iTMS Downloads Top 200 Million

[MacRumors]

In a press release (http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2004/dec/16itunes.html), Apple announced that the iTMS has successfully sold over 200 million tracks, with the second 100 million coming since July 12, 2004. (http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2004/07/20040712013118.shtml)
iTunes has made it easy to give the gift of music this holiday season with iTunes prepaid cards that are available from retailers like Amazon.com, Best Buy, Circuit City, CompUSA, Kroger, RadioShack, 7-Eleven, Target, as well as Apple’s online store and Apple’s retail stores and offer $15 or $25 of music on the iTunes Music Store. Gift givers can also send iTunes gift certificates in amounts from $10 to $200 by email or regular mail, and can print out these gift certificates in color right on their computer for the perfect last minute stocking stuffer.


“iTunes has now sold over 200 million songs, making it the world’s number one online music store by far,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “We’re thrilled to be making music an even more popular gift this holiday season with iTunes and iPod.”

[MattG]

All the "Complete U2" sales must have helped a lot ;)

[plasticparadox]

Congrats. I guess the closest competitor would be Napster?

[dobbin]

WOW!

Makes my 10 or so songs seem so insignificant. Then again it would only be 199,999,990 without me! :D

[bpd115]

I wonder if they count the free download of the week with that?

[Stella]

200 million. Good.

However is the purchase rate speeding up or slowing down ( taking into account the new stores ) ?

[iGary]

I do hope this makes Bill Gates squirm.


I really, really do. :D

[Mechcozmo]

Yay! :D:D:D

I wonder how well the MS store is doing.... :confused:

[JGowan]

I wonder if they count the free download of the week with that?No... it just for songs purchased.

[cxny]

I think what we have here is the "Moore's Law" of music downloads. Let's see if Job's Law holds up for 40 years as well! Of course that may entail the entire planet listening to 10 terrabyte iPods each with several billion dollars worth of ITMS dowloads.........

[jbembe]

O.K. who's the ambitious soul who's going to plot iTMS sales over time to show us how the curve is progressing!!?? :D

[Xtremehkr]

I'm up to 37 songs from iTMS, more than I thought. The exclusive tracks keep sucking me in. 3EB just released a cover of Cry, Cry, Cry that is outstanding. I haven't even started on all of the Pearl Jam tracks yet.

[Stella]

Well thats good (see quote below ), but its only for the usa, Apple is forgetting the rest of the world. Napster are making better initiatives than Apple, for example, in the UK you can buy Napster vouchers from Dixons ( Dixons being the largest chain of electronic stores ). Where are such initiatives from Apple?

Apple appears to be resting on their lorrals. I don't care if Apple have the market share, they need to be more proactive about where you can buy pre paid vouchers from etc. Napster will catch Apple up ( market share), I'm very sure of that.

Napster are marketing their store better than Apple - i.e., cheaper sales for bulk users ( universities) , partnering with Store Chains - internationally.

Apple are far behind in their marketing initiatives and they need to improve otherwise Napster will pass iTMS, at some point.




"Tunes has made it easy to give the gift of music this holiday season with iTunes prepaid cards that are available from retailers like Amazon.com, Best Buy, Circuit City, CompUSA, Kroger, RadioShack, 7-Eleven, Target, as well as Apple?s online store and Apple?s retail stores and offer $15 or $25 of music on the iTunes Music Store. Gift givers can also send iTunes gift certificates in amounts from $10 to $200 by email or regular mail, and can print out these gift certificates in color right on their computer for the perfect last minute stocking stuffer.
"

[Sir_Giggles]

O.K. who's the ambitious soul who's going to plot iTMS sales over time to show us how the curve is progressing!!?? :D

At this rate, the curve skyrockets upwards and falls back on it self. With sales so dizzying, time will go in reverse. :D

[weezer160]

he get something for this, like a PB or ipod?!

[jxyama]

wow... that's roughly 22 weeks to get the 100 million -> 4.5 million per week -> 650k per day.

and christmas isn't even here yet...

we could see 250 million by MWSF.

and just the other day, we saw a post about Real almost boasting selling 3 million tracks in 3 weeks at 50% off... :D

[jbembe]

I'm up to 37 songs from iTMS, more than I thought. The exclusive tracks keep sucking me in. 3EB just released a cover of Cry, Cry, Cry that is outstanding. I haven't even started on all of the Pearl Jam tracks yet.

