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Behind the Scenes In Apple Vs. the Record Labels

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the does-steve-wear-turtlenecks-in-private-too dept.

je ne sais quoi writes "The New York Times recently posted an article describing what really happened between Apple and the Record labels that culminated with the January 6th Macworld Keynote by Apple Senior VP Phil Schiller." Essentially they discuss a bit of a swap: Apple allowed variable pricing for songs and the industry allowed DRM free music. And apparently the iTunes homepage is a huge hit making device. Big shock.

3 of 146 comments (clear)

  1. No Pity/Sucks to be them. by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Really, the ip0wning that the record guys are now receiving is their own fault(and I, for one, am experiencing everybody's favorite German emotion). They wanted DRM to protect their precious content. DRM is, by nature, inimical to interoperability. Thus, the record labels, by forcing people who wanted to buy music online to choose lock-in to one DRM camp or another, created a situation where the winning DRM "ecosystem" would be extremely valuable, and powerful, and all the others would be near worthless. Shockingly enough, playsforsureexceptonzune wasn't the winner.

    If the online music business were a bunch of generic outfits selling MP3s(or generic AAC) then the relationship between the labels and the retailers would be a lot more like the brick and mortar one. By pushing DRM, the labels created something they can't really seem to handle. Had they just stopped clinging to the nonsense dream of magic interoperable DRM, they might well have been able to avoid this. Idiots.

  2. The music industry is funny by tkrotchko · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The gripe that they effectively created MTV, they gripe that the revived Apple.

    If I was a large shareholder, I'd fire the lot of these guys. Because either one of the two is true:

    1) They're lying as an excuse for their failures
    2) They have all this business opportunities that create entire new industries, but they can't get it done themselves, effectively giving up 10's of Billions of dollars.

    I wouldn't want those guys working for me, that's for sure.

    --
    You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
  3. Re:DRM free? Apple is late to the party. by Lord+Flipper · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Again, how did Amazon and company do it?

    The Labels used looser terms with Amazon in an effort to rob Apple of some marketing muscle and negotiating "leverage" and it failed, on both counts.