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97 Comments
- DamageInc, on 10/11/2007, -8/+62Music bought from iTunes accounts for 0% of songs on my mp3 player.
- warpdesign, on 10/11/2007, -4/+39***** the music companies. If they don't want to make their music available to me for legal purchase then I'll download it illegally. They act like they're doing me a favor or something. I'm doing you a favor opting not to steal it, get it straight.
- mrspin, on 10/11/2007, -4/+25The 3% is a stat touted by Apple themselves.
- kingkilr, on 10/11/2007, -7/+27People aren't saying its good for apple(that would just be stupid), they are saying it is less bad for apple then it is for Universal, who are just shooting themselves repeatably the face..
- TheWorm, on 10/11/2007, -19/+38This is a lame attempt to spin the story into being good for Apple. The lack of Universal support is a huge blow to the iTunes music store. I'm surprised people are even trying to say this is good for Apple.
- KuNgFuAzN, on 10/11/2007, -4/+15If i cant buy UMG on iTunes, I wont be going to the store.
www.thepiratebay.org - bergur1, on 10/11/2007, -0/+11its 3% because you are not the only person with music on your iPod. They get this figure by looking at your music collection as a whole, and then getting the percentage of music bought on iTunes per user, then they average it.
When they say iPod I am assuming they mean iTunes. - mywhitenoise, on 10/11/2007, -3/+12Universal owns a huge part of the music industry. This isn't going to effect iPod sales, but it sure as hell is going to cut them back on sales of music. What are you, stupid?
- bluechips23, on 10/11/2007, -1/+10Yup. My thoughts exactly!
- Irfit, on 10/11/2007, -2/+10Because of this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Universal_Music_Group_artists - ArthurSucks, on 10/11/2007, -1/+9Knowing Steve Jobs, he will stick to his guns no matter what Universal does. In the long run, Universal will put there tail between their legs. If it becomes too hard for the average consumer to get their download fix, they'll fill their iPods up the easy way. Bittorrent.
- muppethouse, on 10/11/2007, -0/+8Universal just chose to not enter into a new long term contract. This does not mean that their music is going away on iTunes. Having the most complete music store possible is a selling point for iPods, even if most people do not use it the potential is there.
- iDiggIt42, on 10/11/2007, -0/+8Stop spamming or I will be forced to remove you from the intrawebz.
- Phoenixfury, on 10/11/2007, -1/+8I have a plea for artists under Universal.. Don't renew your contracts, go knock on EMI's door. :)
- ebolaworld, on 10/11/2007, -2/+8I won't miss them.
- victorc26, on 10/11/2007, -1/+6CDs still exist you know...
- yfph, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5or go to any number of music stores that sell nonDRMed tunes like emusic..
- zeeky, on 10/11/2007, -1/+6Thank you for your loquacious response. Your penmanship is extraordinary, and you have added a wealth of information to the conversation.
- RTourn, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5I will NOT buy CDs, they are over priced for 1 or 2 songs! Heck they are over price for the whole albums. Believing a CD is worth $15-$20 is just wishful thinking. Keep pushing a outdated marketplace you find your self left behind in history!
- xmuzik, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4it is possible that this could not hurt apple, i mean even if universal does pull out other majors and indies could step up and get their music promoted in their place.
i'm no apple fanboy, i dont own a mac or a ipod, but i do believe that if apple and the other music companies played their cards right that they could make a decision like this blow up right in the face of universal.
and lets remember apple is not in this alone, there are alot of music executives and companies that would give their left nut to watch universal implode .
the enemy of my enemy is my friend, so to speak - kreatre2007, on 10/11/2007, -3/+73%? Actually, most of my songs are purchased directly from iTunes. CDs are so 90's. Universal is just a bunch of greedy bastards who can't understand that the world has changed.
- GreatDrok, on 10/11/2007, -2/+63% huh? Interesting. Of the 3148 tracks currently on my iPod only 54 were bought from the iTunes store. The rest are from my own CD collection. I wonder if the 3% is for users with smaller capacity iPods, or is it for iTunes itself rather than what can fit on a 2GB Nano for instance? I don't buy much from the iTunes store (clearly) but it doesn't look too far off to me for them to claim 3% as a figure.