You mean Third Eye Blind covered a Johnny Cash song!?? Might have to check that out.

[Xtremehkr]

You mean Third Eye Blind covered a Johnny Cash song!?? Might have to check that out.

Yeah with Merle Haggard, it's really good.

[iriejedi]

How can you deauthorize a computer (iTunes) that dies or is taken away from you (ie work upgrades you and your computer dissapears)

Thanks in advace!

Iriejedi

At this rate, the curve skyrockets upwards and falls back on it self. With sales so dizzying, time will go in reverse. :D

[Threnody]

How can you deauthorize a computer (iTunes) that dies or is taken away from you (ie work upgrades you and your computer dissapears)

I remember reading that if you call or email Apple they'll deauthorize the computer for you (although I wouldn't make a habit of it). I hope you didn't lose all the music on the computer too!

As an aside, I wonder how the Canadian store is doing. I know I've bought my fair share (42 songs and counting). I'd bet they're close to being the most popular in the country if they're not already. They've been getting a crazy amount of press here lately.

[zelmo]

That 2nd 100 million went really, really fast. Does anyone know if that figure includes purchased/unused gift cards, or if it is purely tracks that have already been downloaded?

[Loge]

Well thats good (see quote below ), but its only for the usa, Apple is forgetting the rest of the world. Napster are making better initiatives than Apple, for example, in the UK you can buy Napster vouchers from Dixons ( Dixons being the largest chain of electronic stores ). Where are such initiatives from Apple?


But Napster seem to be forgetting the rest of Europe. Their European store is UK only, I believe.

[eazyway]

200 million. Good.

However is the purchase rate speeding up or slowing down ( taking into account the new stores ) ?

Now downloading at 25M per month or 300M per year.

Took 4 months to go from 50 to 100M
Took 3 months to go from 100-150M
and 2 months to go from 150 to 200M
if this trend continues which I see happening for at least another year
i can see Apple getting above 100M downloads per month.


This next month will see a huge number. From the Christmas iPods, the Gift Certificates .No question they wil hit 250M by MacWorld. At this trend look for the 1 Billionth download to occur during 2005.

Pretty awsome. Looking at getting to a Billion dollars in yearly revenue just from the iTMS !! for 2006.

By 2006 expect there to be 25Mplus iPod users. At an average of 1 song a week(lower than the current rate)you have 1.3B downloads.

Gotta buy some long term stock options on Apple !!

[~Shard~]

Glad to see that the iTMS shows no signs of slowing down! Bring on 300M! :cool:

[jxyama]

here's a chart... based only on apple's own press release...

[jxyama]

the songs sold nicely follows a 2nd degree polynomial. the formula on the chart is a little off, it's the weird math excel does with the dates.

with days since april 28, 2003, the fit is:

songs sold = 0.0006*days^2 - 0.0549*days + 3.7629

projected numbers:

MWSF (1/12/05?): 215 million
2 year anniversary (4/28/2005): 300 million
WWDC '05 (7/10/05?): 360 million
end of the year 2005: 550 million

i doubt this projection will even hold for MWSF...

[gekko513]

Thanks jxyama, that's a nice chart. Good for Apple. Now please bring the store to Norway.

[liketom]

good stuff , i was thinking that my iTunes store buying was slipping as well , only 4 albums this month compared to 8 last month lol

here's to 1,000,000,000 lol

[maelstromr]

Well thats good (see quote below ), but its only for the usa, Apple is forgetting the rest of the world. Napster are making better initiatives than Apple, for example, in the UK you can buy Napster vouchers from Dixons ( Dixons being the largest chain of electronic stores ). Where are such initiatives from Apple?

Apple appears to be resting on their lorrals. I don't care if Apple have the market share, they need to be more proactive about where you can buy pre paid vouchers from etc. Napster will catch Apple up ( market share), I'm very sure of that.

Napster are marketing their store better than Apple - i.e., cheaper sales for bulk users ( universities) , partnering with Store Chains - internationally.

Apple are far behind in their marketing initiatives and they need to improve otherwise Napster will pass iTMS, at some point.


