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If the labels are colluding, inciting competition between Apple and Amazon would indeed be the optimal thing for them to do. The more intense is the competition among downstream resellers like Apple and Amazon, the closer will retail song prices be to the cost of operation, the later being largely dictated by the cut negotiated with the labels. If competition is tense enough the labels will be virtually in control of the retail price, their by allowing them to maximize their profit under collusion.

From consumers' standpoint, if nothing can be done regarding the collusion among labels, the best outcome in fact is to allow the labels to intensify competition among Apple and Amazon.
 
<sigh>. You are right, Apple shouldn't even try to protect it's IP. Suing somebody makes you the bad guy. Nevermind if the court determines the other party is guilty.

Suing somebody over something that isn't an invention (and wouldn't be recognized as such by any system other than the flawed US patent system) makes you the bad guy. It also doesn't matter in this context what courts determine - the rest of the world mostly can only shake heads in disbelief over those decisions. In the US, somebody is getting sued all the time, over nothing at all ("Oh, I did not know it was bad for me to chew up my TV-set, you should have said so in the manual, I'm gonna sue you and get rich!"), and certain companies are deciding to also try that approach: a***hole-companies, as I said. Hope I could foster your understanding.
 
I love Apple,but when I buy music I go to Amazon first.There I check for used CDs.Physical media for a fraction of the price of a download to me is a no brainer.If they don't have used at a good price I check Amazon's and iTune's price and go with the cheaper.

Video?Never iTunes.Netflix is all I need.If I want to buy a video I'm sure not going to pay 10 bucks for a download with (usually)no extra features and severely limited portability and zero possibility of reselling if I ever want to,especially when I can get a DVD cheaper new or possibly used.

Apple needs to get off this one(or two)price kick and enter the real world where Lord of the rings is not worth the same price as Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus.
Why not just demand the same deal Amazon gets and,you know,compete?
 
Apple is using it's dominance in the marketplace to convince (force?) distributors from doing business with Amazon (daily deal).. wow... that's going to get them into trouble. I wouldn't expect Amazon to take this lying down.
 
LOL!!! he actually tried to sound super smart and failed. no one outside of a recording studio ever hears anything above 16/44.1 dvd audio is dead. sacd is dead. shiny optical disks indeed.

My Uncle Records in 24 and down-samples to 16 bit. I reckon it sounds better than just plain straight to 16-Bit

But there is an acoustic and distortion improvement by using 96KHz. Ever heard of the saying, A piece of art is only complete when the details are there. Same goes for music.
 
There seems to be two conflicting views,
1) Apple is abusing its position to wreck competition
2) The major labels are offering albums cheaper to Amazon, and Apple isn't happy

Which is it exactly? If Amazon is getting a much better deal than Apple, seems like Apple has every right to protest?

Maybe the quote from that "major-label executive" is skewing the perspective somewhat.

They aren't just complaining. They are threating to remove support from items featured... This is what's going to get them into trouble...

"Sources say that iTunes representatives have been urging labels to rethink their participation in the Amazon promotion and that they have backed up those warnings by withdrawing marketing support for certain releases featured as Daily Deals."
 
<sigh>. You are right, Apple shouldn't even try to protect it's IP. Suing somebody makes you the bad guy. Nevermind if the court determines the other party is guilty.

No no no. You are only a bad guy if you sue Apple to protect your IP. Otherwise its okay. And if you take it to the most perfect level and sue MS to protect your IP you are in fact awesome.
 
Not exactly. They are crying because a supplier is allowing cheaper prices to be charged by the competition.

What's wrong, you wouldn't like cheaper iTunes prices? Sheesh. I appreciate the Amazon prices and would like similar prices on iTunes. That's my consumer stance.

I would love for iTunes prices to be cheaper, but I am afraid (and admit I do not know this) that what Apple wants is not cheaper iTunes prices, they want more expensive Amazon prices, and that is was scares me. Sounds similar to the whole eBook thing....
 
They aren't just complaining. They are threating to remove support from items featured... This is what's going to get them into trouble...

Into trouble how? Definitely not in some anti-trust way. Anti-competitive business practices aren't a problem when there is no monopoly. It's called using leverage and it happens all the time.
 
This seems like a lot of whining and crying by Apple. Instead of stopping them from offering better deals to Amazon they should be pushing them to give them the same opportunities that they give Amazon to offer the deals.

That's exactly what they are doing. Pushing the labels to treat everyone the same. Especially over the date issue.
Amazon uses all that digital stuff (including ebooks) as loss leaders to draw folks into their stuff. A lot of the time, they make merely a penny, sometimes not even that, on their deal prices. And that's fine. That's their call.

But they get those deals before everyone else. It's not a pre-order. You are buying it that day and downloading it that day. THAT is what has Apple pissed. And they are telling the labels if they play that game, they won't get prime placement in the itunes store. They picked Amazon as their exclusive hype spot.

Now if they treat everyone the same and drop even the option to go on sale early with one location, Apple will talk to them about those big banner buttons and such.

