iTMS Tops One Quarter Billion Songs Sold

[MacRumors]

In a press release (http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2005/jan/24itms.html) Monday, Apple declared the number of songs sold from the iTunes Music Store has topped the 250,000,000 mark. “When we launched the iTunes Music Store we were hoping to sell a million songs in the first six months—now we’re selling over a million songs every day, and we’ve sold over a quarter billion songs in total,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “iTunes is leading the way into the digital music era and together with iPod is changing the way millions of music lovers find and enjoy their music.”

[theonenonlyjoey]

i've contributed to 50 of those! congrats apple!

[2A Batterie]

these guys just keep selling songs faster and faster. But this is probably just a "fad" to the Dell guys.

[Redpoetsociety]

yes but are they turning a profit?

[maelstromr]

yes but are they turning a profit?


I think so, but even if not ITMS wasn't designed to be profitable, it was designed to support and augment the iPod, which has been immensely profitable!

[Redpoetsociety]

I think so, but even if not ITMS wasn't designed to be profitable, it was designed to support and augment the iPod, which has been immensely profitable!

well said, point taken.

[garybUK]

I didn't like the iTMS at first but now i use it all the time, I have found sooo many new tracks I didn't think I liked, the best thing is as well, you can get those older songs you wouldn't usually find elsewhere, it's great!

100 songs including 3 albums in the last 2 months! iTunes essentials is fantastic... Much, Much, Much, Much, Much better service than Napster

[miloblithe]

They declared last quarter that the music store was turning a small profit, but as my accountant wife points out, such a statement is not really all that meaningful. Either way, it is clearly part of the larger picture for Apple. This is a key year: can iTunes and iPods push Mac sales? If not, the darling of investors phase will slow if not end.

[angelneo]

Great... hopefully they will expand to asia as well.

[jncrow]

I have helped with that about 100 times now. I like the fact I can buy the song not the entire album with the other songs I don't care for. Way to go apple selling like "hotcakes" now.

[Zaty]

Great, but Apple, please, don't forget the remaining 30% of the Music market. There are still many potential iTMS customers who would love start spending money at iTMS but so far haven't got a chance to do so.

[pigbat]

yes but are they turning a profit?


The profit is pennies per song but those pennies add up. These numbers give Apple some power with the industry to keep prices where they are and possibly negotiate for discounts.

[VicMacs]

come on apple show us the songs! i live in the Dominican Republic and we cannot purchase songs yet :(

but way to go apple anyways :(

[Abstract]

Well of course they're selling songs faster and faster. Its not like they only have one store anymore. They have lots of stores in different countries now. It's a no-brainer that they would have sold songs faster than at the pace they listed. How much have sales at the US store increased last year? Last quarter?

As of right now, I don't know anybody who has ever bought a song online. So while Apple is ace in a very small market, when the market gets bigger and lots of people buy music online, I hope they manage to fend off the competition and stay on top. :) Maybe I'll be their next customer. Of course, I'm moving to Australia again, so expand there!!! :o

[roadapple]

I think so, but even if not ITMS wasn't designed to be profitable, it was designed to support and augment the iPod, which has been immensely profitable!

I can't help but think it's the ipod that is supporting the development of the iTunes store music store, and that iTunes will soon (2-3 years) become a huge brand for online content purchases of all types. The ipod is not going away, but it will be greatly overshadowed with new changes to the online store. The real money is in selling the content, not the players.

[fixyourthinking]

The profit is pennies per song but those pennies add up. These numbers give Apple some power with the industry to keep prices where they are and possibly negotiate for discounts.

I tried to get an idea of exactly how much this meant so I could gauge how other stores could POSSIBLY be profitting.

Apple's COST of running the ITMS is about $13 million a year - this includes ongoing development/licensing/server bandwidth/etc

Apple pays about 71 cents to the RIAA/artists for each song.

It is estimated Apple pulls in about 13 cents a song. So, after expenses they make about 3 cents a song. (After a little complicated math)

If this is correct they have made about $750,0000 (less than a million) off the store so far.

As other posts have pointed out - the iPod is the 316 million dollar money maker thus far

[macnews]

yes but are they turning a profit?

Yes, iTunes IS profitable. This comes directly from some inside contacts I have at Apple - yes, really inside Apple. Apple planned on the iTMS NOT being profitable for the first few years, or possibly ever. They saw it as a key part of selling iPods and the halo effect.

What has happened, however, if the economies of scale. They make a little more than "a few" pennies per song but selling a million songs a day makes all those pennies add up. If there is anyone who knows how this works it would be Dell. Funny why Dell would dismiss the iPod as a fad. Guess they just don't get the iPod/iTMS connection.

[Veldek]

It is estimated Apple pulls in about 13 cents a song. So, after expenses they make about 3 cents a song. (After a little complicated math)

If this is correct they have made about $750,0000 (less than a million) off the store so far.Last time I checked 0.03 * 250,000,000 = 7,500,000. So, it’s a lot more than one million.

[fraggle]

It is estimated Apple pulls in about 13 cents a song. So, after expenses they make about 3 cents a song. (After a little complicated math)

If this is correct they have made about $750,0000 (less than a million) off the store so far.

As other posts have pointed out - the iPod is the 316 million dollar money maker thus far

If the 3 cent numberis correct that makes $7.5 million which might not be much compared to the sums they earn with the iPods but on the other hand as other people have pointed out iTMS is meant to sell iPods! And then making a healthy amount itself is not too bad I would say.

[AirUncleP]

yes but are they turning a profit?

Let's say Apple makes $.05 a song. .05 times 250,000,000 is.......

.....carry the 5......let see..... A Lot!

[SiliconAddict]

I think so, but even if not ITMS wasn't designed to be profitable, it was designed to support and augment the iPod, which has been immensely profitable!


Well the key thing is that as long as Apple isn't LOSING money on iTMS (This includes overhead like server cost, power, bandwidth, backups, customer support, etc as well.) then its all good. To state the obvious. Bleeding money from iTMS would be a BAD thing.

[Macmaniac]

This is great, I hope they can reach half a billion this year.
Lets hope Apple can expand iTMS into new markets especially Asia.

[Veldek]

This is great, I hope they can reach half a billion this year.
Lets hope Apple can expand iTMS into new markets especially Asia.At the recent rate of about 8,750,000 songs per week they reach about 670,000,000 songs at the end of the year. And this is without the new Pepsi promotion.

[macnews]

If the 3 cent numberis correct that makes $7.5 million which might not be much compared to the sums they earn with the iPods but on the other hand as other people have pointed out iTMS is meant to sell iPods! And then making a healthy amount itself is not too bad I would say.

Exactly, not only can they pay for R&D but it allows them to go down other roads with the store. You also have to remember that the 250 million is total since the store opened, thus the $7.5 million is since conception not a yearly total. Still, the volume is growing and that is key to allow the store to grow as well. Soon iTMS will be making $7.5 per year and more.

Even though I would love to have 7.5 mil/year it isn't a lot in the greater picture of Apple. I do wonder, however, how Napster and some of the others stay in business - or how long they will stay in business. It is certainly possible they have similar costs and are using all of the same 13 cents per song (approx since they also have subscriptions) to stay attractive to investors. Still, it takes significant more money to KEEP subscribers (made more difficult by the popularity of the iPod) than just to offer an ala carte service like iTMS.

[Raid]

Well I hope Apple won't rest on their laurels for too long. While this is a great achievement and shows that there is a market for legitimate downloaded music, I know that number (in terms of my personal purchases) would be higher right now if the song availability across all music stores would be the same. Right now it appears that Apple is either tied up in legal matters that prevent certain songs from being offered in other countries and/or is operating under the false assumption that tastes in music are dependant solely on the country of residency.

I fail to see why certain songs/artists are available in one countries iTMS, yet not available in another. Its just good business to sell where there is demand and little in the way of expansion costs (I mean all they really need is to set up links to files right?). I think the disparity that I’m seeing in the different iTMS’s is more due to a lack of foresight in the legal agreements between Apple and Artist/Label. I hope that it’s being corrected, but for now I sit and wait to buy songs that are available in other iTMS stores, waiting for the Canadian iTMS to let me buy.
:(

[ebow]

This is great, I hope they can reach half a billion this year.
At the recent rate of about 8,750,000 songs per week they reach about 670,000,000 songs at the end of the year. And this is without the new Pepsi promotion.

My records show they've been selling about 1.28 million songs a day recently (similar to your 8.75 M/wk); if they do no better than sustaining this rate they will reach the 500 million mark by 7 August. There's every reason to believe the rate will continue increasing, though, so I expect we'll see the announcement sooner.

[KCK]

Last time I checked 0.03 * 250,000,000 = 7,500,000. So, it’s a lot more than one million.

I've heard it depends on how many songs you buy at one time that determines if Apple makes any money. If you only buy one song a day then Apple loses money due to the cost of processing the credit card transaction. If you buy two songs a day ( or at a time) then Apple breaks even. Buying 3 or more songs at a time means that Apple makes a profit. At least that is what I remember reading someplace.

[AppleFoussa]

Let's lok at the convenience of buying songs online. You crave a certain artist or a certain song all you got to do is sit on your chair and go to iTunes. Definitaly beats gowing to tower records or some crap like that. I can't remember lasat time I went there.

[lem0nayde]

Man, not to be a negative Nelly, but I am SO sick of hearing about the iPod and the digital music revolution. Even Wired Magazine listed the iPod as "Tired" in it's funny Wired | Tired | Expired graphic in this months magazine (Firefox on the cover.)

I think Apple is teetering on the edge of overexposure. If they fall over the edge, they could find themselves in the sticky situation of having the iPod no longer be cool to own because it's so mainstream. Consumer backlash could ensue.

Just a thought. Good for them on selling so many songs though.

[srobert]

Apple is doing great!

But maybe we should observe a momment of silence, as a sign of compassionate understanding, for all those 229 (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A20043-2005Jan19.html) other music stores. These poor stores are probably not even selling 1/10 as much as song as Apple and they can't even profit from sales of portable music players. My thoughts are with you little guys. Keep on fighting! (...So Apple won't have a complete monopoly in the music arena) Need a hug?

[rosalindavenue]

Yes, iTunes IS profitable. This comes directly from some inside contacts I have at Apple - yes, really inside Apple. Apple planned on the iTMS NOT being profitable for the first few years, or possibly ever. They saw it as a key part of selling iPods and the halo effect.

What has happened, however, if the economies of scale. They make a little more than "a few" pennies per song but selling a million songs a day makes all those pennies add up. If there is anyone who knows how this works it would be Dell. Funny why Dell would dismiss the iPod as a fad. Guess they just don't get the iPod/iTMS connection.

