Northeastern and Apple?

[MacRumors]

This blog reports on an unconfirmed rumor that Apple may be stepping up to negotiate with at least one college to provide iTunes Music service to their students.

According to the blog, Northeastern University "is negotiating to buy a predetermined number of downloads at the reduced rate from iTMS so that its students will be encouraged not to download songs off P2P networks."

So far Napster has found success in negotiating deals with universities to provide their unlimited streaming service for college students. Apple's iTunes does not share a similar flat-fee/unlimited access model, however, so its unclear how such a deal would be implemented.

[1macker1]

How would this work, ITMS is a pay per song store, unlike napster which is subscription based.

[paulypants]

it would be great for apple to compete with napster on that level

[pb1212580]

great idea... would solve SOME of the P2P illegal download problems and just tag on the price into the student fee... yet another misc. fee!

so is this going to turn into a "flat rate" program in the future? like the cell phone plans...

$30/month for UNLIMITED DOWNLOADS!

and Buy an iPod and get 1st month free!

think about it... how many people you know download 30 songs a month...? that's about 2 albums. or how many CDs would you buy ON AVERAGE per month... it's definitely 2+ for me!

[VicMacs]

yeah, a neat deal to start off with, then the money wouldnt hurt so much and we could get used to the "music bill"

go with this apple!

[Wash!!]

All the University has to do is to set up the students as allowance system and the students buys it from the University as need it or they pay a flat fee for it.

Also they can sell gift certificates at a discount...

Its not that difficult to set up

[gwuMACaddict]

i think all these campus things are a bad idea personally... downloading music IS illegal... why pander to it at all?

[wdlove]

I think that anything that encourages students to download music legally is a good idea. It's good for Apple and the students.

[raptorhigh]

I attend the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and they have taken a pretty hard line on this subject. They are constantly monitoring network packets trying to catch people file sharing. It seems to have worked at least to a degree. In the beginning of the year the violators were fined, cut-off from the network, and forced to do community service. I already used iTMS exclusively, but if I hadn't I would have been convinced to stop stealing.

[ITR 81]

How about MIT, Yale and Harvard?
Ivy League Schools need love too.

[Frisco]

Great Idea!

I am glad Apple isn't becoming complacent just because they are currently #1. Apple is determined to stay #1.

Other music services have their own strengths and if Apple finds a way to implement others' strengths into ITMS then it will only be that much stronger!

[mrsebastian]

Originally posted by gwuMACaddict
i think all these campus things are a bad idea personally... downloading music IS illegal... why pander to it at all?

i agree that the selling to colleges and how those funds are come by is a sore subject for many. though i'm outta college by a long shot, i'd rather have that money go to some part of my education.

all that said, i think it is a good idea to stop some of the illegal downloading. however, until the industry changes it's greedy ways and remembers that they wouldn't be anything without first the artists and second the customers, they aren't going to get much sympothy. i think every artist should set up a website for donations for their hard work. i'd just assume download their music directly from them.

[Doctor Q]

If Apple makes no changes to the iTMS service and software, the university would presumably pay for a number of tunes at some discounted bulk price and then parcel them out to students. But they couldn't give students umlimited downloads for a fixed price or "for free" (bundled into tuition) since there would be an upper limit to the quantity. And I doubt the university would agree to pay Apple after the fact no matter how many were downloaded, or to cut off all students if one of them used up the monthly allotment that covers all students. And how would iTMS distinguish students from that university from the rest of us?

So, without Apple making changes to the iTMS system and software, I don't see a practical way to implement this service.

If Apple does make changes, it could be to allow a charge-my-group-account method of some kind. Maybe connections from the university network would be given access to the university iTMS account, with unlimited downloading once the university and Apple set up a fixed-cost contract based on estimated usage. Allowing downloading by off-campus students would still present a technological challenge.

[jvaska]

Originally posted by gwuMACaddict
i think all these campus things are a bad idea personally... downloading music IS illegal... why pander to it at all?

it is illegal...and it's probably here to stay...

i'm reading more and more about general usage fees (not just at colleges) that will provide for either unlimited downloading or a point system for downloads (each song is three points or something like that...

which is why i believe this is happening...because it must...it's not about encouraging bad habits, it's about encouraging good ones with the obvious extra incentives...

if the industry doesn't get on board...it will fall apart...they should have been doing this back in 99...v

[Elektronkind]

Originally posted by gwuMACaddict
i think all these campus things are a bad idea personally... downloading music IS illegal... why pander to it at all?

Buying a bootleg CD from a street vendor is illegal. Does that make going to a store and buying the real CD a bad thing?

By your logic, music shops are "pandering" to the bootleg street vendor.

/ek

[david_r_p]

for universities to have to subsidize their student's music downloading habits in any way whatsoever. I mean really, how ridiculous, especially considering that many universities are public and supported with taxpayer money. I really don't want my taxes going to some kid's Eminem collection! Will the university have to supply an iPod to all students too?!?

I guess for Apple this would be a good thing though. I wish Apple would worry more about getting universities to adopt the Mac platform and OSX rather than this year's Walkman.

