[kman42]

Apple inked deals with the four major record companies to continue offering downloads at $0.99.

http://news.ft.com/cms/s/297eecc2-d9...0779e2340.html

kman

[mduell]

So much for showing pricing leadership.

[Stogieman]

The article didn't mention how long this deal will last. Is it another 4 years?

[Big Mac]

Thank you for the article, kman.

Choice quotes:

"Several music executives privately acknowledge that they have little leverage over Mr Jobs."

"“The labels need Apple too much right now,” one record executive said."

It's strange that AAPL was down a bit today and down a tiny bit more in after hours trading. Usually the stock runs on any remotely positive news, but today that's not the case.

[kman42]

News seemed to come late in the day and I still only see that one article or another one that references the first. We'll probably get a press release tomorrow or at least some other form of confirmation.

kman

[Salty]

Lovely, now I can continue to never get the music I like put on the Canadian store till after I go out and buy the bloody CDs!

[ironknee]

can you imagine michael dell trying to do this? lol only steve can tell record companies what to charge!

[JoshuaZ]

Lets hope they put Steve's brain in an iRobot body so he can be CEO forever.

[ironknee]

by 4-5 years, itunes could sell 4-5 + billion songs ! amazing

[Millennium]

Originally Posted by mduell

So much for showing pricing leadership.

If you ask me, they are showing pricing leadership: no popularity-based gouging, and no rent-your-music scams. Just simple, honest, one-price downloads.

It's a real shame that such a thing is truly 'innovative' and 'leading' in the marketplace: it should really be common sense. But in a climate where music distributors have become so unethical about the way they do business, I suppose it shouldn't be all that surprising.

[mduell]

Originally Posted by Millennium

If you ask me, they are showing pricing leadership: no popularity-based gouging, and no rent-your-music scams. Just simple, honest, one-price downloads.

I don't like constant pricing, I think the current price is too high, and I like the idea of renting music.

Song and album prices should be adjusted based on cost of production and current market demand. A common criticism of albums is that people are only buying them for one or a few songs; those songs should go for $5.00 while the rest of the album goes for $0.20. Selling online makes this practical; you don't have to update hundreds of brick and mortar sales every time you want to change the price.

The current price is nearly as much as the CD costs, yet instead you get a low-quality version crippled by digital restrictions. With a flat rate model I feel $0.25/song and $2.50/album is a fair price today for such low quality and tight restrictions; for $0.50/song and $5/album I'd expect higher quality (256kbps give or take) and better interoperability with other platforms; for $1/song and $10/album I'd expect lossless quality and no DRM, just like buying a CD without the expense of pressing CDs, creating cases/liners, shipping, and retailing the product.

Renting music makes sense because it allows easy quality upgrades (as it becomes practical to push bigger and bigger files) and because it prevents you from being chained into one DRM system. If I subscribe to a music rental service and in 5 years I see another that I like better (due to cost, quality, limtiations, hardware, variety, etc), I can switch with relative ease. With the current "licensing" method (you certainly aren't buying it, and your "rights" can and will change at any time) you're stuck forever buying hardware and music from Apple if you want to keep using any of what you've already paid for (or you could carry around two devices if you want to use two stores, but that seems silly).

[KeyLimePi]

I hope the Motion Picture industry takes note of this deal. They seem to be very resistant to sell movies online at a reasonable price* for fear of losing revenue. And yet a study released today says they're losing much more to movie piracy than even their highest estimates. Believe me if the Recording Industry didn't think they were making money, they wouldn't have signed.



*Movielink...Isn't it like $20-30 for a standard-definition, PC-only, DRMed-out-the-wazoo download?

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by mduell

I don't like constant pricing, I think the current price is too high, and I like the idea of renting music.

Song and album prices should be adjusted based on cost of production and current market demand. A common criticism of albums is that people are only buying them for one or a few songs; those songs should go for $5.00 while the rest of the album goes for $0.20. Selling online makes this practical; you don't have to update hundreds of brick and mortar sales every time you want to change the price.

The current price is nearly as much as the CD costs, yet instead you get a low-quality version crippled by digital restrictions. With a flat rate model I feel $0.25/song and $2.50/album is a fair price today for such low quality and tight restrictions; for $0.50/song and $5/album I'd expect higher quality (256kbps give or take) and better interoperability with other platforms; for $1/song and $10/album I'd expect lossless quality and no DRM, just like buying a CD without the expense of pressing CDs, creating cases/liners, shipping, and retailing the product.

Man, are you naïve. If iTunes didn't have the flat-rate $1 price and the recording industry had their way with variable pricing, the average price would probably be about $3, for the exact same files you get for $1 now. If you think any tracks would ever be less than $1 under such a system, I have some real estate in the middle of Lake Michigan to sell you.

[Dakar]

Originally Posted by mduell

The current price is nearly as much as the CD costs, yet instead you get a low-quality version crippled by digital restrictions.

And remember, the Music Industry thinks they're getting ripped off by offering you such a thing.

[slugslugslug]

Originally Posted by CharlesS

Man, are you naïve. If iTunes didn't have the flat-rate $1 price and the recording industry had their way with variable pricing, the average price would probably be about $3, for the exact same files you get for $1 now. If you think any tracks would ever be less than $1 under such a system, I have some real estate in the middle of Lake Michigan to sell you.

I don't think Mark's post showed any naivete (I don't know how to type accented characters on this here BSD system) on his part. He's saying what he thinks consumers should be able to get, not something he actually expects the record companies to go for. His demands aren't actually that unreasonable on their own, it's just that not enough people are making them for the industry to care.

[mduell]

Originally Posted by CharlesS

Man, are you naïve. If iTunes didn't have the flat-rate $1 price and the recording industry had their way with variable pricing, the average price would probably be about $3, for the exact same files you get for $1 now. If you think any tracks would ever be less than $1 under such a system, I have some real estate in the middle of Lake Michigan to sell you.

I'd agree with you if there weren't other music services selling music from the same labels, with variable prices ($0.79 to $1.29), and my unscientific observation is that the average price is around $0.99.

As for the "exact same files you get now", there are several other services offering better bitrates (160 and 192kbps off the top of my head, using advanced codecs) for the same woeful constant $0.99 pricing.