Hey, could you call those "inside Apple" folks and ask then when the new powerbooks are coming out? :D :D

I have about 30 itunes purchases in my 3000 song library-- its a great way to pick up singles. I have to say, however, that I'm a little uncomfortable about then, given the DRM, and that I prefer to buy CDs (generally used) and rip them.

[AnewMac]

Good for iTunes, now if that could translate into more computer market share...

[jxyama]

another updated projection...

iTMS went from 230 million at keynote to 250 million today. from 12/16 announcement of 200 million, the songs sold per day went from 1.11 million to 1.67 million.

the projection for the two year anniversary is now 320 million songs, for early July WWDC is 397 million songs and the end of the year is 605 million songs. given the momentum, i'd be not surprised at all to see iTMS sell 500 million songs by WWDC.

edit: it may sound crazy, but by the super bowl, there's a chance iTMS will hit 300 million, which would be a nice round number to kick off the pepsi promotion/super bowl ad.

[lem0nayde]

Let's lok at the convenience of buying songs online. You crave a certain artist or a certain song all you got to do is sit on your chair and go to iTunes. Definitaly beats gowing to tower records or some crap like that. I can't remember lasat time I went there.

The convenience is definitely nice, but if I like more than 3-5 songs on an album - I really enjoy owning the CD. The tangibility of the CD, Booklet and artwork are still very nice, especially for my favorite artists. I don't think I would ever buy an entire album from them though - unless it was exclusive to iTunes.

The store has proven fantastic for putting together mixes for parties, where I want a gaggle of songs that I couldn't possibly afford to purchase otherwise.

[shawnce]

ok graph boys start your graphing...

[virividox]

go apple go itms, hopefully they start asia support :)

[sushi]

The profit is pennies per song but those pennies add up.
So true.

Let's say apple makes a 5 cent profit per song download. (For discussion sake -- no idea how much they make)

And they have sold 250 million songs. That would be a 12.5 million profit. Not bad at all.

...and now with the iPod Shuffle, which can play the protected songs, I bet we will see the numbers jump higher.

Edit: I meant to add, that the iPod Shuffle is going after 30% of the market (low end flash based players). Not sure how many iPods are in existance as of today. But SJ held up the 10 millioned one at MWSF. Rumored manufacturing rates for the iPod Shuffle are 400K to 500K per month, or 4.8 million to 6 million per year. This is a huge jump in just one portion of the MP3 market. And I am sure that Apple is working to increase the iPod and iPod mini market segments as well. Plus the new iTMS stores opening. So we should see a huge jump in song sales this year.

Sushi

[lem0nayde]

I'm a little uncomfortable about then, given the DRM, and that I prefer to buy CDs (generally used) and rip them.

I'm a bit confused about peoples concern over the DRM - if you burn the songs to CD and then rip them again into iTunes they are treated as regular songs with no DRM, aren't they? I haven't tried it in a while, but I know that was the case early on, maybe Apple has changed that somehow.

[jxyama]

ok graph boys start your graphing...

here you go...

[jxyama]

I'm a bit confused about peoples concern over the DRM - if you burn the songs to CD and then rip them again into iTunes they are treated as regular songs with no DRM, aren't they? I haven't tried it in a while, but I know that was the case early on, maybe Apple has changed that somehow.

it degrades quality. as far as i remember, it's one of the reasons jobs managed to convince the music labels that the easiest way to remove DRM would degrade quality somewhat so that there'll be less incentive to flood the p2p with those files.

[srobert]

ok graph boys start your graphing...

Here you go:

[lem0nayde]

it degrades quality. as far as i remember, it's one of the reasons jobs managed to convince the music labels that the easiest way to remove DRM would degrade quality somewhat so that there'll be less incentive to flood the p2p with those files.

Really? That's odd, since it would have to be converted to an uncompressed AIFF to work properly on a CD. It should retain the same quality as the original DRM file, unless iTunes can recognize (maybe through metadata) when a DRM song is being reimported and lower the quality (which, come to think of it, is totally possible)

[asif786]

Really? That's odd, since it would have to be converted to an uncompressed AIFF to work properly on a CD. It should retain the same quality as the original DRM file, unless iTunes can recognize (maybe through metadata) when a DRM song is being reimported and lower the quality (which, come to think of it, is totally possible)

I think the loss of quality comes from converting it to AIFF file and then back to an AAC file.

Just a thought.

/asif

[Porchland]

I can't help but think it's the ipod that is supporting the development of the iTunes store music store, and that iTunes will soon (2-3 years) become a huge brand for online content purchases of all types. The ipod is not going away, but it will be greatly overshadowed with new changes to the online store. The real money is in selling the content, not the players.

Right now the money is in selling the players, but I agree with you that Apple is fantastically positioned to be a major content provider of all kinds of stuff. This new NFL thing is only scratching the surface of it. I expect very soon to see some sort of alliance with a news source like NPR, New York Times, NBC News, etc., to put some sort of free "Daily News" track out there to listen to with more content available for purchase. Another possibility is some sort of subscription model, which would make a lot more sense when iPod mobile comes along.

[jxyama]

Really? That's odd, since it would have to be converted to an uncompressed AIFF to work properly on a CD. It should retain the same quality as the original DRM file, unless iTunes can recognize (maybe through metadata) when a DRM song is being reimported and lower the quality (which, come to think of it, is totally possible)

just because the format of the file is uncompressed AIFF doesn't mean it's CD-quality. AAC already discarded some information in the process of initial encoding. "decompressing" it up to AIFF format does not bring back the information that's already been discarded. at best, AIFF upcoded from AAC will sound as good as the original AAC. then you compress it again to DRM-free mp3 and you've got even more information loss. iTunes isn't doing anything tricky, like you suggested.

[rosalindavenue]

Really? That's odd, since it would have to be converted to an uncompressed AIFF to work properly on a CD. It should retain the same quality as the original DRM file, unless iTunes can recognize (maybe through metadata) when a DRM song is being reimported and lower the quality (which, come to think of it, is totally possible)

My understanding is that a track is converted to uncompressed AIFF when it is burned to CD-- however, the original song lost a lot of "bits" in being compressed to AAC-- and those original bits are not reinstated when the AAC is blown back up to AIFF. So the AIFF is like a swiss cheese copy. I think the re-burned track does retain the original quality of the DRM'd AAC, but that quality is not the quality of the real full uncompressed track.

[Veldek]

it degrades quality. as far as i remember, it's one of the reasons jobs managed to convince the music labels that the easiest way to remove DRM would degrade quality somewhat so that there'll be less incentive to flood the p2p with those files.This might also be a reason why Apple doesn't sell higher bitrates or lossless songs.

[johnnyjibbs]

Wow, that's quite something. And it's still increasing exponentially. They'll hit a billion by the year's end. This will continue to happen as long as iPod remains on top. iTMS needs iPod, and iPod needs iTMS.

[lem0nayde]

just because the format of the file is uncompressed AIFF doesn't mean it's CD-quality. AAC already discarded some information in the process of initial encoding. "decompressing" it up to AIFF format does not bring back the information that's already been discarded. at best, AIFF upcoded from AAC will sound as good as the original AAC. then you compress it again to DRM-free mp3 and you've got even more information loss. iTunes isn't doing anything tricky, like you suggested.

Right, I know that converting to AIFF doesn't magically bring back any information. I tend to rip using the highest AAC encoding - so I guess I didn't consider people who might want to rip it to an MP3, which would be a fairly severe double compression and definitely degrade sound.

[Porchland]

Apple is doing great!

But maybe we should observe a momment of silence, as a sign of compassionate understanding, for all those 229 (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A20043-2005Jan19.html) other music stores. These poor stores are probably not even selling 1/10 as much as song as Apple and they can't even profit from sales of portable music players. My thoughts are with you little guys. Keep on fighting! (...So Apple won't have a complete monopoly in the music arena) Need a hug?

This is the main reason, I think, that Apple continues to publically state how many tracks it has sold through iTMS. Apple wants consumers and competitors to know that it already has market power, that it is the default provider of online audio content and that no one else need consider getting into a pissing match with them over total tracks sold.

Can you imagine how much ridicule Napster would endure for an announcement that it had sold 10 million tracks?

[lem0nayde]

My understanding is that a track is converted to uncompressed AIFF when it is burned to CD-- however, the original song lost a lot of "bits" in being compressed to AAC-- and those original bits are not reinstated when the AAC is blown back up to AIFF. So the AIFF is like a swiss cheese copy. I think the re-burned track does retain the original quality of the DRM'd AAC, but that quality is not the quality of the real full uncompressed track.


That's correct. It's like saving a digital photo as a compressed jpeg - you can reopen the photo and save it as an uncompressed tiff, but all of the compression artifacts will remain. If you open the tiff and save it again as a jpeg you are doubling the compression artifacts. The rule pretty much applies to any digital media file - movie, sound, picture. If compression is applied, you aren't ever getting the original quality back.

[shawnce]

If compression is applied, you aren't ever getting the original quality back. If _lossy_ compression is applied...

[johnnyjibbs]

That's correct. It's like saving an digital photo as a compressed jpeg - you can reopen the photo and save it as an uncompressed tiff, but all of the compression artifacts will remain. If you open the tiff and save it again as a jpeg you are doubling the compression artifacts. The rule pretty much applies to any digital media file - movie, sound, picture. If compression is applied, you aren't ever getting the original quality back.
Surely, therefore, you're going back on your original argument? ;)

As Apple only provides compressed 128kbps AAC files, burning them to a CD and then reimporting gives you the option of either:

1) Storing an AIFF file (at around 10 times the original AAC size but the same quality as the DRM'd AAC file)

or

2) Reimporting as a normal (non-DRM) AAC file (or MP3) of the same or similar file size but drastically reduced quality (because it has been compressed twice).

Therefore, there is cause for concern regarding DRM files, although I personally am not bothered about it too much.

[jxyama]

the latest number from napster, according to their press room, on jan. 13 was that they have 270,000 subscribers. giving generous assumptions of 300,000 subscribers and all of them paying $10 a month, their revenue for a given month is $3 milion. let's also assume that each subscriber is buying $10 worth of songs per month on top of the subscription. that will bring their revenue to $6 million per month.

in comparison, iTMS sells $6 million worth of music in less than one week.

and this comparison doesn't even include associated hardware sales...

[JGowan]

yes but are they turning a profit?Yeppers. They help sell iPods. Where have you been during all this "Music Stuff"? :D

[lem0nayde]

Surely, therefore, you're going back on your original argument? ;)

As Apple only provides compressed 128kbps AAC files, burning them to a CD and then reimporting gives you the option of either:

1) Storing an AIFF file (at around 10 times the original AAC size but the same quality as the DRM'd AAC file)

or

2) Reimporting as a normal (non-DRM) AAC file (or MP3) of the same or similar file size but drastically reduced quality (because it has been compressed twice).

