Digital Music Downloads Too Expensive?

threeofnine writes "The Sydney Morning Herald has an article written by a copyright and technology lawyer asking if we are paying too much for digital downloads. From the article: 'Parallel imports are unavailable in the Australian digital market, however. Australian consumers cannot purchase downloads from iTunes or Wal-Mart in the US, which are often cheaper than downloads available here, without a US-issued credit card. And restrictive licensing conditions imposed by copyright owners also limit the sale of digital downloads across international borders. For both reasons Australian consumers miss out. And retailers cannot buy downloads from overseas and resell them here, even if it is worthwhile for them to do so. In a recent analysis, the prices of Australian-made CDs of artists such as Bon Jovi, REM and Robbie Williams were compared to those of legal parallel imports. It was found that the local product was as much as 300 per cent more expensive.'"

Comments

Music has no absolute value

[koweja]

So it is "worth" what people are willing to pay, no more no less. Buyers are willing to pay $1 for a song, so songs are worth $1. Besides, if the music industry had it's way songs would be selling for a whole lot more. Besides Australia, and Europe for that matter, get screwed over why it comes to buying computer hardware and videogames compared to US prices. So in the end we (Americans) get the better deal when it comes to entertainment.

There are alternative stores for them.

[gasmonso]

They can shop at eMule, Bittorrent, and Gnutella. They have very reasonable prices and the largest selection available anywhere!

http://religiousfreaks.com/

Why is this even news?

[DaHat]

Companies have been practicing price fixing for years based on location.

Don't believe me? Compare your cost of cable TV to people in other local cities.

This has also been the case for years with things like software, movies and textbooks where the producer will likely lower the price in some areas and raise it on others.

This is simple economics of pricing an item at what the market will bare. Don't like spending so much on a ____? Don't buy it then!