"

This seems like an awefully subjective statement couched as fact. "Better initiatives?" Come on, is there ANY indication Napster is even thinking about approaching Apple's market right now?

I guess there always has to be one doomsayer predicting the fall of the company...you guys want to be the first to call the next microsoft/windows-ascension-over-Apple-controlling-a-market type thing. So far, I think Jobs is brilliant and I completely trust his judgement on the next 10 years of Apple evolution.

[wdlove]

It would seem that have iTunes fro the Mac & PC has been very profitable. Also having a store now in Europe and Canada. That is amazing to have sold 100 million since July.

[azdude]

It's still not quite exponential, but it's a really healthy continuation of rate, with a small increase:

EDIT: Damn... I've been beaten! :(

http://www.jerrod.us/itmsdec04.jpg

[fabsgwu]

I'm glad Apple is now selling iTMS gift cards at BestBuy, Target, 7-11 etc., because last year I made two attempts to send iTunes gift certificates, once via email (recipient never got it) and once via US mail (never arrived). Of course my credit card was charged, Apple refunded the first (lost email), but I gave up on the mailed one. Sending things of monetary value through email (i.e. gift certificates) seems unsound to me, since people are most likely going to think its junk.

Would you clik on an email that said "Your friend David has just sent you a $25 iTunes Gift Certificate!" :confused:

[Stella]

Apple don't release sales figures per country. In some countries Napster could be doing better than iTMS.

The point I was making - Apple have done very little in the way of partnering with companies / organising outside the US, where as Napster have. Apple need to improve this otherwise iTMS will become like their computers - where they do not so well in non-us markets.

Apple don't do promotions in other parts of the world like the offers in us:
- there are no discount days such as you get for us thanksgiving ( Apple don't even do this in Canada for its thanksgiving)).
- apple only offers us customers the paypal promotion - NO excuse for this
- some .mac promotions only for us customers.

So, iTMS could become like apple computers where the us is the most popular market for macs. This situation has come about due to lack of promotions, over inflated currency conversions.

btw: This is NOT doomsayer'ing.

This is a tad off topic, but apple need to promote iTMS throughout the world, not just the us.


This seems like an awefully subjective statement couched as fact. "Better initiatives?" Come on, is there ANY indication Napster is even thinking about approaching Apple's market right now?

I guess there always has to be one doomsayer predicting the fall of the company...you guys want to be the first to call the next microsoft/windows-ascension-over-Apple-controlling-a-market type thing. So far, I think Jobs is brilliant and I completely trust his judgement on the next 10 years of Apple evolution.

[azdude]

Would you clik on an email that said "Your friend David has just sent you a $25 iTunes Gift Certificate!" :confused:

Security Notice:
Forward all such spam to me for analysis!

[jxyama]

Apple don't release sales figures per country. In some countries Napster could be doing better than iTMS.

highly doubtful. napster hasn't released any numbers. in fact, Real's announcement the other day of 3 million tracks in 3 weeks of 50% off promotion is just about the first time i've heard of anyone but iTMS releasing numbers.

they all say it's difficult to track because they also have subscription. whatever.

edit: actually, napster did release a number. back in feb this year, they said they had sold 5 million tracks. they've been around since oct '03. no other words from them.

[AmigoMac]

Would you clik on an email that said "Your friend David has just sent you a $25 iTunes Gift Certificate!" :confused:

wouldn't you? :confused: ;)

send me one and I'll tell you... :p

[macridah]

oh yeah! So the person that downloaded the 200 million song didn't get a call from Steve? ;)

[Fredstar]

This is quiet an achievement, they really have grasped the market pretty much globally.
Does anyone have any figures to compare with other legal music downloading companies? Just intrigued to see how dominant the itunes store is compared.

[swissmann]

This is quiet an achievement, they really have grasped the market pretty much globally.
Does anyone have any figures to compare with other legal music downloading companies? Just intrigued to see how dominant the itunes store is compared.

I second this request. If anyone would like to post numbers that would be great. Thanks.

[dejo]

here's a chart... based only on apple's own press release...