Therefore, there is cause for concern regarding DRM files, although I personally am not bothered about it too much.


Again, I wasn't considering the fact that people would reimport it in a re-compressed format. I would reimport it at a lower (or no) compression rate than the original (either AAC or AIFF) so as to retain maximum quality. I also forgot that Apples sells songs at such high compression - which is kind of annoying (even if they do sound good.)

Now I can understand the concern, though it doesn't affect me either.

[JGowan]

Well I hope Apple won't rest on their laurels for too long. :(When, under "The Helm of Jobs" have you EVER seen Apple resting on their laurels? Whether it's hardware or software, these guys are perfecting and creating their butts off.

[fatfish]

Man, not to be a negative Nelly, but I am SO sick of hearing about the iPod and the digital music revolution.

I don't understand why anyone who is SO sick of hearing this stuff would read into page two of a forum with nothing other than ipod stuff on it.

I love my itunes. When I was young I had nearly a thousand albums (all on vinyl) but I got busy, too busy to go to a store and my interest dwindled. Now my interest is back and my library is growing. I've lost track of how much stuff I've got from iTMS (probably about 50 albums now plus lots o' singles, since UK launch)

I wouldn't buy a CD now, it would only end up in the car, being distorted by the sun, or someone would put a coffee cup on it, or it would simply get lost.

And another thing I love. You can compile a playlist of samples off itunes (yeah, like an imix) but instead of posting it to iTMS, you can all yer mates round on a Thursday night for a pop quiz.

[jeffbax]

Eh, way to go... I guess.

But 128 KBPS locked files just are not for me.

Its cheaper for me to get CDs for 4.99 free shipping at yourmusic.com than it would be to pay for an intangible download thats locked to a platform.

At least with the CD its mine in a hard copy, and I can rip at whatever quality I want.

[jxyama]

Eh, way to go... I guess.

But 128 KBPS locked files just are not for me.

Its cheaper for me to get CDs for 4.99 free shipping at yourmusic.com than it would be to pay for an intangible download thats locked to a platform.

At least with the CD its mine in a hard copy, and I can rip at whatever quality I want.

yep, that's your choice too. iPod supports both because it plays most formats... iTMS might not be for you, but it apparently is for a whole lotta people.

btw, it's $5.99 at yourmusic.com. and you have to buy at least one CD a month. and those are definitely not for me.

[dejo]

Man, not to be a negative Nelly, but I am SO sick of hearing about the iPod and the digital music revolution.

Yeah, I really wish Apple would concentrate on computers and release some new, cool products in that department. ;)

[JGowan]

Man, not to be a negative Nelly, but I am SO sick of hearing about the iPod and the digital music revolution.Well, you are probably on top of Apple and Technology News in general. With 295,160,302+ U.S. citizens and only 6M+ iPods sold, there is a lot of people who have not only NOT BOUGHT an ipod, but HAVE NOT HEARD of an ipod. So, you better prepare yourself for a whole lot more news on this little music device from Cupertino.

- JGowan

For the nitpickers...

http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/population/003161.html

[Lacero]

Eh, way to go... I guess.

But 128 KBPS locked files just are not for me.

Its cheaper for me to get CDs for 4.99 free shipping at yourmusic.com than it would be to pay for an intangible download thats locked to a platform.

At least with the CD its mine in a hard copy, and I can rip at whatever quality I want.

Wouldn't make sense to pay $5 for an album, and there's only 1-2 songs on it that you like, when you could go to the iTMS and just buy the songs you like. Since you'll be ripping from CD to play in your iPod, why not just skip that step and go directly to AAC. The fact that the AACs from iTMS are ripped from studio masters, would mean the quality would be higher than if you ripped it yourself at the same bitrate. Sure you can rip to 320 KBps, but don't expect to fit the same number of songs on an iPod for what would be almost an indiscernible difference in quality.

[pgwalsh]

I have bought a lot more music downloads than I ever anticipated. 85% has been from the Apple store. The other 15% has been from European download sites that offer small label songs; that Apple may never offer. I have bought only a couple CD's and mostly from overseas. Apple offers very little in the European Goa and Psychedellic Trance.

ITMS has a long way to go. My neighbor is a Pacific Islander and she downloads music, but never heard of iTunes. When I showed her that application and store, she got all excited. The word still needs to get out.

One Compliant: If they could lengthen the listening period, that would be great. Maybe make is have or 3/4 of the song.. Now we're talking.

[JGowan]

I think the loss of quality comes from converting it to AIFF file and then back to an AAC file.

Just a thought.

/asifRight. If you brought it back in as a APPLE LOSSLESS file, you'd be stuck with a pretty hefty file, but it would sound the same as the original DRM'd song. And you could put it wherever you wanted from here on out. With a moderate amount of songs (and HD space getting cheaper all the time, this isn't necessarily a bad way to go.

[fatfish]

Not really convinced by this double compression arguement leading to really poor quality. I can appreciate a certain amount of loss, but why should it be all that much.

Does this make sense.

When the original file is encoded, the codec rips out information to leave a compressed file, I would imagine the codec is fairly selective about the info that it removes, otherwise you'll end up with something of no use. Converting to AIFF won't add any quality back into the file, but must add something to increase the file size. So when encoding the file for the second time I would have thought that the codecs are smart enough to simply remove the stuff that affects quality the least, ie the fluff added by the convertion to AIFF. I doubt very much that the codecs just remove information on a random basis.

[min_t]

Here you go:

Ahhhaha! :D

[macnews]

Hey, could you call those "inside Apple" folks and ask then when the new powerbooks are coming out? :D :D

I have about 30 itunes purchases in my 3000 song library-- its a great way to pick up singles. I have to say, however, that I'm a little uncomfortable about then, given the DRM, and that I prefer to buy CDs (generally used) and rip them.

I wish! My "inside" info is limited strictly to the iTMS - I even rarely hear about anything new in terms of iPod stuff. Not to say I don't ask but the answer is always the some vague response which could be taken many different ways.

[wdlove]

Congratulations to Apple and Steve on this momentous event. May sales continue to increase. The increase in world wide sales is really paying off. Hopefully the profits will go into R&D.

[AppleFoussa]

Here you go:
Like your graph.

It's amazing, I wish people that work at the apple store could be as knowledgable as the peopes in this forum. I've been trying to get a job there and it makes me sick to see people don't know much about Apple. Just a thought.

[Apple!Freak]

I am in charge for 300 of those legally purchased songs and proud of it! :)

[lem0nayde]

I don't understand why anyone who is SO sick of hearing this stuff would read into page two of a forum with nothing other than ipod stuff on it.

I was interested in the discussion about quality retention of converted DRM files.

[dotdotdot]

I am in charge of 100 of these songs and listen to almost all of them every day!!

It is true that iTunes is helping Apple sell iPods - I got iTunes the first week it came out for Windows, and purchased an iPod about 3 months later...

[swissmann]

these guys just keep selling songs faster and faster. But this is probably just a "fad" to the Dell guys.
Exactly what I was thinking. If it is a fad it is a pretty big one. I'd like to see Apple stomp out the competition some more.

[Misplaced Mage]

Not really convinced by this double compression arguement leading to really poor quality. I can appreciate a certain amount of loss, but why should it be all that much.

Does this make sense.

When the original file is encoded, the codec rips out information to leave a compressed file, I would imagine the codec is fairly selective about the info that it removes, otherwise you'll end up with something of no use. Converting to AIFF won't add any quality back into the file, but must add something to increase the file size. So when encoding the file for the second time I would have thought that the codecs are smart enough to simply remove the stuff that affects quality the least, ie the fluff added by the convertion to AIFF. I doubt very much that the codecs just remove information on a random basis.
Lossy codecs inevitably introduce some distortion in playback or AIFF conversion precisely because they are lossy; they throw out the finest details as part of the tradeoff for smaller file size. Precisely how much gets thrown out (and the resulting amount of distortion introduced) depends on the audio being encoded because MP3 and AAC are based on models of how human beings perceive audio, and the degree of compression desired. When you then go to re-encode using even the same lossy codec as before, that codec is now trying to encode the distortions introduced in the first generation copy, introducing even more distortion into the second generation copy. It's the digital equivalent of making an analog copy of an analog copy of an analog original.

[chimerical]

Just wondering...does the 250 million include the free weekly singles and the Pepsi song downloads?

[logical001]

I would buy from the Apple itunes store but at the moment I won't. The reason is, and like many of us, I'd rather Apple started supplying Lossless versions of the file that we can compress or turn into CD's ourselves.

For me, and many others (see the various campaign websites) I can't stand the degredation you get with 128 compared to the original retail CD. With reasonable hi-fi equipment the difference is quite noticable and on high end hifi / studio reference montiors it really is chalk and cheese.

With this in mind and the fact that some artist CD's (certainly in the UK) can be bought cheaper when buying the entire Album, it is something Apple should carefully consider. I wouldn't even mind paying a premium if the increased file size was a cost issue in terms of their bandwidth etc..

Best

Jonathan

[narco]

iTunes is great, even if all I use it for is to preview songs, then download them from allofmp3.com. Still great though, and iMixes are fab.

Fishes,
narco.

[24C]

...snip...For me, and many others (see the various campaign websites) I can't stand the degredation you get with 128 compared to the original retail CD. With reasonable hi-fi equipment the difference is quite noticable and on high end hifi / studio reference montiors it really is chalk and cheese. ...snip...

I used to be like this once, then at a school fair I took a hearing test, for a laugh, now the laughs on me :(
Never could use those speakers/amp of mine at any decent level, as the neighbours would have been knocked off the chairs...for me the listening quality is good enough, the real experience is the ease of use, getting to hear other types of music I wouldn't normally find,it doesn't take anywhere near the same room and I don't have to trudge round the shops getting stuck in the traffic.
I guess it's each to their own.

[Doctor Q]

Just wondering...does the 250 million include the free weekly singles and the Pepsi song downloads?I don't think so. Apple said "music fans have purchased and downloaded more than 250 million songs". I don't think they consider freebies purchases.

[Zoboomafoo]

iTunes is great, even if all I use it for is to preview songs, then download them from allofmp3.com. Still great though, and iMixes are fab.

Fishes,
narco.

you know, i'd be a little careful of what you say or else you might fall in the 'dumb criminal' category.

as clearly you're admitting to illegal behavior and you haven't exactly taken steps to hide your identity (hello, whois on narco-ism.com)

unless that's bogus info on there, someone could sue you without breaking a sweat.

if it is bogus, then shame on you anyway.

