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Networking company Sandvine has released a new report that breaks down North American iTunes traffic on fixed networks, examining how iTunes customers are using the service. Surprisingly, the largest portion of iTunes traffic is not generated from streaming, but from the App Store.

Direct App Store downloads account for 38.1% of total iTunes traffic, while 36.15% of traffic comes from iTunes streaming, which includes movie and song previews, along with iTunes Match.

With iTunes Match, customers can stream music and video purchases to both mobile devices and Apple TVs. Apple's streaming traffic may increase in the coming months with the introduction of iRadio, the company's rumored streaming radio service.

itunestrafficcomposition.jpg
Media downloads, which are non application purchases such as music, movies, and books make up the third largest portion of iTunes traffic at 20.47% and the final 5.33% of traffic is generated from iTunes Browsing as users visit various App Store and iTunes pages.

As Tim Cook noted in Apple's Q2 financial results call, iTunes has been experiencing phenomenal growth with record quarterly billings of $4 billion. Apple's App Store is nearing 50 billion downloads and has paid out more than $9 billion to developers.

Sandvine's report also points out that Apple manufactured devices generate 35% of all streaming audio and video on fixed access networks, with the iPad generating the most traffic at 10%.

To generate its report, Sandvine examined a cross-section of customer data, gathered over a one-month period and compiled a 24-hour profile of each network normalized by the number of active subscribers at each hour of the day.

Article Link: Media Streaming Challenges App Store Downloads for Leading Share of iTunes Store Traffic
 

smithrh

macrumors 68030
Feb 28, 2009
2,722
1,730
Bloody Sandvine.

Ask yourself - how exactly did they get this data? (Hint, it's in the linked article).
 

alent1234

macrumors 603
Jun 19, 2009
5,688
170
between netflix, youtube, spotify and cable channels streaming their content there is no reason to buy anything on itunes except for apps

but i do rent a few movies a month
 

ThatsMeRight

macrumors 68020
Sep 12, 2009
2,284
243
How is it surprising that apps have the largest portion of iTunes traffic? They are selling tens, if not hundreds, of millions of iOS devices each year.

At the same time, streaming services like Netflix and Spotify become more popular because it offers you the same content - based on streaming - as iTunes, for a much lower price.
 

onirocdarb

macrumors regular
Feb 5, 2013
106
0
If itunes added a streaming service that would be killer. Netflix is great but my only gripe is that the selection isn't great (for the shows i like) and you cant watch the latest episodes.
 

dBeats

macrumors 6502a
Jun 21, 2011
637
214
between netflix, youtube, spotify and cable channels streaming their content there is no reason to buy anything on itunes except for apps

but i do rent a few movies a month

Sounds great, until you're on a plane, or out on the water in a boat, or camping or biking deep in the woods. You know, places where there isn't a constant internet connection. Maybe I'm old fashioned, but I like MY music, and if I like a new song, I buy it. Then I can listen to it forever. I added up all my music purchases from iTunes over a year and it was less that a year's subscription to Spotify. Each year my collection grows and one day, when I'm officially too old to like ANYTHING new, I can pay nothing and listen to the songs I like while out on a lake in the middle of nowhere.
 

komodrone

macrumors 6502
Apr 26, 2011
499
0
You mean those 1-2GB apps I have to constantly download to update is generating more traffic than that one time I actually bought an episode from iTunes? shocking!
 

Porco

macrumors 68040
Mar 28, 2005
3,314
6,908
I hope any iRadio (or whatever it'll be called) comes with a hefty chunk of extra bandwidth and/or server performance, because iTunes Match is already pretty flakey on a regular basis.

They should increase the upper song limit for Match while they're at it, seeing as rivals offer far more.
 

E.Lizardo

macrumors 68000
May 28, 2008
1,776
305
between netflix, youtube, spotify and cable channels streaming their content there is no reason to buy anything on itunes except for apps

but i do rent a few movies a month

Dittto.but I don't rent streaming movies at all.Between Netflix streaming+discs,Amazon prime(I already had prime so it's FREEEE!),If I can't find something to watch I must not really want to watch TV.Plus I've just started exploring Crackle,so that's plenty of options.Aereo Is coming to town soon,and that will be the last of my cable bill.
 

HobeSoundDarryl

macrumors G5
I hope any iRadio (or whatever it'll be called) comes with a hefty chunk of extra bandwidth and/or server performance, because iTunes Match is already pretty flakey on a regular basis.

They should increase the upper song limit for Match while they're at it, seeing as rivals offer far more.

I think you're hinting at what I think Apple iDevice innovation is all about now: data burn... faster and faster. Siri, Maps, iMessage, Match, Photostream, iCloud and possibly this iRadio... all dependent on burning data against which we have hard caps with almost every major carrier.

