Jobs Says People Don't Want to 'Rent' Music

eldavojohn writes "PhysOrg is running a piece on a recent speech by Apple CEO Steve Jobs about DRM free music. While we know that Jobs is a self proclaimed proponent of DRM free music who's not all talk, he's now said that 'by the end of this year, over half of the songs we offer on iTunes we believe will be in DRM-free versions. I think we're going to achieve that.' Jobs pointed out what's obvious to us, the consumers, but isn't obvious to the music industry — 'People want to own their music.' He also dismissed subscription based music as a failure, and claimed a lot of other music labels are intrigued by the EMI deal."

Comments

It *is* obvious to the music industry

[LighterShadeOfBlack]

The music industry aren't complete idiots. They know people don't want DRM'ed music, just like they knew people didn't want to pay inflated prices for records for 30+ years. That's not the point though. It's not about what we want, it's about what they want, and what they're willing to do to get it. Whether they violate racketeering laws, buy legislature, or lie straight to the faces of their customers every second of every day, it's not because they're stupid. It's because they're greedy crooks.

Depends on Their Purpose

[servoled]

I spend more than I probably should on music, but I still pay for one of those subscription services. Why? To audition new music. Lots of times I'll hear of something new, and listen to the album (lots of times a 30 second sample just doesn't cut it) on the subscription service to decide whether its worthwhile to buy the album. Other than that, its fun to go through stuff I already own and randomly follow the recommendation links they provide to see if I stumble on something good.

Now, I certainly wouldn't want to use the subscription service as my only source of music... primarily due to the limited selection, mediocre encoding quality and limitations of where I can listen. However, I'd say its worth its worth the $10 to be able to audition full albums of most stuff without trying to track them down on some p2p system.

Jobs' Perspective in Context

[jonathanbearak]

I think Jobs' perspective should be put into context.

First of all, iTunes DRM is not designed for a subscription model. Re-engineering would be required, including firmware updates for older iPods, to enforce the subscriptions.

Moreover, not all songs are typically available via the subscription model. Jobs continues to make an issue about variable pricing for songs, with the DRM-free option being the one exception. Yet, consider how they are planning to implement this: by a preference in which the user selects which kind of music s/he prefers to buy.

Some have said a subscription model would require a whole new iTunes Store -- a separate store, with rentable tracks. This is not really true -- users could be presented with a "Buy Song" or "Rent Song" button where applicable.

A subscription service is "not out of the question," he says, but it doesn't look like it's in Apple's interests -- they would bear the price of increasing download costs, unlike the record companies.

DRM-free music, on the other hand, allows for seamlessness. Users can download music, copy it between iPods, computers, and friends' computers without a hassle. Rentable tracks would lend themselves to the opposite kind of experience.