[bcsmith]

I don't think so. Apple said "music fans have purchased and downloaded more than 250 million songs". I don't think they consider freebies purchases.


The number does include the Pepsi downloads, becuase Pepsi paid for them.

[dejo]

Lossy codecs inevitably introduce some distortion in playback or AIFF conversion precisely because they are lossy; they throw out the finest details as part of the tradeoff for smaller file size. Precisely how much gets thrown out (and the resulting amount of distortion introduced) depends on the audio being encoded because MP3 and AAC are based on models of how human beings perceive audio, and the degree of compression desired. When you then go to re-encode using even the same lossy codec as before, that codec is now trying to encode the distortions introduced in the first generation copy, introducing even more distortion into the second generation copy. It's the digital equivalent of making an analog copy of an analog copy of an analog original.

Interesting theory but I think many people would like to see some scientific proof. I remember seeing an article a while back that looked at how lossless the Apple Lossless format was. It not only looked at file sizes by going from AIFF > Apple Lossless > AIFF but also used an audio program to compare the two waveforms to prove the re-encoded AIFF contained the exact same information as the original AIFF. But I can't seem to track that article down. I think it would be very interesting to see a similar approach to analyze AAC > AIFF > AAC.

[AppleFoussa]

you know, i'd be a little careful of what you say or else you might fall in the 'dumb criminal' category.

as clearly you're admitting to illegal behavior and you haven't exactly taken steps to hide your identity (hello, whois on narco-ism.com)

unless that's bogus info on there, someone could sue you without breaking a sweat.

if it is bogus, then shame on you anyway.

I totally agree with you, but have you checked the website. Good luck trying to understand it. I believe it's from eastern Europe. Nonetheless still shame on him. What is the policy on songs downloaded illegaly from foreign countries. Last I heard they were cracking donw on people who shared their music.

[Redpoetsociety]

Yeppers. They help sell iPods. Where have you been during all this "Music Stuff"? :D

i had an orginal 5g ipod before the music store first opened ..i was actually wondering if itms it self was turning a profit ;)

[logical001]

I used to be like this once, then at a school fair I took a hearing test, for a laugh, now the laughs on me :(
I guess it's each to their own.

No I do agree with you about the ease of use. I guess it would just be nice to have the a high-end option bearing in mind the number of Pro users on the Mac such as audio engineers. Downloading 20MB audio files won't be for everyone though. And one day, I also won't care, probably only hearing in mono and with an ear trumpet at that. :D

In my case I had to grab a sound track off iTunes to overlay on a TV commerical for an audio edit. When were sat in the studio using a 128 version till a CD turned up with it on. The difference was quite shocking though and the audio engineer really pulled a face and started checking all his frequency meters. But then most London SOHO audio places go up to and beyond subsonic ranges.

[gwangung]

No I do agree with you about the ease of use. I guess it would just be nice to have the a high-end option bearing in mind the number of Pro users on the Mac such as audio engineers. Downloading 20MB audio files won't be for everyone though. And one day, I also won't care, probably only hearing in mono and with an ear trumpet at that. :D

In my case I had to grab a sound track off iTunes to overlay on a TV commerical for an audio edit. When were sat in the studio using a 128 version till a CD turned up with it on. The difference was quite shocking though and the audio engineer really pulled a face and started checking all his frequency meters. But then most London SOHO audio places go up to and beyond subsonic ranges.

Hm. Bet that wouldn't make a difference for US commercials, because the US broadcasts clips the low end and much of the top end of the audio...

[ipedro]

you know, i'd be a little careful of what you say or else you might fall in the 'dumb criminal' category.

as clearly you're admitting to illegal behavior and you haven't exactly taken steps to hide your identity (hello, whois on narco-ism.com)

unless that's bogus info on there, someone could sue you without breaking a sweat.

if it is bogus, then shame on you anyway.

allofmp3.com is a PAY site. Just alot cheaper.

[JGowan]

i had an orginal 5g ipod before the music store first opened ..i was actually wondering if itms it self was turning a profit ;)I know... just giving you a bit of ribbing. I, too, joined the iPod Ranks early with my 1G 5GB iPod being purchased on November 12, 2001,... two days after the initial release. I waited the two days on purpose as the 12th is my birthday -- what a great gift I got for myself that day.

One thing that marred that day, though, was hearing that a plane had crashed in a neighborhood of New York (state I believe) and thinking it was another terrorist attack. Turned out to be just a crash with no terrorists involved. It's funny how news like that can stick with you.

[MCCFR]

According to my calculations, this will be the first quarter that Apple posts more than $100 million in iTMS sales, with the possibility of $125 million being the actual figure for this quarter.

Given that it's a non-holiday quarter, Apple should ship around $1.0 billion of iPod sales, $125 million in iTMS, and around $125 million in Mac mini sales.

That's $1.25 billion alone, which means that Apple "only" has to get another $1.0 billion in other items to beat the 15% year-on-year growth target that Peter Oppenheimer talked about the other day. By my reckoning, Apple can achieve that by selling around 700,000 CPUs (excluding Mac mini), which should be a cakewalk given all of the positive attention Apple is receiving at the moment.

However, the introduction of a significant PowerBook revision (even a difference in fabrication and slight architectural changes) might increase that 700,000 to anywhere between 850,000 and 1 million. Even the lower edge of those numbers could see another $300 million in revenue, which would see Apple reporting $2.5 billion revenue for Q2 - a 30%+ increase from Q2/04.

[SiliconAddict]

allofmp3.com is a PAY site. Just alot cheaper.


I use allofmp3 as well but lets be honest here. At best it falls into the legal grey area due to the way the Russian RIAA structures things at worse you are actually funding the Russian Mafia. This is the going rumor.
At any rate I still purchase my tracks off of iTMS and then download them again off of allofmp3 so no one can say I'm not giving my pound of flesh to the music industry.
Simply the quality is better on allofmp3 and at that price I'm more then willing to pay twice for an album without DRM and 256kb/s AAC. Yes there is some work involved finding coverart and correctly labeling the metadata since allofmp3 does a piss poor job but its a small price to pay for a higher quality file.

[schatten]

Even Jobs pointed out that there's no money to be made in selling music online. iTMS is there to sell iPods. Those companies whose sole profit is their online music sales will probably fail.

[SiliconAddict]

I totally agree with you, but have you checked the website. Good luck trying to understand it. I believe it's from eastern Europe. Nonetheless still shame on him. What is the policy on songs downloaded illegaly from foreign countries. Last I heard they were cracking donw on people who shared their music.

Way to be open minded. Did you even look at it long enough to click on the English option in the upper left? :rolleyes: Mac users.
Its based out of Russia and it IS a legal site as far as Russian law and their version of the RIAA is concerned. The question is not if its a legal site. The question is do the laws from that site based in that country apply to those in another country. The web is funny that way. :p There are serious gray issues in that regard and something the RIAA never considered.

[wdlove]

I don't think so. Apple said "music fans have purchased and downloaded more than 250 million songs". I don't think they consider freebies purchases.

Although when ever I download one of the free songs, I go through the same procedure of using my password. Then several days letter Apple sends a message acknowledging my purchase, indicating the cost $0.00. Looks just the same as when I do make a purchase.

[sinisterdesign]

I would buy from the Apple itunes store but at the moment I won't. The reason is, and like many of us, I'd rather Apple started supplying Lossless versions of the file that we can compress or turn into CD's ourselves.

...

With this in mind and the fact that some artist CD's (certainly in the UK) can be bought cheaper when buying the entire Album, it is something Apple should carefully consider. I wouldn't even mind paying a premium if the increased file size was a cost issue in terms of their bandwidth etc..


i agree 100%. i'm a HUGE fan of iTMS & have bought a lot of stuff from there (including the audiobook i'm listening to right now), but it's never my favorite bands. if it's someone that i KNOW i'm going to like, i still buy the CD. if it's a new band or recommendation, i'll put up w/ the 128kb encoding.

c'mon steve, you give us enormous 60GB hard drives and mediocre size/quality files. i know giving people quality options makes the iTMS just that much more of a hassle to maintain, but when you've sold 250M songs & have $$$$ in the bank, i think you have the ability to spring for the cost.

[dejo]

c'mon steve, you give us enormous 60GB hard drives and mediocre size/quality files. i know giving people quality options makes the iTMS just that much more of a hassle to maintain, but when you've sold 250M songs & have $$$$ in the bank, i think you have the ability to spring for the cost.

I doubt seriously that this is solely Steve's decision. I bet the RIAA has something to say about offering uncompressed tracks.

[Object-X]

i've contributed to 50 of those! congrats apple!

Only 50? You're such a lightweight! ;)

[Lacero]

Eventually, iTMS will replace major music labels. RIAA and all their suck-up lawyers can go shove themselves.

[WM.]

Way to be open minded. Did you even look at it long enough to click on the English option in the upper left? :rolleyes: Mac users.
Its based out of Russia and it IS a legal site as far as Russian law and their version of the RIAA is concerned. The question is not if its a legal site. The question is do the laws from that site based in that country apply to those in another country. The web is funny that way. :p There are serious gray issues in that regard and something the RIAA never considered.
I have changed my thoughts on that site a little bit. It appears that it may actually be reasonably legal to buy from them (in the US). Apparently it's legal to import music recordings into the US for your own personal use, which is a plausible interpretation of what you're doing when you buy from allofmp3.com--you (legally) buy the songs in Russia and then (legally) import them into the US (IANAL, of course).

However, for me the most important issue is whether buying from allofmp3 is ethical, and specifically whether any of your money gets back to the artist. And here I think the answer is a lot clearer: NO. Your $0.05 per track or whatever goes into the site's bank account and stays there. That's the whole reason why they can sell so cheap--Russian copyright law allows works to be "performed" (something like that) with zero compensation for any copyright holders.

Now, one could argue that as a customer of a legal business you simply "expect" that they will operate ethically, and if they don't, well, that's not your problem. I suppose that's okay if you can do that and still sleep at night ;) , but I would rather buy a CD or off of iTMS and know that I'm doing the RIGHT thing, as opposed to just the technically legal thing. IMHO, buying from allofmp3 is no better than downloading from Kazaa or whatever--and perhaps worse, because you have the illusion of doing the right thing and compensating the artist without actually doing so, and you may or may not be supporting some shady Russians.

You mentioned that you buy things from iTMS and allofmp3, and I suppose that that addresses most of the ethical issues, aside from the possibly-supporting-the-Russian-Mafia thing.

FWIW
WM

[geese]

Well I bought 500,000 off those songs, so you should all me thanking me. :mad:

[min_t]

I have changed my thoughts on that site a little bit. It appears that it may actually be reasonably legal to buy from them (in the US). Apparently it's legal to import music recordings into the US for your own personal use, which is a plausible interpretation of what you're doing when you buy from allofmp3.com--you (legally) buy the songs in Russia and then (legally) import them into the US (IANAL, of course).

