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iTMS Downloads Surpass 300 Million

If we get a store in Japan...

In terms of music market size, a store in Japan will see quite a big jump in sales, me thinks...but when...and how much per song.

I think the only reason we don't have a store here is the crappy ego-centric, arragant and self centered music companies in Japan - at 3,000 yen for a Japanese artist CD (about $30) I don't know why the music buying public takes this up the you-know-what, and the music is generally crap.

If only Apple can get an agreement in place, I am sure it is not from a lack of trying.

Sorry for the rant, and well done Apple on 300 million...
 
TheMasin9 said:
Fo sho. Ill take that bet, and raise you 50 mil. actually, ill bet we see 600 mil by the end of 2005. that is kinda hard to fathom, 600 million songs by the end of 2005. but at a million songs a day+ its very very possible.
Click to expand...

At the current rate (1.35 million a day) plus the number of days left in the year (~300 days) I'd bet more around 405 millions more songs, for a total of around 905 millions. There's a chance it could hit 1 billion, especially with the new iPod shuffle and lower iPod prices (and better battery life, which was about the only thing people complained about).
 
1 billion by the year's end seems unrealistic, but 750 mil might be within reach. (300 mil now + 1.5 mil a day for the next 300 days)

There was a rumor of iTMS Latin America. Not sure what the market is like in those countries for downloaded music but it's potentially a huge market. also, we don't have a iTMS Japan yet which I bet will be a big seller once it opens.

Some speculate that Apple will sell 4-5 million ipods this year (or is that 4 mil ipod shuffles alone?). iPod sales should accelerate iTMS downloads. 2 mil downloads a day doesn't seem unrealistic by the year's end. Apple may be targetting 1 billion for the 3-year anniversary of the store (about 420 days from now), which would be pretty sweet.

$600 mil a year in revenues from music downloads isn't too shabby, even if the profit margins are razor thin.
 
To be fair those number could be misleading. Obviously the numbers are going to grow as Apple opens up iTMS to new markets. The question I have is how are sales doing here in the States since the store opened. That is a graph I would really like to see. :confused:
 
Another Chart

This one doesn't include the "new country" dates, but does include the "average per day" numbers for each time period:

itms_sales.gif


I got all of the numbers from Apple press releases except for the 13 million and 230 million figures, which were announced by Jobs at the iTMS for Windows launch and this years' MWSF keynote respectively.

Note that there actually has been a slight dip in the rate since January, but it's actually the other way around--the first few weeks of January had a brief *spike* while thousands of gift certificates were traded in, new iPod recipients went nuts with their new toys, and so forth.

At the current rate, they should hit 375 million by the 2-yr. anniversary (April 28, 2005) and around 700 million by years' end...but they could indeed break 1 billion if the rate keeps ramping up...
 
my thoughts...

If the pace can be met, Apple will probably reach a billion sold by Fall 2005 (maybe winter). To some degree I'm pleased that Apple is doing so well. I love the fact that if I want to share an iMovie of mine online, the majority of the time people already have QuickTime installed on their PCs, because iTunes is installed. I remember how annoying it was 2 years ago when PC people I knew hated the idea of putting Apple software on their computer and now they do it with no problem! Bizarre how their love for the iPod can influence such a dramatic change!

I guess the whole one music store idea is starting to annoy me a bit even though I love and always praise the iTunes music store for ease of use and innovation! I guess to help put my thoughts into perspective, imagine if you could only play DVDs on a single brand name DVD player? Imagine you could only play CDs on a single brand CD player? Imagine if you could only buy music from Best Buy!

