Billboard to Reveal Apple Music Plans?

[MacRumors]

MacWorld.co.uk is reporting that Billboard will publish details of Apple Music Service:

US Music-industry bible Billboard is to publish details of Apple's new digital-music service at 8pm UK time [3pm Eastern] ? but only to subscribers of the Premium Services section of Billboard.com. A minimum six-month subscription to the Web service costs $175 for UK and Europe.

This information would presumably be more detailed than this Billboard article which provides some overview of services:

Label sources tell Bulletin that the service is an a la carte download store -- not unlike that of rival Liquid Audio -- that is built into Apple's iTunes player. No subscription is required for the service, and tracks are expected to retail for an average of 99 cents. Once purchased, tracks are transferred to the consumer's iTunes music library and are automatically synched to the user's iPod portable player.

 

[MightyB]

Premium

...anyone have the premium service??????

 

[knoxer]

Why?

I hope no one is stupid (or rich) enough to consider blowing $175 to find out what Apple is announcing in three days. It's only three days after all...

Of course if someone is already a member, we expect a full report

 

[rafaelperini]

Would be nice to have an option of a monthly fee abd unlimited download!

 

[sparks9]

Cool, but it would be nice if there was a discount when buying full albums.

 

[jholzner]

I don't mind the 99 cents a song...but I was hoping they would ALSO allow for a subscription with unlimited downloads or something for those who will download a lot.

 

[ldjessee]

Sounds good

Hello,

Sounds good so far.

 

[dongmin]

the latest rates rumor:

$.99 a song

$10 an album

the latter seems like a pretty decent deal, especially if you combine it with the convenience of previewing all the songs. I'm curious about what kind of quality (i.e. kbps) they'll offer. I would hope for at least AAC 192 kbps if I'm spending that much for an album.

 

[moosecat]

I'm sure someone will make the info available to us when Billboard comes out with it ... Perhaps some other rumor site in need of a "scoop" will spring for the membership.

 

[MightyB]

Digital Rights

Does anyone have any idea of the Digital Rights they may or may not be associated with the service?

Am I going to be able to burn to CD? Send to my friend? Etc, ETc.....

or are they going to "revolutionize" this as well and limit where the song can go?

 

[bennetsaysargh]

i knew that something would leak out before the announcement! i hope someone here has that subscription to give us a full report!

 

[Freg3000]

Originally posted by bennetsaysargh
i knew that something would leak out before the announcement! i hope someone here has that subscription to give us a full report!

I am eager to find out all the details about this service, but I'd rather be surprised with an Apple announcement on Monday...not Billboard .

I guess I'm a purest.

 

[jouster]

It's inconceivable that someone out there, who has a subscription won't let the cat out of the bag.

I'm sure plenty of tech journalists, for example, will have access to this info.

If anything of consequence is released, we'll all know shortly after....

 

[Malic]

Crap

Better not be true - the part about "only playable on up to 3 Macs". If I take good care of them (laser-rot aside), the CD's that buy today are good for forever. I think I will upgrade/go-through more than 3 Macs in my lifetime!

 

[Chef Ramen]

anybody know what kinda selection they will have? i want lots of electronic and jam bands...thats it

 

[Awimoway]

Unlimited iPods, 3 computers

That sounds a lot better to me than the DRM FUD I had been hearing in some of the rumors.

 

[bennetsaysargh]

Re: Crap

Originally posted by Malic
Better not be true - the part about "only playable on up to 3 Macs". If I take good care of them (laser-rot aside), the CD's that buy today are good for forever. I think I will upgrade/go-through more than 3 Macs in my lifetime!

it also says that you will be able to burn it to cds and sync it with the iPod. people will also find ways to unlock these files eventually.

 

[locutus]

why only macs?

why only macs?

I think they should add pc to the mix!

more money for apple!
more good stuff for us!

p.s new mac user! bought a PB 12" (not really a switcher, had macs before)

 

[esome]

Re: Why?

Originally posted by knoxer
I hope no one is stupid (or rich) enough to consider blowing $175 to find out what Apple is announcing in three days. It's only three days after all...