Wow. y = 0.0006x^2 - 45.701x + 829953? Really? That is great news! ;)

[Bengt77]

How does one unsuccessfully sell 200 million songs? :rolleyes: ;)

[Stella]

How does one unsuccessfully sell 200 million songs? :rolleyes: ;)

When it takes 200 years to achieve it! :-)

[Raid]

It's still not quite exponential, but it's a really healthy continuation of rate, with a small increase

It seems that there are only 13 observations in azdude's chart, and maybe less than that for jxyama's. I like the R-squared fit of jxyama's regression but it does assume a non-zero constant and the small number of observable data would make forecasting quite error prone. -> Translation: I think it's a bit too early to predict the future, but trend looks promising!

[eazyway]

the songs sold nicely follows a 2nd degree polynomial. the formula on the chart is a little off, it's the weird math excel does with the dates.

with days since april 28, 2003, the fit is:

songs sold = 0.0006*days^2 - 0.0549*days + 3.7629

projected numbers:

MWSF (1/12/05?): 215 million
2 year anniversary (4/28/2005): 300 million
WWDC '05 (7/10/05?): 360 million
end of the year 2005: 550 million

i doubt this projection will even hold for MWSF...

Your prediction shows that 2005 sales will be just under 30M a month. They are already at 25M a month with a rapidly expanding iPod base. So I feel that your numbers are low. Check you equation it seems a bit off.

[SiliconAddict]

What the heck? ITMS is still in the millions? Millions is sooo yesterday's news. ;) Lets see that billion word get thrown around. :D

[eazyway]

[QUOTE=Stella]

Apple don't do promotions in other parts of the world like the offers in us:
- there are no discount days such as you get for us thanksgiving ( Apple don't even do this in Canada for its thanksgiving)).



Wrong

Last year I bought 3 iPods at the educational price plus 10 % off and free shipping and engraving from the Apple canada site for my children's Christmas gifts. I don't think they did it this year.

[jxyama]

Your prediction shows that 2005 sales will be just under 30M a month. They are already at 25M a month with a rapidly expanding iPod base. So I feel that your numbers are low. Check you equation it seems a bit off.

i only listed the numbers because the polynomial fit was quite good. (there's no inherent reason to think it's a polynomial function, though.) i think the predictions are low too, so that's why i said i don't think the number will hold even for MWSF. based on the fit, 215 mil. is projected, but i think there's a good chance the holiday crowd will push that number to nearly 250 mil. by MWSF.

another method would be to fit a curve on the rate of songs sold and do a projection based on that...

i'm still amazed that the rate of songs purchased is actually increasing. still waiting for it to plateau... who knows when?

[egsaxy]

[QUOTE=Stella]The point I was making - Apple have done very little in the way of partnering with companies / organising outside the US, where as Napster have. Apple need to improve this otherwise iTMS will become like their computers - where they do not so well in non-us markets.

i didn't realize that apple computers did so well in the USA over the rest of the world. where the stats?

[Yvan256]

Congrats. I guess the closest competitor would be Napster?

There's competitors?

[Yvan256]

200 million. Good.

However is the purchase rate speeding up or slowing down ( taking into account the new stores ) ?

And is that 200M for the iTMS USA only, or all iTMS combined?

I'd like to see iTMS Canada numbers...

[Yvan256]

O.K. who's the ambitious soul who's going to plot iTMS sales over time to show us how the curve is progressing!!?? :D

You can be sure that Apple themselves will display such a graphic at the next event...

[ebow]

However is the purchase rate speeding up or slowing down ( taking into account the new stores ) ?

Using Apple's press release dates and figures, I threw together a rough chart showing the number of downloads per day. To compute this I just took the increase from one announcement to the next and divided it by the number of days between. The values are plotted on the second date.

As the chart shows, the purchase rate is speeding up.

[shabbasuraj]

2005 = 350 million?

[jxyama]

Using Apple's press release dates and figures, I threw together a rough chart showing the number of downloads per day. To compute this I just took the increase from one announcement to the next and divided it by the number of days between. The values are plotted on the second date.

As the chart shows, the purchase rate is speeding up.

yeah, i got the same curve. i'm trying to figure out what to attribute the little spike at the one year anniversary... i think it may be the pepsi promotion, but my memory is fuzzy. it's not windows iTMS. it could be the mini..? or holiday iPodders from '03 finally getting around to buying music?