- milkmage, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4no genius, but any other store that sells music with DRM will NOT play on an ipod - so if you have an ipod, you can't use the DRM'd content from
other stores. your only options are to get DRM free music by ripping your own collection or p2p. - blacklilyninja, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3ok universal just wants a peice of the ipod sales and thats it.... the other reasons don't wash. Apple has already made the option for DRM free/more expensive tracks available. And i guarantee artists will start getting their lawyers ready for a way out of the UMG distro deal just to keep their music on iTunes. With all the promotions that happened with U2 and Apple i can bet Bono will be the first in line to say ... "see ya later UMG" to the label. Contracts will be put to question and UMG will lose.
- Shorties, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3I love buying stuff off iTunes and while I have a lot of CD's I buy all my music from iTunes now. If Universal leaves iTunes then Universal will no longer get my money. (I find out about music mostly from iTunes anyway so it will be like Universal doesnt exist)
- fkr3, on 10/11/2007, -2/+5As much as digg users want to believe Apple's the one with the power, it's really a two-way street. Apple's iTunes rely on record labels with popular artists. That's what people want to buy. Take away the popular music and what's left? A line of numbers next to "revenue" on Apple's statement.
They need each other but not evenly. Universal can replace Apple with any distributor, Apple can't replace Universal they can only get other music by other artists which isn't going to satisfy anyone looking for music under the Universal label. Nobody likes to be told they can't have something and would they like something different by someone else.
Apple needs to be very careful not to alienate the major record labels because they've successfully tied iTunes into everything they have, while online distribution is such a simple mechanism it can and has been replicated by others. Only Apple's marketshare hasn't been replicated and there's almost certainly a relationship between iTunes having a wide range of popular music and people buying popular music from iTunes. - EztliNahua, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Incorrect. The 3% stat is this: Total number of songs bought though iTunes/total number of iPods sold.
I think. Maybe I'm wrong? - locojones, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Your argument presumes that a song's place on the charts is exclusively related to its online sales figures, which ignored the multi-factorial component that goes into something like the BillBoard charts including, among other things, radio play.
- Barbarino, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2I find myself only buying older music, I'm 30 and very little of the current stuff impresses me so for their current catalog this won't affect me, but from what I understand they want newer music sold for more and older stuff sold for less, so it appears they will never yank off their older stuff.
- mywhitenoise, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Dude....find some better music. Holy *****.
- kernokerno, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2rise against? is that a bad copy of a bad band?
- r3zonance, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2"Apple is still struggling for market share (3rd recently) and losing UMG is a big loss."
3rd in terms of total music sales (physical and digital). But there are by no means struggling for market share in the download market. - sdm011, on 10/11/2007, -3/+5This shouldn't have made it to the front page. Universal isn't leaving itunes, they are just won't renew their contract. They don't want to be stuck in a year long contract.
- serpicolugnut, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2"They need each other but not evenly. Universal can replace Apple with any distributor, Apple can't replace Universal they can only get other music by other artists which isn't going to satisfy anyone looking for music under the Universal label. Nobody likes to be told they can't have something and would they like something different by someone else."
Universal can use other distributors, and they do. The difference is their other distributors, the ones who move physical product, are moving less and less of it each year. In the digital distribution arena, Apple probably moves 95% or more of all their digital downloads. Cutting off Apple would be worse than cutting off WalMart, because while WalMart sells the largest amount of their product now, in 5 years, digital downloads will probably account for more than physical sales.
My guess is that Universal will go for a few months without a contract, and will test the waters by removing their content from the iTS, and only offer it on sites that use WMP, like Zune, Rhapsody and Urge. Their revenues will plummet, and after a few months (or 2 quarters at most), they will come back to Apple with their head in their hands. - Gerz1219, on 10/11/2007, -3/+5The iPod's market share is falling because it has a lot of competitors with deep pockets, and because they haven't revised the 5G in a really long time, giving competitors time to play catch-up. But the iPod is still a ridiculously profitable piece of hardware, it's still the best music player on the market, and it still dominates the space. Apple only operates the iTunes music store to legitimize the iPod's existence -- it's a low margin business, practically akin to a mafia front operation. There's no money to be made in online music sales, and there never will be, because every album ever made is available online for free. You can't undercut a free product on price. Over 20 billion songs are downloaded illegally every month, we have two generations raised without moral qualms about engaging in piracy, and those pirated songs are overwhelmingly placed on high-margin iPod hardware.
