Amazon Hits iTunes Again With $0.99 Lady Gaga Album, Qualifies for Cloud Drive Storage Upgrade

[econgeek]

Amazon has been PROVIDING Cloud based computing for years. How long has Apple?

A lot longer than Amazon.

Apple introduced iTools (now MobileMe) in 2000, while Amazon's first cloud offering, S3, was announced in 2006.

Further, from an engineering perspective, Amazon's infrastructure is crap, and Apple's is less crappy. (AWS is popular because it does add value to the marketplace for large businesses that were previously operating their own datacenters.... but it is still crap.)

 

[samcraig]

1) When Apple releases/announces something everybody ***** in their pants.
It goes to the extreme end of companies releasing unfinished products.

2) Cloud storage means information for marketing and advertising. You know, the business that gives Google billions every single year. Or did you think that Amazon &co. builds server farms because they are you friend?

THINK before calling someone ignorant.

So Apple is being altruistic and doesn't wants to gain information for marketing and also advertising? Apple is our friend that way?

ALL companies are "guilty" of the same thing. I think the response you replied to was merely pointing out the underlying hypocrisy.

 

[Scott6666]

At least you guys have some songs... all I got was the damn PDF...

I think that's going to be the best part

Without licenses I guess they are making millions of copies of the same bits. With licenses, I guess Apple will just point to a pre-existing server farm instance. Milliseconds vs hours. iCloud wins.

 

[cloud 9]

Musician, –noun
1. a person who makes music a profession, especially as a performer of music.

She writes all of her own songs. She sings live every time. She's a classically trained pianist and dancer. She endlessly tours, appears, and promotes her songs and brand. She plays instruments on stage. It's pretty safe to say that, regardless of if you buy the albums or listen to it on the radio, she's about 1000x the musician that most "artists" out there are. Who exactly do YOU listen to that you call a "musician?" That's why she made $90m last year and has fans lining up to get a photo with her (which she spend hours accommodating for people), and why you're here acting like YOU are too good for HER. Just sayin'.

She's using the same chords, the same progression and the same rhythms like every other bland pop star.
Even if she is amazingly talented she's not putting it to a good use. there's more substance in her clothing than in her music.

That's like trying a cheeseburger and yelling it's the most amazing thing you ever ate just because a so called talented chef made it? It just means you like cheeseburgers, leave it at that.

 

[Cagle]

for some reason that album cover reminds me of another piece of artwork...

 

[tjcampbell]

Incredible price, but there's no profit for anybody involved. Be it Gaga, Amazon, the label.

 

[Fugabutacus]

Everything you said here is true.

Also true: Her music sucks.

Have you given her a proper listen? I hated her at first, she seemed like typical poppy crap. Granted, she was pretty much that at first...

Born This Way is great though. At least the music means something. And I love how there's some Jazz influences in there too -- three cheers for sax solos!

 

[samcraig]

I'm also pretty sure that if iTunes/Apple made this offer - either now or at the launch of their cloud based music service, people would be saying things like "haaa - suck it Amazon!"

 

[rdowns]

Once again, Apple provides the highest levels of customer satisfaction. I saved $13.99 by not buying from Apple and only $0.99 with Amazon.

 

[JCanfield]

lmao wtf are you talking about?
what do you mean by machine processed garbage? do you mean using digital consoles? digital audio work stations? computers?
They may be exact sound for sound copies of something produced in the 60s or 70s but now adays its quite a tale to tell the difference between them, granted the producer is good. but really who cares? music is music....

I think they mean autotune.

 

[Rodimus Prime]

I'd buy music from Amazon if it was AAC or lossless. Not buying MP3.

Umm just like to point out that Amazon use VBR mp3 and at the bit rate Amazon is using it sounds exactly the same as what Apple AAC files are. They are both Lossy formats and guess what they have the exact same quality at the given bit rate and to top it off the Amazon files play on every play. Apple AAC files it is hit or miss.

I am not understanding the strategy behind such a feature in the cloud storage where you can stream tonnes of data, but ultimately, you end up stopping at 500MB/month.

What am I gonna do with 20GB storage of music in the cloud when I can only stream 500MB of it?

It's better I transfer 5-6 of music to my phone and then keep it on a regular sync and so on... :|.

If there needs to be a revolution in cloud storage, there's gotta be two things.

1. Unlimited Data
2. Revolutionary Cloud Capabilities.

I don't know who would do that, but I just fail to understand how people are going to benefit from something like this.

well wouldn't you like a selection of what music you want to listen to... upload 20gb of music and you can choose which albums you want to stream at different times without having to go back and manage your cloud selection.