However, for me the most important issue is whether buying from allofmp3 is ethical, and specifically whether any of your money gets back to the artist. And here I think the answer is a lot clearer: NO. Your $0.05 per track or whatever goes into the site's bank account and stays there. That's the whole reason why they can sell so cheap--Russian copyright law allows works to be "performed" (something like that) with zero compensation for any copyright holders.

Now, one could argue that as a customer of a legal business you simply "expect" that they will operate ethically, and if they don't, well, that's not your problem. I suppose that's okay if you can do that and still sleep at night ;) , but I would rather buy a CD or off of iTMS and know that I'm doing the RIGHT thing, as opposed to just the technically legal thing. IMHO, buying from allofmp3 is no better than downloading from Kazaa or whatever--and perhaps worse, because you have the illusion of doing the right thing and compensating the artist without actually doing so, and you may or may not be supporting some shady Russians.

You mentioned that you buy things from iTMS and allofmp3, and I suppose that that addresses most of the ethical issues, aside from the possibly-supporting-the-Russian-Mafia thing.

FWIW
WM

No way can this be legit. For Russian citizens, ok. But offering it worldwide, no ******* way. I mean, come on. Apple has to negotiate country to country and these guys just appear and it's okay with all countries' RIAA. The only reason why it's working for allofmp3 is that the RIAA lawyers are scared to fly to Russia. Who would want to be the first to come back in a wooden box.

[obeygiant]

dude, Apple is blowing everyone out of the water on this one.

They were first on the scene,
they have changed the music industry forever,
they've got the market cornered,
and they're music player has like 90% market share!

GO APPLE!
be aggressive B-E aggressive
B-E A-G-G R-E-S-S-I-V-E

First and ten do it again!....I mean...whoops!

[Misplaced Mage]

Interesting theory but I think many people would like to see some scientific proof. I remember seeing an article a while back that looked at how lossless the Apple Lossless format was. It not only looked at file sizes by going from AIFF > Apple Lossless > AIFF but also used an audio program to compare the two waveforms to prove the re-encoded AIFF contained the exact same information as the original AIFF. But I can't seem to track that article down. I think it would be very interesting to see a similar approach to analyze AAC > AIFF > AAC.
Apple Lossless is just that -- lossless. It applies a data compression algorithm (possibly a varient of LZW (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LZW) or Golomb coding (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golomb_coding) ) highly optimized for audio. FLAC (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FLAC) is another popular implementation of the concept. Both essentially ZIP an AIFF file which is then decompressed on the fly during playback -- you are listening to all of the original data, which is why the RIAA is unlikely to go for Apple Lossless downloads. Due to the Nyquist-Shannon Limit (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyquist-Shannon_sampling_theorem), however, you will seldom see an AIFF file reduced to less than half its original size when reencoded with Apple Lossless or FLAC. TANSTAAFL (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TANSTAAFL).

AAC and MP3, on the other hand, are psychoacoustic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychoacoustic_model) compression schemes. They are designed so that the audio components that you do hear and will pay the most attention to are the ones that are encoded with the most fidelity. The rest, however, are deliberately encoded at lower fidelity, reducing the amount of data needed for an "acceptable" reproduction of the original audio by an order of magnitude. The tradeoff is that the process is never perfect, and aliasing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aliasing) and other low-level audio artifacts are introduced. So when you go and lossily reencode the decoded, lossily compressed file, the codec goes and applies the same criteria to the artifacts -- compounding them.

Try it -- the degredation in audio quality becomes very apparent after only one or two passes.

[applebum]

I have changed my thoughts on that site a little bit. It appears that it may actually be reasonably legal to buy from them (in the US). Apparently it's legal to import music recordings into the US for your own personal use, which is a plausible interpretation of what you're doing when you buy from allofmp3.com--you (legally) buy the songs in Russia and then (legally) import them into the US (IANAL, of course).

However, for me the most important issue is whether buying from allofmp3 is ethical, and specifically whether any of your money gets back to the artist. And here I think the answer is a lot clearer: NO. Your $0.05 per track or whatever goes into the site's bank account and stays there. That's the whole reason why they can sell so cheap--Russian copyright law allows works to be "performed" (something like that) with zero compensation for any copyright holders.

Now, one could argue that as a customer of a legal business you simply "expect" that they will operate ethically, and if they don't, well, that's not your problem. I suppose that's okay if you can do that and still sleep at night ;) , but I would rather buy a CD or off of iTMS and know that I'm doing the RIGHT thing, as opposed to just the technically legal thing. IMHO, buying from allofmp3 is no better than downloading from Kazaa or whatever--and perhaps worse, because you have the illusion of doing the right thing and compensating the artist without actually doing so, and you may or may not be supporting some shady Russians.

You mentioned that you buy things from iTMS and allofmp3, and I suppose that that addresses most of the ethical issues, aside from the possibly-supporting-the-Russian-Mafia thing.

FWIW
WM


I have no problem downloading both from Allofmp3.com and mp3search.ru for older stuff I have not been able to find on CD or on iTunes. I have been able to replace most of the tapes I had in the 80's by using these services. Things I had looked for on CD for years. If you can't buy it, the artists can't get your money. You would think that online stores would be the perfect way for the Record labels to put up their entire catalogs and make money of songs and albums that are out of print. They aren't making a penny off of these anyway, why not put them online and make what you can. Until they do this, I will use the "grey" sites to get stuff I can't get elsewhere.

[dnnx]

Right now it appears that Apple is either tied up in legal matters that prevent certain songs from being offered in other countries and/or is operating under the false assumption that tastes in music are dependant solely on the country of residency.

I fail to see why certain songs/artists are available in one countries iTMS, yet not available in another. Its just good business to sell where there is demand and little in the way of expansion costs (I mean all they really need is to set up links to files right?). I think the disparity that I’m seeing in the different iTMS’s is more due to a lack of foresight in the legal agreements between Apple and Artist/Label.
:(

This is all about licensing. Its not Apple's fault. There is nothing Apple can do about this. if the record labels say no, its no. Its just not Apple, it affects stores, radio stations, etc.

Each country and/or region is independent. So a new agreement has to be made in every country, and you might get the rights to a song/artist in one countrey, but not in the country next to it because the labels doesnt feel like it.

This is wwhy there is no "iTMS Europe" or "iTMS Asia" but is being worked on, on a country by country basis.

[ASP272]

Sorry guys, but I have to rant . . .
All I can say is that groups like Metallica (my favorite), Evanescense (my 2nd favorite), and so on are most definitely smoking crack! When they don't put their music on the number one digital music download store with the best file security out there they have lost it (A $250,000,000 dollar industry so far)! I mean, come on, "protect the integrity of the album", as one of them was quoted saying. What kind of crap is that? If you only want to sell your songs by album, try and work out a deal with Apple to do it that way. Apple already offers thousands of songs as album only, why can't you (Metallica and others) settle for doing the same. I can tell you that personally I will never buy another CD unless it's combined with a DVD (like St. Anger). The DVD is all I would care about. The CD just gets ripped to AAC right away and I never see it again. Why do I want to pay for some disc that will just take up space in my already cramped house? Does anybody get what I'm saying here? Stop the insanity! :eek: :eek:

Again, sorry for the rant, but with this announcement it had to be done.

[displaced]

Interesting theory but I think many people would like to see some scientific proof. I remember seeing an article a while back that looked at how lossless the Apple Lossless format was. It not only looked at file sizes by going from AIFF > Apple Lossless > AIFF but also used an audio program to compare the two waveforms to prove the re-encoded AIFF contained the exact same information as the original AIFF. But I can't seem to track that article down. I think it would be very interesting to see a similar approach to analyze AAC > AIFF > AAC.

Filesize doesn't immediately indicate quality. There's no doubt that recompressing a compressed stream compounds the compression artefacts.

Original Source -> AAC (or MP3 for that matter): As has been mentioned, psycho-acoustic methods are used to strip out frequences that the human ear's not going to miss. Then add in some other tricks (like Joint Stereo, where only one of the stereo channels are preserved (and compressed), then the other channel is represented as some data on how this channel differs from the first. Personally, Joint Stereo sounds terrible to me, but you mileage may vary.

Now, a couple of options:
AAC -> AIFF/WAV/etc
This will give a full-bitrate, uncompressed representation of the result of decompressing the AAC file. Usually, this'll be at the same bitrate/sampling frequency as an audio CD (44.1Khz, 16-bit). Note that a 3-min compressed AAC converted to AIFF will have the same file-size as the source audio if it was in AIFF format in the first place. However, the AAC->AIFF will be lower quality since it's the result of decompression... An AIFF in this case is just using more bits to describe lower quality sound.

*or*
AAC -> Apple Lossless/FLAC/Other Lossless codecs
Lossless audio compression is the same theory as .zip or .sit data files. You look for repetition in the file, and replace the repeated data with some symbolic representation which is shorter than the original. The idea is, you can decompress a losslessly-compressed data stream, and end up with a bit-for-bit identical copy of the original. Converting a 'lossy' compressed AAC to a lossless compression format by necessity means that at some point, you decompress the original (see above -- you're in the same position at this point as if you'd just converted to AIFF). This decompressed stream is then compressed losslessly. So you get smaller filesize as an uncompressed AIFF/WAV file. But at the end of the day, you've still only got a file which, once uncompressed, contains the artefacts of the original compression.

Burning to CD, then re-ripping will unquestionably lose yet more fidelity. The big question is: do you notice? If not, then the whole thing's a moot point!

[jettredmont]

Not really convinced by this double compression arguement leading to really poor quality. I can appreciate a certain amount of loss, but why should it be all that much.

Does this make sense.

When the original file is encoded, the codec rips out information to leave a compressed file, I would imagine the codec is fairly selective about the info that it removes, otherwise you'll end up with something of no use. Converting to AIFF won't add any quality back into the file, but must add something to increase the file size. So when encoding the file for the second time I would have thought that the codecs are smart enough to simply remove the stuff that affects quality the least, ie the fluff added by the convertion to AIFF. I doubt very much that the codecs just remove information on a random basis.

Actually, that's the problem. An approximation of the original might contain artifacts (and, in AAC, generally does). The approximation of the approximation, however, will try to approximate those artifacts, making them generally more significant, and will of course also introduce artifacts of its own. AAC artifacts aren't the result of a particular n-order waveform being the absolute best fit for the original; they are a result in the assumptions of the encoder and shortcuts to get that encoder within 95% of the best-possible-waveform representation.