In a way this is the flip of what happened with the ebooks. Apple offered the publishers the pricing flexibility they wanted and they went to Amazon and demanded the same. This is the same end result, but just started by one of the stores, not the publishers.

And point of curiosity, I wonder how many of the day before torrents out there are sourced from Amazon's daily deals. Especially back the early day was required.

Exactly right. Apple is behaving appallingly in this case by abusing their monopoly.

Not they aren't. Because they don't have one. Plus this isn't abusive behavior.

Abusive behavior would be more like using their power (if they actually had it) to force labels to only sell on the iTunes store, or to give them way better prices and/or that early day (or hey how about a week, that will really give itunes an advantage)

I agree. One of the reasons I ended up on this site is because I was considering buying a Macbook Pro (to dual boot). Now, I am getting more and more unlikely to give money to Apple each time they do one of these things (the HTC thing, now this...)

So you don't like companies that want fair treatment and that defend their IP.

The fanboys will tell you that Microsoft are a monopoly so it's different

And they are right. Sometimes. It depends on what Microsoft is doing.

If they were arguing this early sales date treatment issue they would probably be in the clear so long as they weren't trying to leverage better treatment for themselves.

and that Apple are not a monopoly so don't need to be punished for anti-competitive behaviour

If you knew the law you would know that tying is not inherently legal. It's the nature of the tying that makes it so. Microsoft was in trouble because they used their power in one market to leverage an unrelated product into a higher position over the same product made by other folks.

Apple has not done this according to the courts. Not with their computers or anything else.

Restricting itunes files to play only on Apple products. that would be in the realm of abusive. Prohibiting all non Mac OS support of any ipod products so you have to have a Mac to have an ipod/iphone/ipad. that would certainly be abusive.

Demanding music labels treat everyone the same over release dates, not abusive. In fact that move by the labels might be cause for a lawsuit. And a rather big one. Even the Brick and Mortar stores would have cause to jump in because they too are damaged by this early day issue. Why would I get up and go buy from them, even at the same price, when I can have it earlier than their required sales date and I can stay in my pjs even.

even though they would like to be a monopoly, and will continue to try to get there

You say that like you know it for a fact, but I'm betting you don't work for Apple.

IF Apple wanted to be a monopoly, in any realm. They could. Just by dropping prices. Knock an easy $500 off every computer and $50-200 off the ipod line. forgot the whole wi-fi only ipad and make the +3g at the wifi prices. and so on. Cut music tracks to 50 cents each, tv shows in their 720hd to $1 and movies in 'HD' to $5 with a 50 cent one week rental. Boom. So cheap why would anyone not buy it. Their share would soar.

And hey why not just make all warranties 3 years for computers and 2 years on everything else standard. and just give away that year of training with the computer. Oh and Mobile Me. Let's include that for free as well.
 
I've never bought MP3's or albums from Amazon before. I buy books and other stuff. I never really thought of comparing prices for music, but after seeing how well they integrate with iTunes I will be shopping there from now on!:D
You better do and you get much better deals all the time even on Mac products. In my book, Apple stores are similar to Bestbuy: check out in person, get it on Amazon. No tax and free s/h.
 
My Uncle Records in 24 and down-samples to 16 bit. I reckon it sounds better than just plain straight to 16-Bit

But there is an acoustic and distortion improvement by using 96KHz. Ever heard of the saying, A piece of art is only complete when the details are there. Same goes for music.

Don't even get me started on this one. Scientifically speaking there are only minor audible benefits to recording above 44khz. Most of the tangible benefits come from the increased headroom that 48 and 88, 96 and now 192 give to you while mixing. However to the naked ear, those benefits are lessened considering the final compressed product, which could be CD, or mp3, AAC, typically are played through less then perfect sound environments. For the most part, I only record in 48khz now. I just couldn't hear a big enough difference to justify twice the hard drive space for supposed improvements.

It does depend on the genre though.
 
My Uncle Records in 24 and down-samples to 16 bit. I reckon it sounds better than just plain straight to 16-Bit

But there is an acoustic and distortion improvement by using 96KHz. Ever heard of the saying, A piece of art is only complete when the details are there. Same goes for music.

Actually, there are studies that show recording in 96khz sounds "worse" than 48khz. But if you can pick out the difference between two tracks at that format, then you have the ears of superman my friend.

This audiophile stuff has been disproven many times over.
 
Actually, there are studies that show recording in 96khz sounds "worse" than 48khz. But if you can pick out the difference between two tracks at that format, then you have the ears of superman my friend.

This audiophile stuff has been disproven many times over.

Usually the tests are done on people who have never played a musical instrument, therefore do not know what an instrument sounds because they were never intamately close to one.

TBH, the difference is subtle. But there is less distortion in the higher notes, but you have to look for it. I'm not talking about an electric rock band. I'm talking about acoustic music. Guitars sound the same really, but brass and woodwind have a less... 'them' feel to them. Its hard to explain really.

Plus you lose frequency range recognition as you get older. So younger teenagers would be able to tell more than say 30-40 year olds.