Right now, the music industry is seeing a modest trickle of honest consumers -- who are in the minority -- willing to pay for digital music online, but they have one and only one viable avenue for selling DRM'ed songs. If they want to keep the DRM, they have to play ball with Apple. If they want to drop it, then they can sell music through competing online music stores, because the files can still be played on iPods. Either way, Apple will make boatloads of cash on iPods until one of their competitors makes a better product, which isn't happening anytime soon (and more importantly, has absolutely nothing to do with the music selection on the iTunes music store). Universal needs Apple a lot more than Apple needs Universal. - Murdats, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3right, because apple is so glorious and mighty, you wouldnt dare buy from another online store
- mal1964, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3They need each other to make money, its a ploy by Universal music to get more of the pie. Apple knew it was coming they do it also. it will be worked out with the price staying the same.
- SirBotchness, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3I like how every time something doesn't go apple's way the macfags try to make it a good thing.
- gmillerd, on 10/11/2007, -0/+21/3 of the new releases are from universal as well.
- kazamx, on 10/11/2007, -3/+5While not waqnting to come accross as a fan boy, I think your wrong.
One of the most important thing to labels is the single charts. Getting a number 1 gets a single, album and band huge exposure. Now iTunes sells a huge % of singles in the US ( I think I read something like 40%). If Universal pulled its artists from itunes then it can not only kiss goodbye to any chance of getting a number 1 single. In fact it can forget about getting anything in the top 20. Not having a high flying single can have a huge knockon effect.
People like a single and that can tempt them to buy the album, so no single means less album sales. No single also means much less radio airtime.
While not being on iTunes wouldn't destroy Universal, it could cause it alot of problems - kelly, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Sorry... its your logic that is flawed.
If you consider that itunes is the 3rd largest music reseller in the world AND that not much intues music is on each ipod, what that means is that 1/3 of all Universal's music profits stems from that small percentage that is on people's ipods. It's a HUGE amount of money for Universal (as mentioned its 1/3 of their profits. It's very insignificant for Apple as Apple makes their money on iPod sales... only only a small percentage of itunes music comprises the total of music that is on people's ipods.
Apple is making money by providing a service to people that bought music from Universal (and other companies) primarily in the PAST. (already-purchased CDs). Universal only profits as new tracks are purchased. This demonstrates exactly what you're claiming is refuted... this doesn't hurt Apple anywhere near as much as it hurts Universal. - miniboss, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1You have to admit it is a bit sick the way people try to spin negatives into positives. You don't work for Apple, you don't have Apple stock and you in no way benefit from Apple's profits. Yet when it comes to defending consumers vs a big corporation then the most vocal of these Apple fans choose to defend the big boys.
As hard-working consumers we're supposed to root for whats in OUR best interest. Not Apple's. And that includes complaining like babies when a product we spend our money on doesn't fulfill the needs we have. If you want your iPhone to have an AIM client then why not group up and complain rather than make lists of "top 10 reasons why IM is unecessary on iPhone" posts. And to spin that losing ANY label from the iTunes catalog is somehow a good thing? Get real. Let's not get stupid in our Apple love. - Sidnak, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1I guess Im the exception here. I and my family buy all our music on itunes. The price is fair and its just easy to do. If universal ended up not going with itunes then I suppose I just wouldn't buy anything from universal. I dont download/steal music and I sure wont end up buying a CD.
- paulgibson, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Yeah I totally agree with you warpdesign. I had high hopes with the recent DRM free music announcement that the music companies were finally on the same page as the rest of us....but now.
I'm going to fire up Xtorrent again :) - slapthemonkey, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1If iTunes doesn't have them, ill go down and buy them. simple.
- celkin, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1"Why Apple doesn't need Universal Music"
Stay tuned for "Why PS3 doesn't NEED games." - Jimidoll, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1They did mention that only 3% of the music in iPods are from iTunes itself.
So yeah. - dharh, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1I'll go one step further. Those of us who disdain CDs as I do, will also not buy music with DRM for more than 99 cents per song. If Universal wants to sell its songs for more i've got news for them. Very few will buy them.
- thomas, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Universal isn't going to pull its music off of the third largest music seller (in the US).
- LeeSoong, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Universal Music TALENT and ARTISTS can cite Universal for being a pain in their collective butt...
DUMP Universal,
and all those musicians can work DIRECTLY with iTunes - forget the middle man.
iTunes can offer artists a FATTER cut of the $$$$ for dumping their OLD way of thinking and
embracing the New Digital Age.
More Money for Musicians
- Less money for the no-talents -
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