Yes, in an ideal world you'd end up with the exact same bit-for-bit file after a cycle. However, that's not how the encoding algorithms work. For a visual demonstration of this, take a detailed cartoon image, save in low-quality JPEG, then open the JPEG and save again in low-quality JPEG.

For a very slightly (but certainly not perfectly) similar problem, see Moire patterns, which crop up precisely because of the precision of sampling, and go away with a more random sampling. But, again, that's not how the algoithms work.

Could you devise a decompress-recompress lossless AAC algorithm? Possibly, if you knew with perfect detail the original AAC encoding algorithm, and had a really large computer on hand to go through the best-fit algorithm for your output AAC waveform, AND were able to perfectly synch the 128kbps of the original with the 128kbps of the output (which would involve knowing very intimate details about both the decompression algorithm originally used and the CD reader currently being used). But, that's a whole lot of effort and money to put into saving $0.99 on a DRM'd download!

[jettredmont]

Just wondering...does the 250 million include the free weekly singles and the Pepsi song downloads?

RE free downloads, I suspect not. "...purchased and downloaded..."

For the Pepsi downloads: I am pretty sure those are counted in (as they were counted in the goal of selling 10M last year sometime). Essentially, Pepsi is buying each of those, whereas the free tracks are a promotion being sponsored by Apple itself.

[TopCatz]

100? 300 songs? pah! I'm over the 500 mark now... ...oh dear, just realised how much how much I've spent :eek: damn you Apple for wringing me dry! (but at least I'll see the receivers with a good soundtrack ;) )

[doogle]

Man, not to be a negative Nelly, but I am SO sick of hearing about the iPod and the digital music revolution. Even Wired Magazine listed the iPod as "Tired" in it's funny Wired | Tired | Expired graphic in this months magazine (Firefox on the cover.)

I think Apple is teetering on the edge of overexposure. If they fall over the edge, they could find themselves in the sticky situation of having the iPod no longer be cool to own because it's so mainstream. Consumer backlash could ensue.

Just a thought. Good for them on selling so many songs though.


WIRED is TIRED and has been for years espeically that tired/wired segment. I do agree though iPod is in danger of becoming over saturated, entrenched, pervasive, embedded, taken for granted.........wait a minute that's real success!!!!!!!!

[voodoofish]

However, for me the most important issue is whether buying from allofmp3 is ethical, and specifically whether any of your money gets back to the artist. And here I think the answer is a lot clearer: NO. Your $0.05 per track or whatever goes into the site's bank account and stays there. That's the whole reason why they can sell so cheap--Russian copyright law allows works to be "performed" (something like that) with zero compensation for any copyright holders.
FWIW
WM

I heard that it was that anyone could broadcast whatever music they liked and then had to pay a fixed royalty to the broadcaster-royalty-people. Since the royality is similar to what you'd pay on Russian radio/tv (i think), it is *much* lower that CD royalties in the west (remember royalities here in the west are far lower for radio than CD/iTMS downloads). since anyone is allowed to broadcast the songs without permission from the lisencor of that song it means a site like allofmp3.com doesn't have to get permission from the rights holders of the music they sell, which they would probably never get.

I don't remember if the exact wording was 'broadcast', but it was something where it was perhaps a bit dubious, but still possible, that downloads could be catagorized under.

[voodoofish]

I've heard it depends on how many songs you buy at one time that determines if Apple makes any money. If you only buy one song a day then Apple loses money due to the cost of processing the credit card transaction. If you buy two songs a day ( or at a time) then Apple breaks even. Buying 3 or more songs at a time means that Apple makes a profit. At least that is what I remember reading someplace.

I wouldn't be surprised if you did this Apple didn't group payments together. For example, my email reciepts are grouped together. Obviously the first couple of times you use your card they'd probably check it, and they most likely attempt to authorize your card before each purchase, but probably wait a few days before actually charging it to see if you order anything else to group it with. Either way, i'm sure apple has a nice system worked out. (if you bought like one song a month they'd be forced to billing you one song at a time though, so they'd prolly loose money then).

[dejo]

Okay, I decided to verify for myself whether there is really is a noticeable difference when moving from AAC > AIFF > AAC > AIFF > AAC. And it's true! Everytime you re-encode to AAC, you lose a little more of the acoustic quality of the song. I doubted you guys but you are correct. I apologize. In fact, even when converting from AAC > AIFF, the waveforms are not exactly the same!

To be fair, the difference was less noticeable during the first AAC > AIFF > AAC trip than it was during the second. This is something that many users will only be doing. But the second time around, especially during louder sections, the quality was just not there.

P.S. If anyone is interested in a more detailed explanation of my (semi)scientific analysis, including Peak screenshots, let me know. I'll put together a webpage (similar to http://www.idmonsters.com/archives/2004/04/lossless_is_goo.php) with my findings.

[weezer160]

i contributed 550 of that 250,000,000 :D... or 0.000006% :D

[rogo]

"Even Jobs pointed out that there's no money to be made in selling music online."

That is absolutely the ultimate Jobsian RDF statement of all time.

The >>real<< prize is in selling music, not selling iPods. It's wonderful that iPods can be sold today at reasonably good profit margins, but controlling even 1/5 of the digital-music market going forward is as valuable a business as the entirety of Apple today.

It'd be about $6 billion annually. With a 5% profit margin, it'd make $300 million. Apple today is worth $22 billion (after subtracting cash). That $300 million profit chunk would be larger than what Apple made in the fiscal year ending last September.

People can believe whatever they want, but the reality is that upgrade cycles on devices to play the music will eventually lengthen and margins on devices will shrink -- hell, they already are shrinking. The buying of tracks >>and<< subscriptions is an "evergreen" type of business and is the one Apple wants to dominate.

Their unbelievable success in the device market to date is wonderful for the company and allows them the flexibility to become aggressive competitors -- e.g. taking the profit out of the flash market to hurt Creative and Rio. What continues to make no sense is the lack of aggressiveness in fleshing out the product line to offer something at every price / feature point like Creative does. Everyone who doesn't buy the iPod won't buy from iTMS, yet Creative -- which sells no music -- continues to understand the value of variety in the lineup.

I'm hoping Shuffle is just the beginning and that by year end we'll see a more full featured flash player (with screen, maybe voice record, et al.) above Shuffle, cheaper Shuffle (a bit, to make room for screen versions), $199 5GB mini, $249 10GB mini, 80GB at $599, with 60GB and 40GB coming down in price some (cheaper 40GB drive will make this happen). I have no real take on Photo, other than it needs a card slot to be relevant and appears very overpriced.

[pgwalsh]

"Even Jobs pointed out that there's no money to be made in selling music online."

That is absolutely the ultimate Jobsian RDF statement of all time.

Well said.

I think overtime that iPod sales will dwindle. At that point in time, I see iTunes opening up to other players and Apples DRM being offered on other players. However, Apple will hold out as long as possible.

[chimerical]

I have no problem downloading both from Allofmp3.com and mp3search.ru for older stuff I have not been able to find on CD or on iTunes. I have been able to replace most of the tapes I had in the 80's by using these services. Things I had looked for on CD for years. If you can't buy it, the artists can't get your money. You would think that online stores would be the perfect way for the Record labels to put up their entire catalogs and make money of songs and albums that are out of print. They aren't making a penny off of these anyway, why not put them online and make what you can. Until they do this, I will use the "grey" sites to get stuff I can't get elsewhere.

All right. But you should at least send an iTunes music request to Apple while you're at it. They do respond. I've seen it happen.

http://www.apple.com/feedback/itunes.html

[Stella]

This reminded me of the microsoft music store... I'd forgotten all about them. Wonder how they are doing....!!!?

[Stella]

Apparently napster are going to start movie downloads.

When iTMS follows suite it won't be too long until Apple add movie capability to iPod photo.

I'm surprised Apple didn't add quicktime capability to iPod photo... to play those home movies you recorded..

[fatfish]

Actually, that's the problem. An approximation of the original might contain artifacts (and, in AAC, generally does). The approximation of the approximation, however, will try to approximate those artifacts, making them generally more significant, and will of course also introduce artifacts of its own. AAC artifacts aren't the result of a particular n-order waveform being the absolute best fit for the original; they are a result in the assumptions of the encoder and shortcuts to get that encoder within 95% of the best-possible-waveform representation.

Yes, in an ideal world you'd end up with the exact same bit-for-bit file after a cycle. However, that's not how the encoding algorithms work. For a visual demonstration of this, take a detailed cartoon image, save in low-quality JPEG, then open the JPEG and save again in low-quality JPEG.

For a very slightly (but certainly not perfectly) similar problem, see Moire patterns, which crop up precisely because of the precision of sampling, and go away with a more random sampling. But, again, that's not how the algoithms work.

Could you devise a decompress-recompress lossless AAC algorithm? Possibly, if you knew with perfect detail the original AAC encoding algorithm, and had a really large computer on hand to go through the best-fit algorithm for your output AAC waveform, AND were able to perfectly synch the 128kbps of the original with the 128kbps of the output (which would involve knowing very intimate details about both the decompression algorithm originally used and the CD reader currently being used). But, that's a whole lot of effort and money to put into saving $0.99 on a DRM'd download!

I wasn't disagreeing that recompressing, previously compressed and decompressed files didn't loose you quality, I was just wondering whether it was as much as you lost in the first compression.

(trying to put it into numbers, but just notional numbers because I really have no idea of how you would measure loss of quality) My thoughts were that if compressing a file lost say 30% of the quality leaving you with say 70% of your original quality, decompressing back to the original format would still leave you with a file at 70% quality, but does it neccesarily follow that your second compression would loose you 30% of the 70% you have left (ie 49%). Or are the codecs smart enough (as I suspect they are) to leave you say 62% quality (still a loss, but not as much as the first time round.

This was really only a thought about something that had been raised in connection with the idea that by buying from iTMS you were stuck with itunes or a real loss of quality if you decompressed to CD and recompressed to a codec supported by other players. Actually I rather suspect that it is illegal to do that, even if the intention is honourable, although I suspect I'd do it, if they discontinued itunes or something (UNTHINKABLE)

However I wouldn't actually compress the CD I'd burnt with a lossy codec, because despite all I've said, I suspect I would either leave them uncompressed or use a lossless compression, because regardless of how much quality is lost by a second compression,I can actually tel the difference. And I'm one of those who's hearing isn't good enough to tell the difference on my equipment between iTMS d/l's and CD quality.

[fatfish]

Apparently napster are going to start movie downloads.

When iTMS follows suite it won't be too long until Apple add movie capability to iPod photo.

I'm surprised Apple didn't add quicktime capability to iPod photo... to play those home movies you recorded..

Don't know whether this is true, but it won't interest me for a good while to come.

