In another 30 years we will look abck on these years in awe just as we do when stereo LPs became a standard and 4 track tape machines were invented.
What is dismaying is that so many people have simply given up on the connection between artist and listener because of big labels, big money, big media etc, etc...so here is service that is setting the music business on a new course and one that in my book levels the playing field a little more for those artists who have no expectation of a "corporate handout" in the guise of a "contract". People need to realize there is no going back. Music listening now requires more energy and attention by the fan to sift through the dizzying array of choices. Staduim rock concerts and FM as the major inlfuences of buying habits are gone, gone, gone. One to One interaction, small clubs, independant releases, blogs and online serivces like iTunes are now the major influence in the music industry.
The internet and digital music technology enables independent artists to baypass tradtional music buinsess models and reach out directly to listeners and build rapport on a one to one basis. That activity alone leaves "gate keeping" big media running around STILL trying to put a "gate" in front of bands hoping they will walk through. Crazy thing is artists can now simply walk around the "gate" because the "fence" is gone. The cost of entry has lowered thanks to digital music technology and distribution. Bands have their own studios now capable of producing commercially viable products and a means to reach a worldwide market. In fact because of home and project studios the very techniques and technical sound of music has changed. All the innovation in recorded music is coming not from the big studios and labels, it is coming from independents. There is so much great music being made now it is mindboggling.
What is gone in the music industry is the control they once had as gatekeepers...the money is slowly starting to spread out across a wider range of artists and companies. WHo would of thought 15 years ago that a educational computer company would be a leader in the music industry....certainly not the RIAA, or Capitol Records....maybe Steve Jobs did...
I find it interesting to review a few of the dong milestones - quite meaningful...
1,000,000,000 - Speed of Sound - Coldplay
500,000,000 - Mississippi Girl - Faith Hill
100,000,000 - Sumersault - Zero7
25,000,000 - Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow! - Frank Sinatra
I only came here to do two things; kick some ass, and drink some beer...looks like we're almost out of beer.
Agreed. Gigging is vital to any band. We do gig. We have yet to embark on a three month national tour...not as easy to set up as one might think. They are very expensive, obviously time conuming and really don't pay all that well for emerging artists. So we play in our region mostly. SE WIscosnin and are building a good reputation and are always welcomed back to venues we play. Right now we are hunkering in the studio to catch up on working on work for our second disk. Gigging even the 1 or 2 a month we do takes a ton of time away from recording.
It takes a multi prong approach from lots of different directions. First is writing and recording. Online sales and promotion, gigging as much as possible, puttnig out somekind of "product" all the time, getting music in other media, TV, film. There are boat loads of paperwork to deal with with ASCAP, music licensing, distibution. etc...it all comes together slowly and also take a buzz. As ususal the good music floats to the top. But to do so it first has to be heard....either by word of mouth, gigs or from a music blog...
One thing is for sure...it is really a lot of fun...for a longtime musician and day job computer geek..it is difficult, a sh*t load of work, but immensely satisfying to DIY. It has gotten much easier over the years...and is still as much fun as it was when I was 15. Can't beat that.
ROFL WAFFLES = ROFFLEn ment/09_1_b.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v203/MoEntertai
They got sold on eBay a while back.
I'm sure someone is very proud of their purchase.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
OK. So 1,000,000,000 songs sold. 43,000,000 IPODS.
That means that there are only 23.25 legit songs on each IPOD. The RIAA should be able to get 43,000,000 search warrants pretty easily.
Love to see the real numbers on the illegal/legal rips/downloads for the rest of the songs.
hmm. I have 140 tunes on my 2gb (1.8gb without the marketing speak) Nano at it's full. 8 of those tunes are 1 hour long each so I suppose they can count as 10 tunes each. All at around 192kbps.
250 little photos totalling a few megabytes.
500 tunes on average my arse.
6 hours battery life on full volume if I'm lucky.
And it's covered in tiny little scratches even though it's only ever lived in my key-less, coin-less pocket...
So dissapointing. I now wish I'd choosen a different MP3 player. Teach me for being a fashion sheep I suppose. Baaaaaaaaaa.
This post contains benzene, nitrosamines, formaldehyde and hydrogen cyanide.
::::WATCH THE DANCING BALL:::::
do only as you are told....
listen to only music that has been deemed culturally acceptable by television and large volume sales...
Now speak...
"BaaaaBaaaaBaaaa"
Excellent you are now ready for fleecing.
And it's covered in tiny little scratches even though it's only ever lived in my key-less, coin-less pocket...
Have you tried toothpaste? Put a little on it and rub with your finger (not a toothbrush, the bristles itself will scratch it.) Then get a holder for it.
Ooh, a sarcasm detector. Oh, that's a real useful invention.
I wish I can put this another way, but your math stinks.