[Savage Henry]

And is that 200M for the iTMS USA only, or all iTMS combined?
Combined, definately.

It still surprises me that it was so soon after the big 100m, and it seems kinda nice to know that the 200mth song was part of the cross promotional U2 thing.

Three years time there'll be the billionth ... time is just flying.

[zac4mac]

... is from the rush to be "the 100 millionth song" downloader.

Z

[JGowan]

Does anyone have any figures to compare with other legal music downloading companies? Just intrigued to see how dominant the itunes store is compared.Well... you can bet Steve Jobs does and we'll know about it at the next conference in January. Of course, by then, the number might be Two Hundred-FIFTY Million! Way to go, Apple!

[ASP272]

Awesome! I hope it's 400 million by next July. Apple deserves kudos for making such an awesome, and legal, interface for purchasing digital music. It can only get better from here, and I'm not complaining about how it is now. :)

[bemayo]

I did the same thing, but you beat me to the graph! Since I spent some time on it, I'll post it anyway. Mine is an area graph with event callouts.


Using Apple's press release dates and figures, I threw together a rough chart showing the number of downloads per day. To compute this I just took the increase from one announcement to the next and divided it by the number of days between. The values are plotted on the second date.

As the chart shows, the purchase rate is speeding up.

[Fredstar]

Well... you can bet Steve Jobs does and we'll know about it at the next conference in January. Of course, by then, the number might be Two Hundred-FIFTY Million! Way to go, Apple!

They have done a marvelous job, i have to say it again :P
By MWSF imagine all those new ipod owners thinking "oh how kewl is using itunes" and my ipod and how easy it is to download any song i want at any time for a reasonable price.
I hope the download figure will over 250 mill because that graph would become exponential!

[Nermal]

Wow, look at all those graphs popping up in this thread. Dr Q must be asleep! :eek:

[dontmatter]

How's the fit on that versus exponential growth? It should fit exponential better than a quadratic...

also, as per that earlier comment, is the rate of sales increasing or decreasing.... of course it's increasing!!! The question is, is the rate of growth increasing or decreasing. More likely, it's is it holding steady, as it is a HUGE rate of growth, (rate of growth being say, 20% increase per year or month), or is it leveling off? I'll play around with the stats in a few minutes.

Anyway, I just want to know what this means by market share and by growth rate. Either way, though, I'd say this market has enough more growth in it that even if apple is surpassed in market share, we can still expect long term a raw number of songs of several hunded million a year.

Still, all the profit is in the ipod. But with a closed platform... could be major, major money for apple. And, you know, a nice place for microsoft to pour dough and never end up getting money from, at least compared to the other divisions of the company, because they don't do the hardware. Internet explorer, anyone? Of course, it'll suck just as much, but it will also make microsoft just about as much money.

One other fun number-200 million songs is about enough (correct my arithmatic) to fill up 20,000 40 GB ipods. Surprisingly small, given the number of ipods sold to date (but mp3's are so much more common) but surprisingly large, too, I think given how big 20,000 is.

Anybody know the number of songs in the catalog, now? (how do napster et al. compare?)

EDIT: sorry, should have read whole thread first.

the songs sold nicely follows a 2nd degree polynomial. the formula on the chart is a little off, it's the weird math excel does with the dates.

with days since april 28, 2003, the fit is:

songs sold = 0.0006*days^2 - 0.0549*days + 3.7629

projected numbers:

MWSF (1/12/05?): 215 million
2 year anniversary (4/28/2005): 300 million
WWDC '05 (7/10/05?): 360 million
end of the year 2005: 550 million

i doubt this projection will even hold for MWSF...

[jxyama]

How's the fit on that versus exponential growth? It should fit exponential better than a quadratic...

it's not exponential. the first year or so of numbers make the function not fit very well for the second year on... (to be exponential, even the amazing growth of iTMS in the second year has not been enough.) the second year numbers alone, though, is a good exponential fit...

the rate of growth of sales? like the second derivative? since quadratic function fit well, it's been pretty much a constant, i imagine.

[Avicdar]

Today Lou Dobbs reports that iPods are one of the hottest selling Christmas gifts this year, and there is an expectation that Apple will sell a total of 4 million units for the Christmas season alone.