If I was going to watch a movie on my mac's 30" screen, I'd want something much better than VCD quality. Never really paid much attention to VCD, it wasn't good enough for my old 21", but what size are they typically?, I know some come on 2 CD's, so we are talking 600-1200 Mb. Downloading will be a nightmare.

So after 4-5 Hrs you get a poor quality movie that you have to pay for - NO THANKS.

As for movies on an ipod, the screen on my p900 phone is bigger than the ipod screen, movies are a joke, it's only good for saying "look what I can do" and pretty soon the novelty wears off.

No doubt in time with more bandwith and satelite internet connections and better codecs things will change, but for now NO THANKS.

[nuckinfutz]

Apparently napster are going to start movie downloads.

When iTMS follows suite it won't be too long until Apple add movie capability to iPod photo.

I'm surprised Apple didn't add quicktime capability to iPod photo... to play those home movies you recorded..

I think not.

Movie downloads as a hot item is years away. Apple will not be adding quicktime capability to the iPod anytime soon either.

[mgargan1]

so, i just looked to see how many song's i've purchased... and i haven't really checked since apple hit the 100,000,000 in the summer some time, but i have about 500 songs, in my library of a little more than 2500.

[billystlyes]

sell that amount of songs during a time when peer to peer stealing ruled!

[Stella]

I think not.

Movie downloads as a hot item is years away. Apple will not be adding quicktime capability to the iPod anytime soon either.

Oh, I think so:
http://news.com.com/Napster+eyes+movie+downloads/2100-1027_3-5548022.html

If you read the article, its already happening to a limited extent.
Quote:
"Online movie distribution has already taken off to a small degree in the United States, with Movielink and CinemaNow selling films via the Web from $2.99 upwards."

Adding QT capability to iPod is a natural progression. You show granny your photos.. and next you'll be able to show granny your films you made on your camcorder or digital camera.

To say "QT won't be added any time soon".. well, none of us really know what is coming next, unless you have inside information.

[Mr.Bob]

Aside from sheer size and the ability to spread costs over a larger number of song sales, Apple has leverage from:

1). Promotions like Pepsi (One big check per month with no credit card charges).
2). Gift certificates over a 1,000,000 sold (no credit card and lower servicing charges), i.e. cash in advance, so even interest earned if escrowed until used.
3). Pay Pal, again no crdeit card charges and summary checks once a month, little to no carry or service charges.
4). Audio downloads of books, NFL games, etc, have higher profit margins.
5). Watch for first releases and independent labels where the formula doesn't include high or no fees, the artist gets paid directly.

Apple's expenses are higher now because of new country expansions, but at some point this will go down (when most countries have a music store).

In time, profit margins will grow and become a significant contributor to the bottom line and at the same time margins will go down on the iPods as we know them today. Of course, new models, new gadgets and new ideas will have the higher margins.

Thus, continued innovation is the lifeblood and it flows best at AAPL!

[sushi]

Even Jobs pointed out that there's no money to be made in selling music online. iTMS is there to sell iPods. Those companies whose sole profit is their online music sales will probably fail.
That was back when they expected to sell 1 million downloads in the first 6 months.

Obviously, with DL's being over 1 million a day, things have changed a bit market wise.

Sushi

[sushi]

If I was going to watch a movie on my mac's 30" screen, I'd want something much better than VCD quality. Never really paid much attention to VCD, it wasn't good enough for my old 21", but what size are they typically?, I know some come on 2 CD's, so we are talking 600-1200 Mb. Downloading will be a nightmare.

So after 4-5 Hrs you get a poor quality movie that you have to pay for - NO THANKS.
There are some places where you DL a 600-1200 file in seconds.

...and an entire DVD in 10-15 minutes or only the movie in 5-10 minutes.

.....today! :D

Sushi

[chaos86]

Again, I wasn't considering the fact that people would reimport it in a re-compressed format. I would reimport it at a lower (or no) compression rate than the original (either AAC or AIFF) so as to retain maximum quality. I also forgot that Apples sells songs at such high compression - which is kind of annoying (even if they do sound good.)

Now I can understand the concern, though it doesn't affect me either.

correct me if im wrong but (going back to the swiss chesse metaphore) if you take your drm'd-aac and burn it to cd in the uncompressed aiff format you make swiss cheese right? because the starting file had chunks taken out by the acc compressor. now if you compress an aiff file into aac (assuming apple uses the same compressor for their music store as they put in itunes) wouldnt it remove the same stuff every time? if so, wouldn't it be removing nothing from the already empty holes in the file/cheese? in other words if their compressor has removed certain frequancies (inaudible ones), then we put it in a larger aiff format, still without those frequencies, and then we run it through the compressor again, wont it just not find any of those frequencies and spit out the exact same file, only without drm (or metadata)?

[chaos86]

There are some places where you DL a 600-1200 file in seconds.



raises eyebrow...

do you work for the government?

[FlatMac]

Starting iTMS has probably required a LOT of effort (from a lot of very well paid people :p ) I'm glad Apple can make a little money out of it.

RIAA (and others around the world) were like a big pile of rocks slowly eroding. And it takes a lot of effort to convince a rock to move.
I guess no rock will ever have moved if napster and kazaa didn't exist. Thanks Napster, without you it would have taken a little longer before Apple could sell its 10 millionth iPod :cool:

It shows that a lot of work (and belief) can lead to success. That's good to hear.

[Poff]

open iTMS Norway and I'll add to that number! We'll give you lots of black, thick oil! I know we can't match the Saudi-Arabs, but we'll be able to give you some oil anyways..


..I guess I'll at least add some to the number. Tho I have this plan of swapping the harddrive in my G4 iMac 700 with a 160GB one or something, just because of music. Apple Lossless, Apple?

(now that music can be encoded when transported to the iPod, it is actually a possibility..)

[Poff]

raises eyebrow...

do you work for the government?

Sweden is a good place. In Småland. Where Emil in Lønneberget comes from. If you've heard of him. (probably not! :()

You can get 1Tb lines there, for just a bit more than a 1Mb lines cost here in Norway. Bummer!

Me wants to move to Sweden!!

[Alasta]

I think not.

Movie downloads as a hot item is years away. Apple will not be adding quicktime capability to the iPod anytime soon either.

In terms of the long term development of the iTunes Music Store, I would love to see them add music videos. Then I could have music with videos when I have my iBook handy, and have the option of loading just the audio onto my iPod.

[Veldek]

i contributed 550 of that 250,000,000 :D... or 0.000006% :D550 from 250,000,000 are 0.00022%. Your 0.000006% would be 15 songs.

[faustofernos]

Big f---king deal! My only wish is that Apple come out quickly with a iMovie video on demand store, and that I had bought apple stock 21 years ago. Happy Birthday Bitch!

[WheresMyItunes]

A lot of good that is to us in Oz. I have decided to visit apple.com.au every day and use their search function to search for "Australian iTunes Music Store". All you other aussies do the same - maybe they'll get the message :p

[littlejim]

I have bought a lot more music downloads than I ever anticipated. 85% has been from the Apple store. The other 15% has been from European download sites that offer small label songs; that Apple may never offer. I have bought only a couple CD's and mostly from overseas. Apple offers very little in the European Goa and Psychedellic Trance. <snip>


Agree about the lack of Goa/Trance.

I bought an album yesterday (Foretaste by Shamen) from another online Music Store that was powered by MusicDock. A truly awful experience (and looking at the MusicDock website, they charge the artist 40% of the proceeds for the service).

It really made me appreciate iTMS.

[csimmons]

Oh, I think so:
http://news.com.com/Napster+eyes+movie+downloads/2100-1027_3-5548022.html

If you read the article, its already happening to a limited extent.
Quote:
"Online movie distribution has already taken off to a small degree in the United States, with Movielink and CinemaNow selling films via the Web from $2.99 upwards."



Well, Apple also wasn't the first to offer music as paid downloads. They were the first to do it right, though. It'll most likely be that way if and when they offer paid movie downloads.

The reason there is no iTMS-like movie store is quite simple, IMO:

1. the major film studios must get their act together first; and
2. Not enough people have broadband connections to make having such a service make sense.

[Poff]

I might be wrong, but I just don't see how Apple could declare this as the year of HD, and then announce some whimpy little VCD-download service.

And DVD is too early for now.
I have a 1200Kbps line, I guess many people have even less.
A 6GB DVD would take approximately 11 hours 6 minutes and 40 seconds to download at optimal speed, when not using the internet for anything else.

I wouldn't dare to try to download Schindlers List!! :eek:

How big would a HD-movie be, btw..?


The maths:
A 1200Kbps line will have a maximum download speed of 1200/8=150KBps.

6 GB = 6 000 000 KB

6''KB / 150KBps = 40 000 seconds

[JFreak]

just because the format of the file is uncompressed AIFF doesn't mean it's CD-quality. AAC already discarded some information in the process of initial encoding. "decompressing" it up to AIFF format does not bring back the information that's already been discarded. at best, AIFF upcoded from AAC will sound as good as the original AAC. then you compress it again to DRM-free mp3 and you've got even more information loss. iTunes isn't doing anything tricky, like you suggested.

yes, you cannot tell anything about this. you don't even know how apple has made the aac file being sold - has it been encoded from the 16bit/44.1kHz cd version or straight from some 24bit/192kHz master archive. if it has been encoded from higher quality master, then the 128kbps aac file might actually sound BETTER than the 16bit/44.1kHz aiff cd version. it is possible, folks, you just cannot believe it unless you hear it yourselves.

just the same way you can do a higher-quality DVD movie (480p) out of analog film material (about 11MP/frame) than shooting the same material with a 480p camera and viewing it uncompressed. granted, the quality difference in this video analogy is a lot huger, but still...

[JFreak]

the original song lost a lot of "bits" in being compressed to AAC-- and those original bits are not reinstated when the AAC is blown back up to AIFF. So the AIFF is like a swiss cheese copy. I think the re-burned track does retain the original quality of the DRM'd AAC, but that quality is not the quality of the real full uncompressed track.

original song does not lose bits. you don't compress bits, you model the waveform and compress that model. if you would compress bits, we would be talking about lossless encoding, which aac is not.

aac models the waveform that converted to analog and again to air pressure is what we hear. on the other hand, the model of the waveform models the bits that construct the waveform, but instead of using bits/second this aac model uses algorithms that try to estimate the original waveform as closely as possible. this is in other words lossy compression, as the original waveform cannot be 100% reproduced. the higher the bitrate, the more precise algorithm can be saved, and thus the more exact representation can be reconstructed.