Also, I don't think a 300mb song uses 300mb of data to stream. (someone correct me if i'm mistaken)

well you do not listen to it all and on top of that I know for me I often times am in range of a wifi of some type that I can use. for example I am up at campus so I will stream threw the schools wifi. My computer is not with me but I can listen to most of it. I have unlimited data and I will still use the schools wifi. A hell of a lot easier on the battery life.

Amazon is scared ****less about Apple's imminent release of iCloud. They know darn well that iCloud will blow Amazon cloud storage away so they are trying to get as many people on board as possible before the announcement. Good luck with that.

Ummm no not really. This is pretty normal of amazon so I would read nothing into it like you are.

 

[iberroa]

Amazon pWns iTunes again.

Just bought the new lady gaga album for .99 cents w00t w00t.

 

[Xtremehkr]

I like the competition, it will keep Apple honest and encourage them to innovate more often.

Even so, I think Apple is doing something quite exciting with their cloud plan, all of the most important record labels seem to be on board.

Not a Gaga fan myself, though it's good enough background music not to be annoying.

Amazon is being pretty aggressive about that but a few cents isn't going to make most people abandon convenience. Besides, the Amazon music store is about as visually appealing and well organized as the rest of that site is. It's a mess of content links, flashing things, psy-ops, columns scrolling in every direction. Just a lot of visual noise for a website, it reminds of me of the 1990s when all of those things were new and impressive on a website.

By this stage in the history of Internet people appreciate more stripped down websites that are easier on the eyes. I hope Amazon realizes this at some point.

 

[ChrisA]

Actually there is no reason someone can't make money selling 99 cent albums. It cost next to zero to make a digital download.

 

[roadbloc]

Actually there is no reason someone can't make money selling 99 cent albums. It cost next to zero to make a digital download.

You've never heard of cross-collatrolisation have you? It is clear to see that at such a price, someone, if not everyone involved but the consumer, is loosing money at the moment.

 

[citi]

I don't love her...but my wife does. .99cents I can swallow pretty easily.

 

[bbeagle]

Actually there is no reason someone can't make money selling 99 cent albums. It cost next to zero to make a digital download.

You're going to have to renegotiate that Lady Gaga contract where she gets $1.50 per album sold then. Plus what her agent and label demand.

 

[mack pro]

She's not really my 'cup of tea' but there's no denying the Lady can shift music - and all this promotion means is that she'll shift shed-loads more.

As far as us mere consumers are concerned, this move by Amazon means everyone wins

RTP.

Leave it to Apple fans to be pissed off about low prices.

 

[citi]

You've never heard of cross-collatrolisation have you? It is clear to see that at such a price, someone, if not everyone involved but the consumer, is loosing money at the moment.

Lady Gaga is going to make her money. Her income is based on advances which are recouped for losses/profit on the tru-up. This is probably absorbed into her marketing budget. We don't know the details of her contract with the label, and the labels contract with Amazon. For all we know, Amazon is giving the labels the .99 to the label and increasing their royalties on all albums sold for a set period of time to recoup. There are many ways to do this.

 

[mack pro]

She's not really my 'cup of tea' but there's no denying the Lady can shift music - and all this promotion means is that she'll shift shed-loads more.

As far as us mere consumers are concerned, this move by Amazon means everyone wins

RTP.

Leave it to Apple fans to be pissed off about low prices, but If it were Apple doing this promo it would be a different story

 

[ThisIsNotMe]

So why does Apple continue to play by the rules and negotiate with the MPAA/RIAA?

 

[184550]

Incredible price, but there's no profit for anybody involved. Be it Gaga, Amazon, the label.

I seriously doubt Gaga or the label teamed with Amazon for the promotion.

I'd assume Amazon is covering the difference from their marketing budget or similar.

Like the article stated, this is just promotion for Amazons cloud service.

 

[mack pro]

She's not really my 'cup of tea' but there's no denying the Lady can shift music - and all this promotion means is that she'll shift shed-loads more.

As far as us mere consumers are concerned, this move by Amazon means everyone wins

RTP.

Leave it to Apple fans to be pissed off about low prices, but If it were Apple doing this lady caca promo it would be a different story

 

[Born Again]

People r angry today

Amazon is awesome

 

[HMFIC03]

They would have to pay me to download a whole lady gaga album. Can't wait for the iCloud!