I have no idea what space of time is considered "the Christmas season", but I would speculate its Oct-Dec.

I don't know what iPod sales figures are to date, but this is one mighty impressive number. Of course, this should cause a nice spike in ITMS sales as people want to get some tunes onto these lil guys.

Hopefully Apple is doing something smart inside the iPod boxes now to convince people to get onto the store quickly. A coupon for some free tunes, for example, would be good. Been a while since I have opened an iPod box, so dont know what the current setup is.

[jxyama]

if anyone else wants to play with fits and numbers, here are the apple press releases on iTMS.

date days since iTMS launch songs sold (in millions)

12/16/04 598 200
10/14/04 535 150
7/12/04 441 100
4/28/04 366 70
3/15/04 322 50
12/15/03 231 25
9/8/03 133 10
6/23/03 56 5
5/14/03 16 2
5/5/03 7 1
4/28/03 iTMS launch

[ebow]

it's not exponential. the first year or so of numbers make the function not fit very well for the second year on... (to be exponential, even the amazing growth of iTMS in the second year has not been enough.) the second year numbers alone, though, is a good exponential fit...


Here's my chart for total downloads with an exponential trendline. Like you said, it doesn't fit well after the 12 July 2004 point. I had to remove the store opening (downloads = 0) to get exponential as a trendline option. Oh, and while I emphasized the equation in the image, now that I actually read it I realize it's pretty daft because of Excel's date numbering system. :rolleyes:

Update: if you consider just the previous year, then the curve is much closer to exponential. See the second attached image.

[dontmatter]

I wonder: Are gift certificates counted when they are purchased, or when the song is downloaded? If it's a purchase thing, then these are inflated numbers thanks to x-mas. If it's downloaded.... there should be quite a nice spike for january, and of course the last 6 days of december.

Of course, the language here is interesting- if it is "200 million songs downloaded" then we don't have all the songs included that have already been paid for in gift certificate form, but should have the free downloads, while if it's "200 mill purchased" we don't have the free downloads inflation, but do have the inflation based on certificates....

Also, any report on apple's stock price? This above or below what wall st. was expecting?

[jxyama]

I wonder: Are gift certificates counted when they are purchased, or when the song is downloaded? If it's a purchase thing, then these are inflated numbers thanks to x-mas. If it's downloaded.... there should be quite a nice spike for january, and of course the last 6 days of december.

Of course, the language here is interesting- if it is "200 million songs downloaded" then we don't have all the songs included that have already been paid for in gift certificate form, but should have the free downloads, while if it's "200 mill purchased" we don't have the free downloads inflation, but do have the inflation based on certificates....

Also, any report on apple's stock price? This above or below what wall st. was expecting?

the fact they announce which song was the 200 millionth (or any other occasion) probably implies that the song is counted when it is downloaded. so unused gift certificates aren't part of the number.

also, wall street doesn't forecast on iTMS sales numbers. they'll forecast on company earnings and such. stock prices may go up and down based on how the company did against those expectations. in a larger picture, when iTMS hits a certain milestone download is a fairly inconsequential to apple's overall health as a company.

[Makosuke]

in a larger picture, when iTMS hits a certain milestone download is a fairly inconsequential to apple's overall health as a company.
That's probably true technically, but not necessarily as far as Wall Street sees it; if the announced iTMS milestones indicate a rapidly increasing growth rate, there are investors who will extrapolate that to mean that the iTMS will eventually become a big chunk of business for Apple--perhaps even directly, or in terms of iPod sales as Apple claims. This could, in turn, push the stock price up, as investors factor in the potential value of the stock a year or two from now if the iTMS were to be grossing $1BN/year or something.

These numbers will of course be reflected in Apple's financial statements, but anything that generates buzz about a company or serves as an early indicator of future runaway success will affect stock price.

Heck, you could well get dotcom-style investors who think "I want to get in on the ground floor of the downloadable music business." when they see a number like 200M songs sold, and they might buy whoever looks the most promising in that space, even if that company happens to have computers as its main business.

[wdlove]

Wow, look at all those graphs popping up in this thread. Dr Q must be asleep! :eek:

I'm sure that he is working on his number crunching. His angle and view point should be very enlightening.