[dongmin]

Originally posted by Doctor Q
If Apple makes no changes to the iTMS service and software, the university would presumably pay for a number of tunes at some discounted bulk price and then parcel them out to students. But they couldn't give students umlimited downloads for a fixed price or "for free" (bundled into tuition) since there would be an upper limit to the quantity. And I doubt the university would agree to pay Apple after the fact no matter how many were downloaded, or to cut off all students if one of them used up the monthly allotment that covers all students. And how would iTMS distinguish students from that university from the rest of us?

So, without Apple making changes to the iTMS system and software, I don't see a practical way to implement this service.

If Apple does make changes, it could be to allow a charge-my-group-account method of some kind. Maybe connections from the university network would be given access to the university iTMS account, with unlimited downloading once the university and Apple set up a fixed-cost contract based on estimated usage. Allowing downloading by off-campus students would still present a technological challenge.

I'm sure Apple has and is considering different economic models. Changes to iTMS, I'm assuming, is the easiest part of the solution.

There was talk of listener loans. It wasn't clear how exactly this would work, especially since Jobs has explicitly come out against the idea of 'renting' music.

My guess is that Apple will just offer discounted price on gift certificates or allowances. This would be the easiest to implement and most consistent with their strategy of 'selling' music. Maybe it'll be 79 cents a pop.

[pbooktebo]

What I think is flawed here is that the ITMS still doesn't let you stream your purchased music on your local network. This is what music at college is all about, and many dorms have converted everyone to using ITMS so that the building's network has music for all.

In fact, I was in my college library yesterday and found 3 shared libraries through my Airport card. I started listening, but two or three tunes brought up the "popup" registration screen.

In other words, if I buy a CD and rip it, I can stream it, but if I buy it off ITMS, I can't stream it. This doesn't make sense as the streaming was always touted by Apple as legal. Like I said, it is a primary reason for those without iPods to use it (that and the fact that it is the best interface).

Any thoughts on this?

[Elektronkind]

Originally posted by david_r_p
for universities to have to subsidize their student's music downloading habits in any way whatsoever. I mean really, how ridiculous, especially considering that many universities are public and supported with taxpayer money. I really don't want my taxes going to some kid's Eminem collection! Will the university have to supply an iPod to all students too?!?

I'm sure the cost of this would be coming out of a student fee subsidized budget.

Almost every US uni out there charges students money, separate from tuition, under names such as "Student Activity Fee", "Student Technology Fee" and so on. These are $50-$100 fees that each student pay to the uni for those services.

/ek

[duce]

It can be done via a localized distribution license . If Apple sold a unique iTune software license and package to the university that would allow them to stream music via iTunes. Now you can share music a maximum of three computers. If a special sever version could share to only those on the university network. The students could choose the songs and they would be uploaded to the server for all to share. Just a thought

[CmdrLaForge]

Instead of that they should work a little bit harder on the european version ! ! !

Why can't they release it in Europe one after another.

[Doctor Q]

How soon before some U.S. city decides that all of its residents would like music on demand, and buys into the same arrangement as the universities? Funding would come from city taxes. All citizens would be provided access at home or at the public library and it would become just another public utility.

If a majority in some small town favors it "for the common good", is there any reason to think this wouldn't, couldn't, or shouldn't happen?

[CMillerERAU]

Originally posted by Doctor Q
How soon before some U.S. city decides that all of its residents would like music on demand, and buys into the same arrangement as the universities? Funding would come from city taxes. All citizens would be provided access at home or at the public library and it would become just another public utility.

If a majority in some small town favors it "for the common good", is there any reason to think this wouldn't, couldn't, or shouldn't happen?

Eeek, sounds a "big brother" situation to me. If that's the case then they might start asking Apple to censor music and not let anyone in that community to download Explicit tracks or something. No, I don't think that groups should be doing this. If only from an ethical standpoint. I personally would hate for my school to start this up. Most people on campus would probably either abuse it or not use it at all, making the fees unfair to the general student body. As for government bodies such as city hall or counties to start this up, I really think its a waste of public resources.

[vpalvarez]

It is going to be curious to see how this works out considering that ITMS downloads are only in aac. Although its an excellent idea to get people started on the RIGHT standard, the means to ultilze that standard are even more important, in my opinion i don't think that provided the itunes software goe far enough. I don't expect Apple to give iPods away, but they will have to at least discount them for the students, because they want to take their music with them, and not just have it on the computer.

[Snowy_River]

Originally posted by gwuMACaddict
i think all these campus things are a bad idea personally... downloading music IS illegal... why pander to it at all?

So those songs I downloaded from iTMS aren't legal?
As far as 'pandering' to it, I'd say that there's clearly a demand for music among students. Why is it pandering for universities to respond to this demand by making such music available? If a university uses its position to leverage a 'bulk' rate for the songs from iTMS, then, if I were a student, I might find that an attractive deal. Go to XYZ-U, and I know that $15 of my fees go toward allowing me to get 20 songs a semester, or whatever. If I was going to download those 20 songs anyway, then this would be a $5 savings for me...