Of course if someone is already a member, we expect a full report

Ha, there are plenty of people out there that are both wealthy AND stupid. Hopefully at least one of them reads this forum.

("The service will also allow legitimate users to play the songs on up to three Macs and an unlimited number of registered iPods, however.")

Anyone care to speculate on how one would be prevented from just copying what they'd download on to a fourth machine (or a CD or shared network drive for that matter)? Or is the suggestion that this would just be the rule and it would be up to the individual to police themselves? If the latter, it's hard to imaging the music industry signing on to such an arrangement. I'm pretty niave and uninformed about these issues so maybe someone here could eplain this to me.

Thanks!

[edit] oh, i see now that you CAN burn to CD. I'm still a little fuzzy on how these files might be 'protected' though.

 

[lunarmac]

audible.com

ok
just check out
audible.com if
you want to know
how apple will
implement any type
of restrictions on songs

i'm pretty sure apple
will use the same type
of setup as audible

 

[richard5mith]

You register iTunes. You download a song. It's tagged to your iTunes. Each time you play it, it checks what iTunes is playing it. If the two match, it plays.

Every time you play it on a new iTunes, it adds that iTunes code to the file. Once that hits three, no more.

Or something.

I'm just making this up as I go along.

Or how about you register up to three iTunes under your .Mac account. And the song is tied to all three.

Or...

Nah, I'm out of ideas now.

 

[dongmin]

Re: why only macs?

Originally posted by locutus
why only macs?

I think they should add pc to the mix!

more money for apple!
more good stuff for us!

p.s new mac user! bought a PB 12" (not really a switcher, had macs before)

the problem with offering this service to PCs is that Apple can't control every step in the distribution like they can with Macs--for better or worse. No other company has the tight integration between the service, music app, PC, and portable player to make this work.

Only three computers? How would they enforce this? Would it involve some sort of hardware ID? Or will iTunes 4 have to be registered with Apple for this thing to work?

I would guess the latter. You'll have to enter your Mac ID to register your iTunes. And then you'll only be able to play your downloaded songs with matching registered copies of iTunes. Finally, each Mac ID will allow only three registered copies of iTunes.

So when you buy a new Mac, you can 'unregister' the copy of iTunes on your old mac and install a new registered copy on your new Mac.


edit: sorry to repete most of richard5mith's post; he posted while I was typing...

 

[Playfrsbee]

Boo!

I really would be dissapointed if this turned out to be true. $10 an album would be more then a label would make (after distribution and retail costs) on a real cd! No wonder Apple was so successful in getting the majors on board! They're gonna make out like bandits, and get to sit on their rears while doing it.

Plus there will be copy protection on your legally downloaded music?!?!?

If this things are true, this service is doomed for failure. I (for one) will not be spending a dollar a song for a file that sounds (at best) half as good as a .aiff (cd-quality) file--especially one that will prevent me from listening to it at times.

Boo to Apple...I thought they'd stick up for us, the consumer a bit more here...

So much for rip...mix...burn, more like crash and burn.

 

[meghop]

Re: why only macs?

Originally posted by locutus
why only macs?

I think they should add pc to the mix!

more money for apple!
more good stuff for us!

p.s new mac user! bought a PB 12" (not really a switcher, had macs before)

The Mac has a small enough marketshare that the record companies can do this on a smaller, "trial" sort of scale, to see how well it works. The record companies have been very tepid about even the very restricted services that are already available - this is a way for them to test the waters while keeping their risk very low. This is just my opinion, of course, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was initially available to only Mac users, then to windows ipod users (for example, d/l direct to ipod with a small windows application), then a full windows release of the service via webportal or something, incrementally as the service establishes itself as both profitable and successful. Just my 2 cents

 

[mactastic]

Re: Re: why only macs?

Originally posted by dongmin
So when you buy a new Mac, you can 'unregister' the copy of iTunes on your old mac and install a new registered copy on your new Mac.


I was thinking something similar, but couldn't you just unregister and reregister all the time then?