[kaszeta]

Yeah with Merle Haggard, it's really good.

Unlike Olivia Newton-John's cover of "Ring of Fire (http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?playlistId=33687&selectedItemId=33669)", which isn't good.

[FelixDerKater]

That was a quick jump to the next 100 million.

[virividox]

WOO HOO i contributed to that figure ;) hopefully dl keep coming strong

[dejo]

I wonder: Are gift certificates counted when they are purchased, or when the song is downloaded?

I don't know how gift certificates or even allowances could be included since they are not for a certain number of songs but instead for a certain number of dollars. Whole-album vs. individual-track purchases (not all albums are $9.99), etc. affect, in a small way, how many songs you can buy.

[Mechcozmo]

There's competitors?

Only in name. Think of them as ants under Apple's giant feet. Think of them as ants under Apple's pesticide sprayer.


My graph:


/\ --Now
|
|
| --Start
Downloads goes up faster and faster.


As you can see, I didn't use fancy-shmancy Excel. Nope. I did it the old fashioned way...

[ct77]

As an aside, I wonder how the Canadian store is doing. I know I've bought my fair share (42 songs and counting). I'd bet they're close to being the most popular in the country if they're not already. They've been getting a crazy amount of press here lately.

I'm at 92 songs and counting (yikes!) and that doesn't include a $30 gift certificate I bought someone for X-mas. :rolleyes:

[Mainyehc]

So, iTMS could become like apple computers where the us is the most popular market for macs. This situation has come about due to lack of promotions, over inflated currency conversions.

btw: This is NOT doomsayer'ing.

This is a tad off topic, but apple need to promote iTMS throughout the world, not just the us.

Spot on... and BTW... Apple NEEDS to promote MACS throughout the world... The only thing I see Apple promoting (just a little bit) here is the iPod (and it really isn't Apple, only it's "official representative"). How many times have I already said how I find weird that Apple has an iTMS store here in Portugal, however, there isn't such a thing as "Apple Portugal"? Dammit!

I could go on, and on, and on with the same old stuff: G5 supply issues, lack of advertising... The only things I really like about Apple is their products themselves, and their corporate culture. As for the rest... I think Apple is still very... how should I put this... immature?

And NO, even with the iPod's success, Apple isn't performing that much better in their supposedly *primary* business: COMPUTERS! The world would be a much better place if Apple was selling 5 million Macs a year instead of 5 million iPods, and even though I absolutely LOVE my iPod, I'd much rather NOT see my platform of choice being bashed by some users, and unsupported and ignored by lots of developers and hardware makers, even if that meant the non-existence of the iPod. If Apple can solve this Mac marketshare issue (which is relevant, IMHO) thanks to the iPod, great! We may be getting the best of both worlds... The best digital music players and computers at affordable prices, now that would be tech-heaven on earth!

Anyway, back on the advertisement issue: I have NEVER seen an Apple/iPod/iTunes/Mac ad here. I mean, NEVER EVER... However, iPods are really catching on, I'm now seeing at least one pair of white earbuds in Lisbon underground almost everyday. Sometimes I see two or three, so that makes a nice average.

And remember, this is WITHOUT advertising in the media, and only with some iPods in acrylic displays, some postcards beside them, and sometimes girls dressed in pink pseudo-official iPod shirts, giving information on the device.

I mean, heck, people probably find out about the iPod via the web, I suppose, or maybe, these people are just Mac users who are buying them in massive quantities (which AFAIK, of course, isn't true :rolleyes: )

[Xtremehkr]

Unlike Olivia Newton-John's cover of "Ring of Fire (http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?playlistId=33687&selectedItemId=33669)", which isn't good.

:eek: :eek: :eek:

Is that or the Austalians guys cover of Stairway to Heaven the worst cover of all time?

Or anything covered by William Shatner?

[MacBandit]

Yay! :D:D:D

I wonder how well the MS store is doing.... :confused:

I wonder how any of the other Music stores are doing. It seems you never hear any news about how many sales they have had. At leas not since the first few months of them opening. The only one that ever makes major news is Apples iTunes store.