BUT you have to understand that the bits/second encoding of aiff file is also an estimate of the original analog waveform. it is just a model based on sampling instead of a model based on some clever algorith. these both are models that try to estimate something that we can hear, and we cannot hear either digital file without converting that file to air pressure.

so the question is: what method gives the most accurate representation of "the" air pressure that we want to hear? if we take the same source, then, in many cases, aac wins. but if we model the aiff file from the master audio and then model the aac file from the aiff model, then, because aiff file is closer to the source, aiff wins no matter how good the lossy encoding would be.

[JFreak]

Right, I know that converting to AIFF doesn't magically bring back any information. I tend to rip using the highest AAC encoding - so I guess I didn't consider people who might want to rip it to an MP3, which would be a fairly severe double compression and definitely degrade sound.

correct: converting to aiff doesn't brong back anything. it just preserves whatever is left from the original audio.

incorrect: mp3 -> aac is NOT double compression. it is double encoding. yes, it degrades sound, because of the fact that the both are lossy encoding methods, but that loss of quality does not come from compression but the fact that another lossy encoding of the already lossy encoded material re-encodes the mistakes that the first encoding has introduced to the audio material. the best that the second encoding can do is to make zero new mistakes and the resulting waveform would have as few mistakes as the result of the first encoding.

encoding is not compression. compression means decreasing the file size with a lossless method and a compressed file can always be decompressed with 100% accurate output. encoding however means decreasing the file size with a lossy method (a jpeg photo for example) and de-endoded output is never 100% accurate.

[JFreak]

saving a digital photo as a compressed jpeg - you can reopen the photo and save it as an uncompressed tiff, but all of the compression artifacts will remain. If you open the tiff and save it again as a jpeg you are doubling the compression artifacts. The rule pretty much applies to any digital media file - movie, sound, picture. If compression is applied, you aren't ever getting the original quality back.

again, to clarify, compression and encoding are two different beasts: lossless and lossy. this comment should be:

"saving a digital photo as jpeg-encoded, you can reopen the photo and save it as an uncompresseed tiff, but all of the encoding artifacts will remain. if you open the tiff and encode it again as a jpeg, you are doubling the encoding artifacts. the rule pretty much applies to any digital media file - movie, sound, picture. if the material is encoded [with a lossy algorithm], you aren't ever getting the original quality back"

jpeg is not compression. it is a way to encode image data to a lot smaller file size, if it were ok not being able to get the original data 100% back.

tiff is not compression either, it is an uncompressed file format that often uses LZW compression algorithm (which is lossless because it is a compression algorithm). tiff file format never loses quality, as there is no encoding anywhere.

is this point clear now :D :D :D

[JFreak]

If _lossy_ compression is applied...

there is no such thing :) using a lossy algorithm is called "encoding".

[fixyourthinking]

Aside from sheer size and the ability to spread costs over a larger number of song sales, Apple has leverage from:

1). Promotions like Pepsi (One big check per month with no credit card charges).
2). Gift certificates over a 1,000,000 sold (no credit card and lower servicing charges), i.e. cash in advance, so even interest earned if escrowed until used.
3). Pay Pal, again no crdeit card charges and summary checks once a month, little to no carry or service charges.
4). Audio downloads of books, NFL games, etc, have higher profit margins.
5). Watch for first releases and independent labels where the formula doesn't include high or no fees, the artist gets paid directly.

Apple's expenses are higher now because of new country expansions, but at some point this will go down (when most countries have a music store).

In time, profit margins will grow and become a significant contributor to the bottom line and at the same time margins will go down on the iPods as we know them today. Of course, new models, new gadgets and new ideas will have the higher margins.

Thus, continued innovation is the lifeblood and it flows best at AAPL!


1). Promotions like Pepsi (One big check per month with no credit card charges).

Yes, but Apple is surely giving the songs to Pepsi for less than 99 cents.


2). Gift certificates over a 1,000,000 sold (no credit card and lower servicing charges), i.e. cash in advance, so even interest earned if escrowed until used.

You have printing and distribution costs of the plastic cards - but this is probably your best point for higher dollar achieved.

3). Pay Pal, again no crdeit card charges and summary checks once a month, little to no carry or service charges.

As an ebay stockholder - my quarterly statement says differently here. It says the iTunes Music Store deal offers PAYPAL less of an expense because they don't have to offer cash back to premum users. The credit card processing is actually higher than Apple's merchant rate of 1.2%.

4). Audio downloads of books, NFL games, etc, have higher profit margins.

Not so on all purchases. But good point.


5). Watch for first releases and independent labels where the formula doesn't include high or no fees, the artist gets paid directly.

Also good point.

As for my math, Apple is said to have made less than 1 million on the iTunes Music Store so far. But I have read they are making, after expenses, about 3 cents per song average.

[sinisterdesign]

Okay, I decided to verify for myself whether there is really is a noticeable difference when moving from AAC > AIFF > AAC > AIFF > AAC. And it's true! Everytime you re-encode to AAC, you lose a little more of the acoustic quality of the song. I doubted you guys but you are correct. I apologize. In fact, even when converting from AAC > AIFF, the waveforms are not exactly the same!

i can't say that i'm very surprised about this. try taking a BMP image>JPEG>BMP>JPEG, etc. everytime the computer has to compress something, it slightly changes the data. when it goes to recompress, the data is slightly different than it was the original, so it has to compress it slightly different and on and on. i don't see why AAC/MPEG audio compression would be any different than JPEG image compression. it's just taking the areas that we really focus on and compressing them less and areas of less detail & compressing them more.

[sushi]

Sweden is a good place...You can get 1Tb lines there, for just a bit more than a 1Mb lines cost here in Norway.
1Tb -- sounds great.

In Japan (at least the Tokyo area) you can get FTTH (100Mbps) for around $50-60 per month depending on the exchange rate.

Of course you can always get faster lines at a higer price. :D

Sushi

[sushi]

I have a 1200Kbps line, I guess many people have even less.
And some have faster connections! :D

A 6GB DVD would take approximately 11 hours 6 minutes and 40 seconds to download at optimal speed, when not using the internet for anything else.

The maths:

A 1200Kbps line will have a maximum download speed of 1200/8=150KBps.

6 GB = 6 000 000 KB

6''KB / 150KBps = 40 000 seconds
Or with FTTH (100Mbps) you can easily DL at 8MB per second.

A 6GB DVD would take about 12.5 minutes.

And considering that most DVD movies are smaller, if you exclude the extras, then it would take even less time.

Sushi

[BOOMBA]

they shouldn't, since there hasn't been a good one yet...

[Veldek]

Or with FTTH (100Mbps) you can easily DL at 8MB per second.

A 6GB DVD would take about 12.5 minutes.

And considering that most DVD movies are smaller, if you exclude the extras, then it would take even less time.

SushiYeah, but how many people have these kind of connections? A vast minority, I would guess.

[dejo]

i can't say that i'm very surprised about this. try taking a BMP image>JPEG>BMP>JPEG, etc. everytime the computer has to compress something, it slightly changes the data. when it goes to recompress, the data is slightly different than it was the original, so it has to compress it slightly different and on and on. i don't see why AAC/MPEG audio compression would be any different than JPEG image compression. it's just taking the areas that we really focus on and compressing them less and areas of less detail & compressing them more.

The reason they might be different is because they are using different algorithms. If JPEG compression and AAC compression used the same algorithm, your logic would make perfect sense. But they don't. But, as I stated in an earlier post, multiple compressions to AAC do introduce more and more artifacts each time, but not for the same reason as JPEG compression.

[wdlove]

they shouldn't, since there hasn't been a good one yet...

I think that it depends on age. There are many that I don't like. I enjoyed each and everyone of the 13 free songs from Apple, they got 4 stars. The one today got 4 stars.

[min_t]

I might be wrong, but I just don't see how Apple could declare this as the year of HD, and then announce some whimpy little VCD-download service.

And DVD is too early for now.
I have a 1200Kbps line, I guess many people have even less.
A 6GB DVD would take approximately 11 hours 6 minutes and 40 seconds to download at optimal speed, when not using the internet for anything else.

I wouldn't dare to try to download Schindlers List!! :eek:

How big would a HD-movie be, btw..?


The maths:
A 1200Kbps line will have a maximum download speed of 1200/8=150KBps.

6 GB = 6 000 000 KB

6''KB / 150KBps = 40 000 seconds

OS X Tiger
Quicktime 7
H.264
itunes support movies

I don't think these are all coincidences

[rdowns]

Napster loads up on cash in private sale
BEN FRITZ and GORDON MASSON, 01.25.05, 12:49 PM ET

Daily Variety

Signaling it's still a strong competitor in the digital music biz dominated by Apple, Napster is expanding into Germany and Monday closed a private placement of 7.1 million shares that will bring in an additional $52 million in cash.

Those funds, combined with the $80 million the company recently landed for selling its software business and the $20 million it had on hand as of Sept. 30, gives it a healthy cash cushion.

Napster said it plans to use its new funds primarily to market its Napster to Go service, which will allow users to take music they acquire via a monthly subscription, rather than on a pay-per-download basis like iTunes, onto mobile devices.

Napster also revealed it may use its growing cash horde for acquisitions. Many analysts have said the online music market is ripe for consolidation.

At the Midem music confab in Cannes, Napster CEO Chris Gorog told Daily Variety that expansion through acquiring other digital music services is "not out of the question" but added that for the time being, Napster is concentrating on building as fast as it can.

Gorog also said at the conference that Napster may offer a video subscription service, although no definite plans have been made.

Gorog expects the German service to launch before the end of this year and revealed that Napster will next expand into France.

Besides the U.S., Napster is already doing business in Canada and Blighty.

To expand its business, the company has focused primarily on subscriptions, which have bigger margins but have been thus far less popular than 99? downloads. As of Dec. 31, it had 270,000 paying subscribers, most of whom were paying $9.95 per month to access Napster's library of more than 1 million tracks. Some 44,000 subs were paying a discounted rate as part of university programs.

Since the beginning of the year, when Napster became a public company focused solely on digital music, its stock has declined 15%

[sushi]

Yeah, but how many people have these kind of connections? A vast minority, I would guess.
Here in the Tokyo area, it is becoming pretty standard and easy to get vice a couple of years ago.

Just had a friend get FTTH and everything (installation, modem, etc.) was free. He just pays a monthly fee. Compare that with two years ago when installation was $400 plus, and you had to purchase your modem, plus pay for everything.

Competing with FTTH is ADSL at 40-45Mbps. Those in older buildings have to settle for these types of connections.

Sushi

[RealDeal]

ordered an ipod shuffle recently on impulse- bought about 200 tracks- happily doing playlists, burning CDs, and eagerly awaiting the shuffle.

i'm greatly pleased with ease of use, guess 40% sad that ALL available tracks limited by record deals etc.

Makes music really FUN!

Local music stores pretty limited compared with online "catalog" (old Apple II jargon!).- they're a dead-end for business...