Apple states clearly that "song capacity is based on 4 minutes per song and 128-Kbps AAC encoding". Your one-hour long tunes do not count as ten, but 22.5 ((60 min / 4 min) * (192 kbps / 128 kbps)). Each of your 4-minute 192 kbps songs would also count as 1.5 each. So, let's say you have 132 4-minute 192 kbps songs and 8 60-minute 192 kbps songs, that's 378 "Apple songs". We can make a more accurate estimate if you provide a more accurate account of the songs you're loading.
In any case, you can argue that an "Apple song" is an unrealistic measure (it is, by the way, a bitrate reasonable enough to sell one billion songs in) or whatever else you want to complain about, but loading longer and higher bitrate songs and whining that you can't get the advertised song count really just means you either refuse to read or can't perform arithmetic.
Also, I suggest you avoid playing your iPod at full volume to protect your hearing, not to mention get better battery life out of your iPod.
What you forget is that those 42 million iPods were probably sold to less than 42 million people, and purchased songs are transferrable to any number of iPods. An average family may own three iPods, each loaded with thrice the average number of songs from your math.
This seems to contradict the oft repeated claims that the iPod ties you to iTMS
Rudimentary knowledge already contradicts that claim. iTunes rips CDs very well. Unlicensed music has also been widely available well before the iPod was introduced.
or that iTMS is a major contributor to the iPod's success.
When you're talking about a vertically-integrated solution, it's not generally useful to talk about how big a contributor each part is. The iPod doesn't win mostly on design, UI, marketing, iTunes integration, iTMS, etc., but on the whole that exceeds the sum of its parts. A component in such an integrated solution may have value ("I might want to buy a single song one day") that affects the purchase decision, even if the customer never actually bothers to.
Try listening to a 24bit/48 or 96 khz datafile recorded using high quality DACs.
Flat out the frquency range and resolution is so above the dumbed down 16bit CD audio quality.
Sony's SACD is incredible, the detail and "air" is amazing. Not siince I was in a 32 track analog studio listeing to the mix play back direct form grand master have I heard that level of detail. But that is likely dead (4 good reason beyond sound)
If you start with 16 bit and encode a 128 Mp3 for pete's sake you are gonna hear high end attenuation. If you listen close. (warble) Plus with today's mixes being pumped up to the highest levels, bands are tossing in "garbage" into the mix to keep it musical. Distortion and noise of all kinds is introduced. Anything goes now as long as it is musical and is not fatiguing to listen to. So on high end equipment you start to hear these artificial noise floors from audio dithering and other effects like tube pre-amps, room modeling and harmonic exciters...
We encode 192 kbit Mp3s direct from 24/48 khz master AIFF files and they sound pretty darn good on my vintage Pioneer silver face receiver running through nice AR bookshelf speakers. Not high end but better than most stuff around now a days. http://soul-amp.com/.freebies
Also a new service touting high quality.
http://musicgiants.com/
Still I applaud apple. It's a new age in music. Long gone are the days of a little 45 case and the GE Wildcat portable. The quality is coming. Everyone in the recording industry tech pros are really anxious to see 16 bit depth 44.1 Khz sampling rates go away. It simply like making a sculpture and then grinding away 1/3 of it..
$10,000 / $0.99 = 10,101.01
1010101 = 85
and you know what that means!!!!!
'85 == the year windows 1.0 was relased.
Don't belive Apple - its 1985 all over again!
Pepsi paid for every song that was redeemed on iTunes. It was in the press releases I believe.
Amusingly the album 'In the Aeroplane Over the Sea' is available on eMusic.com in unencumbered mp3 format.
Link
There are whole markets (like... Poland - 39 million potential Apple customers) that can't use iTMS at all.
With all of the free downloads available now, the major point of itunes (for me at least) isn't the fact that I can download songs- again, I can do that for *free*- but rather the fact that I can download a song I like and actually help support the artist I'm downloading. I listen to some semi-obscure bands who haven't reached the point where they are selling millions of albums, or in some cases are barely selling enough to support themselves, so its important to actually support them in order to make sure they can continue making great music. So in 5-10 years, when it turns out that the format of the Ladytron song isn't supported, I'll go and download it for free knowing that I contributed to the artist whose song I actually enjoyed and wasn't just someone who claimed to be a huge fan of a band who didn't bother supporting them.
Apple already knows what you've purchased and searched for.
Who's to say Apple won't just offer you a choice to purchase a better bitrate or format? Seems like a perfectly fine to hit up the known customers with another fee.
Better yet, pick from the list and have them burn you CDs or DVDs with the tracks on them. '
And if they HAVEN'T thought of this already, pay up suckers.
Musical tastes are subjective. That means no one has the "right" or "wrong" musical preferences. Thusly there are no sheep in this regard.
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.