[Mainyehc]

Aren't we forgetting something? The iTMS now covers HUGE markets... Almost the entire EU, plus Canada, besides the US. It seems strange to me that iTMS downloads aren't surging EVEN more.

Just a bit of speculation: is everything happening here in the EU the same way it has happened in the US? First, the iTMS didn't sell that much songs (by today's standards), then, the download rate started climbing, and climbing, and climbing?

It's not very easy to understand how well the iTMS is doing by analising just the *TOTAL* download count or dowload rate, without taking into account the recent iTMS expansion. What if the donwload rate in the US has reached a plateau and is now increasing in the EU? Or what if it's still increasing in the US, and stagnant in the EU (higly unlikely because the iPod is selling very well, and Napster hasn't even reached other countries besides the UK and Canada; and remember, I'm just speculating).

[MacBandit]

Aren't we forgetting something? The iTMS now covers HUGE markets... Almost the entire EU, plus Canada, besides the US. It seems strange to me that iTMS downloads aren't surging EVEN more.

Just a bit of speculation: is everything happening here in the EU the same way it has happened in the US? First, the iTMS didn't sell that much songs (by today's standards), then, the download rate started climbing, and climbing, and climbing?

It's not very easy to understand how well the iTMS is doing by analising just the *TOTAL* download count or dowload rate, without taking into account the recent iTMS expansion. What if the donwload rate in the US has reached a plateau and is now increasing in the EU? Or what if it's still increasing in the US, and stagnant in the EU (higly unlikely because the iPod is selling very well, and Napster hasn't even reached other countries besides the UK and Canada; and remember, I'm just speculating).

It would be cool to see a purchasing graph for each region.

[EJBasile]

I have an idea for the phone:

Camera, Video, and PDA phone with a 5gb hd for storing music and such.

[melgross]

All of these charts are nice, and they are very positive for the short term. They are very possibly correct (within limits) as well.

Over the longer term, there are problems. Already, Apple's dominance in the player marker, and to a lesser extent, the music downloads market, is getting the cry of monopoly.

If Apple, as seems the case, does come out with a flash player soon, and then gets 80% or more of the total market, someone might take them to court. If that happens, then they will be restricted as to what they can do there.

The music companies are already getting antsy over Apple's 70% share in music download sales. If the flash player increases that to over 80%, which would seem likely (perhaps even to 85%), the music companies might want to do something about that. You can't blame them for not wanting one company to control that part of their business.

If Apple is declared a monopoly in either, or both, of these areas, they might have to license Fairplay after all. If this happened, perhaps WMA might be the loser, but Apple still wouldn't control the technology in the way they do now.

They might still dominate, but not with these overwhelming numbers. As other players continue to get better, and other music sites do as well, things will even out.

As industries, and technology, improves we see a leveling out. Remember how bad most online stores were a few years ago? Most of those problems have gone away Rarely do we see a really bad store site these days (the quality of the company is another thing).

The overall sales numbers will continue to increase. After all there are almost a billion CD's sold a year. That's about 10 billion songs. A long way to go from 200 million.

Apple's share will just be smaller. They have to improve some things, though. They need to get the artists that other sites have that they don't. They should improve the quality to 160K with variable-bit encoding. Every review now seems to say that the quality from iTunes isn't quite as good as the others. I can vouch for that when listening through higher quality playback.

We'll see. I hope for the best.

[nagromme]

If Apple, as seems the case, does come out with a flash player soon, and then gets 80% or more of the total market, someone might take them to court. If that happens, then they will be restricted as to what they can do there.

Overseas maybe... not in the US. Look at Microsoft! The Bush DOJ likes monopolies ;)

[melgross]

Overseas maybe... not in the US. Look at Microsoft! The Bush DOJ likes monopolies ;)

Remember, MS was declared a monopoly HERE. The problem with being declared one, is that if it happens when the market share is at a level of, say, 80-90%, it is still considered to be one if that share slips to 60%. There is no point other than 51%, or so when the monopoly is no longer in effect.

The music companies might want to do something if they feel that they are losing control of the distribution of their product.

[Loge]

Virgin tried to sue Apple for this in France and it was thrown out.

http://news.com.com/French+court+wont+force+Apple+to+open+up+iTunes/2100-1027_3-5447124.html