Converting 44 to 96 can make it sound worse as it adds noise to the sound.
 
You should try googling "Walmart price discrimination" , then read one or two of the 53,000 links that come up.



Well, in the case of Walmart, "price discrimination" is really occurring because Walmart can purchase in goods in such high volume so as to leverage the advantage of economies of scale in their favor. In other words, they buy so much of a product that the original manufacturer can afford to give Walmart a discount.

I don't know if the media companies' discontent with Apple is because Apple takes such a large cut of sales from the iTunes downloads that labels are forced to increase their pricing to get a desirable chunk of the sales.
 
Apple is using it's dominance in the marketplace to convince (force?) distributors from doing business with Amazon (daily deal).. wow... that's going to get them into trouble.

Actually no. for two reasons

1. Apple isn't refusing to carry the titles. Merely that they won't give a title major placement on the itunes store if the title is part of the Daily Deal pre-release stuff. Why should they? they do all this hype, build up a list of pre-orders and then the day before Apple can legally download the music to folks, Amazon has it up and way cheaper and the pre-orders are cancelled. Not nice. So let the major space go to someone else.

2. This is more a case of Amazon using their dominance as an online retailer to force a term of sale that helps them gain sales over everyone else. Not just the iTunes store but potentially every Brick and Mortar as well. Because Amazon is getting an earlier release date than all others. Which is an unfair advantage. It's a term they would not have gotten had it not been for being one of, if not THE, top online stores.

I would love for iTunes prices to be cheaper, but I am afraid (and admit I do not know this) that what Apple wants is not cheaper iTunes prices, they want more expensive Amazon prices

Apple wants equal treatment for everyone. Particularly on the release date issue. And they feel that taking it out as a requirement isn't enough. It shouldn't even be an option. If it is an option for Amazon than all release dates should be negotiable for everyone.

As for prices, well those are always going to be a little different. Happens that way at bookstores too. Barnes and Noble works out a huge buy at a discount on the new whatever and can mark it down 20% from the publisher's cover price. Borders works out a huge buy at a bigger discount by agreeing to put the title on their front tables with huge banners in the windows etc and they can give it a 30% discount. So long as the prices aren't way way different, there's generally little to argue with on that deal.

As for the ebook comment, well yes as I noted before this is similar. In a way. Equal Treatment for all, by all. Apple was willing to give publishers the option to flex price where Amazon had not. The Publishers demanded equal from Amazon. The table has turned but it's the same basic issue.
 
Apple isn't refusing to carry the titles. Merely that they won't give a title major placement on the itunes store if the title is part of the Daily Deal pre-release stuff.

One core component of the Microsoft antitrust case was that
Microsoft would "favor" those who cooperated, and "punish"
those who didn't. ("Sell Linux, lose some of your discount".)

Apple's strong position in digital downloads could leave it open
to similar litigation.

Remember the key takeaway from the MS case - if you're big, the
rules are different. A small company could have done everything
that Microsoft did without worry. The dominant market share is
the differentiator.

Or is any Apple fan going to claim that Apple doesn't have a
significant share of the digital download market?
 
This seems like a lot of whining and crying by Apple. Instead of stopping them from offering better deals to Amazon they should be pushing them to give them the same opportunities that they give Amazon to offer the deals. ... For now I'm glad that at least someone found a way to be cheaper than Apple.

Actually, it's quite the opposite. Because music downloads are just transfer of files, the marginal cost of production is almost free. Apple's not selling the tracks more expensive because they want to. Apple's just not allowed to sell the tracks at prices that Amazon's being offered. This *is* price discrimination, it's just that it's on the music industries' part.

One core component of the Microsoft antitrust case was that
Microsoft would "favor" those who cooperated, and "punish"
those who didn't.

Last I heard, Microsoft wasn't facing litigation for 'promoting' HP computers at demos.
 
Actually, it's quite the opposite. Because music downloads are just transfer of files, the marginal cost of production is almost free. Apple's not selling the tracks more expensive because they want to. Apple's just not allowed to sell the tracks at prices that Amazon's being offered.

But see even that isn't the issue.

The labels set up this whole 'street date' system where everyone starts selling on a date set by the label. The idea was that no one would have an unfair advantage because (in the brickmortar days) UPS dropped off your stock the day before I got mine. They extended the idea to online so that digital wouldn't have a sales date advantage over physical

And yet, Amazon is getting to sell said titles before the street date. And they have, it seems, an exclusive deal that no one else can negotiate an early release date for a title that is on the Daily Deal.

Apple is actually asking for everyone to have the same right to negotiate their own release dates, or for no one to have it. And since they have no power over Amazon they are doing it by telling the labels if they choose to be a part of the Daily Deal that title is not eligible for prime market space on itunes. Someone else can have that slot, someone that could use the marketing. Seems pretty fair.

And if one looks at Amazon's online sales market share, particularly in books and physical CD/DVDs, it seems a little like they might be using their dominance to gain share in digital media sales. So perhaps they should also be investigated.
 
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