Do we not see what's going on here? Apple likes the iPhone subsidy. The carriers whine about having to pay Apple so much. So Apple starts innovating "must have" iDevice features that burn data faster and faster. Use them and you get to your tier limits more quickly, which then yields more revenue for the wireless data tollmasters.

At first I couldn't make sense of iRadio as a "next big thing". Pandora, Spotify, etc already exist and work great. I'm sure Apple can bring a few new things to that table. But radio? It seems so yesterday.

Then, I saw several articles around each carrier releasing their earnings in which they loved the revenue & subscriber growth that came with iPhone but hate the fatter subsidy they pay Apple for iPhone. That subsidy is a big part of Apple revenues roaring (they basically have corporations paying for most of the cost of iPhones so that the masses can be financially enticed (as well) to go iPhone). So how can Apple make their partners happy? Help them make more money from us. How to do that? Give us new software toys that bang us into data tiers faster and faster.

Win for Apple. Win for AT&T, Verizon, etc. We just pay more and even gush our excitement at anything coming with even more data-burn fundamentals.

If you want to anticipate the biggest new software features of iOS 7 & 8, think about what else could be built by Apple that will stream lots of data. Some other video streaming service (aka various forms of an Apple Television rumor) would be a very hungry data hog. What else could Apple internalize or "invent" that would really burn that 4G/3G data?
 
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4TheLoveOfTech

macrumors 6502
Feb 27, 2013
432
0

MacDav

macrumors 65816
Mar 24, 2004
1,031
0
I think that this chart from the same report gives a little clearer picture of video streaming market from home.

http://appleinsider.com/articles/13/05/14/netflix-accounts-for-13-of-nightly-home-internet-traffic-apples-itunes-takes-2

Image

Interesting, but completely Apples and Oranges chart. Netflix is a paid streaming service without any new highly demanded media. Youtube is paid by advertisers. iTunes is a rent or buy per movie or show and so on and so on.
 

4TheLoveOfTech

macrumors 6502
Feb 27, 2013
432
0
Interesting, but completely Apples and Oranges chart. Netflix is a paid streaming service without any new highly demanded media. Youtube is paid by advertisers. iTunes is a rent or buy per movie or show and so on and so on.

Google's new music streaming service being introduced tomorrow is a streaming service. Where's iRadio?

Kind of like BBM, late to the party.
 

mdelvecchio

macrumors 68040
Sep 3, 2010
3,151
1,149
between netflix, youtube, spotify and cable channels streaming their content there is no reason to buy anything on itunes except for apps

but i do rent a few movies a month

so you basically do have a reason to buy things on itunes besides apps. nice post, dude.

like you, i rent a few movies a month on itunes. perhaps more, since i dont have cable or use hulu. i also enjoy buying music since i dont use spotify and prefer to own my music.
 

dec.

Suspended
Apr 15, 2012
1,349
765
Toronto
Looks like Google already is going to beat Apple to the streaming music arena.

Tomorrow's Google i/o keynote should be an interesting one.

Verge:
"Exclusive: Google readies its Spotify competitor with Universal and Sony now on board"

http://www.theverge.com/2013/5/14/4331110/google-lands-universal-music-sony-for-spotify-competitor

Wonder if this is why Apple stock tanked today and after hours?

So this would exclude the possibility of Apple offering a streaming music service?
 

4TheLoveOfTech

macrumors 6502
Feb 27, 2013
432
0
So this would exclude the possibility of Apple offering a streaming music service?

Not at all, but it sure does take the wind out of Apple's sails when they are late to the party.

My guess is Google will release it on iOS as well. Won't know until tomorrow though...
 

bigpoppamac31

macrumors 68020
Aug 16, 2007
2,449
424
Canada
I buy the majority of my music on iTunes now. Very rarely will I buy a CD. But I still buy DVDs or Blu-ray's over downloading my movies. I still prefer it that way. Until they stop making them I'll still buy them.
 

ThunderSkunk

macrumors 68040
Dec 31, 2007
3,782
3,990
Milwaukee Area
I buy the majority of my music on iTunes now. Very rarely will I buy a CD. But I still buy DVDs or Blu-ray's over downloading my movies. I still prefer it that way. Until they stop making them I'll still buy them.

Yeh, I bought Venture Bros on itunes. It cost just as much as the dvd set, and didn't come with any of the special features. Last time I do that.
 

toaster64

macrumors regular
May 14, 2013
164
0
Google's new music streaming service being introduced tomorrow is a streaming service. Where's iRadio?

Kind of like BBM, late to the party.

They're different things. iRadio is something like Pandora. Probably will be nothing new, but it'll work with iTunes and iPhone, so I'll be happy.
 
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