I guess the argument could be is why don't Playstation 2 games play on an XBox or Nintendo? You're right! It makes perfect sense why Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo have titles available only (sometimes temporarily like Grand Theft Auto titles) for their systems. *cough* Halo, which was originally to be a Mac title *cough* Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony want fans to buy their machines, because of the exclusive titles! Everyone's in the business of making money! So in a sense, that's the same approach I see Apple doing with their store and the iPod. The music are the games and the iPod is the video game system. Makes sense, right? But still - I just wish I could take my iPod elsewhere to other online stores to purchase music, because I like the freedom of purchasing online rather than the store! It's so much cheaper and easier, which is why I purchase so much online! Eventually I'm sure this will change and I'm sure another reason behind this is the music downloads don't equal a lot of revenue. Apple has even said this and the store compliments the iPod, because it sells iPods. (or the othe way around) I can just see this biting Apple in the end, so I hope one day (soon) they do decide to license the DRM to other stores. Anyway...
 
pepsi?

Does this include the boost that the current Pepsi promotion is providing? If so, I'm wondering if the pace will slow down some after may 23. While not much of a sample, I've seeen my rate of "purchases" climb significantly this last month as I continue my miraculous winning streak (currently at 9).
 
If sales are at 50 million a month in February, a notoriously sluggish time for selling anything, hitting 1 billion by christmas is a plausable goal. The iPods are going to see dramatic improvements by year's end which will spike sales again, as will opening the music store in more countries (Asian/Australian markets). I'd put money on this being the sales goal in Cupertino.
 
iGary said:
I wonder if Napster is doing the math this morning... :eek:
Click to expand...

at Napster HQ:
"uh, let's see....carry the two, add that...six plus three...uh, eighh..no, nine. take away the denominator, factor in costs, divide by pi...HEY GUYS, WE'RE ONLY $28 MILLION IN THE HOLE!"

"let's run another Super Bowl ad!!! what do you mean we have to wait until next year??!?"


:D
 
dongmin said:
1 billion by the year's end seems unrealistic, but 750 mil might be within reach. (300 mil now + 1.5 mil a day for the next 300 days)

There was a rumor of iTMS Latin America. Not sure what the market is like in those countries for downloaded music but it's potentially a huge market. also, we don't have a iTMS Japan yet which I bet will be a big seller once it opens.
Click to expand...

There are some 500 millions in Latin America, most of us have less than 40 years, and most of us LOVE music,-specially if you've seen those brazilian girls dancing- ;) if the iTMS wants to reach a billion by year's end, it only has to open a iTMS regional store down here.

I can play the reason card or i can even beg if Apple remains skeptical about it :(
 
can someone tell me, are we talking about the Beatles "across the universe"? did i miss something? how did they pull off that license? aren't apple and apple records still at it?
 
Okay...

This is a RUMORS site for chrissakes. Stop reporting news. You think you're MacMinute?

Sheesh.
 
I still haven't bought on iTunes

Other than the free Pepsi Tunes.

Am I alone, or are there others who want a losseless format before they're willing to pay for a download? I can't imagine buying a lower quality song, with no option to every get better quality out of it.

What happens if home audio changes in the next few years, and the lossy formats used by iTunes today turn to shrill?

I can always lower the quality if I start with lossless. Let me decide.
 
louden said:
Am I alone, or are there others who want a losseless format before they're willing to pay for a download?
Click to expand...


You are right. Even if I bought a few, this is my biggest concern...
For now, I still convert my CDs in MP3's (that will be someday outdated but has been around for a while...) But I have no choice regarding iTMS...

I guess you can only hope that (someday) they will come up with an audio-losseless-to-whatever software...
 
The last I heard Apple had projected iTMS Japan by mid-2005, but that is the only hard, if you can call that hard, evidence of iTMS expansion plans. Anyone know of others in the works?

As to the passing of the 300 million mark, if Apple could keep up with the demand for the iPod shuffle and the rest of its newly revamped line of players, then 1 billion by year's end doesn't sound out of the question.
 
Macmaniac said:
I happy to say through gift certificates I have contributed 60 songs to that total:) I would not be suprised to see 750 Million if more stores are announced, they really should get ITMS China, Korea, and Japan, that is a huge untapped market.
Click to expand...
I think Japan is potentially a huge market but I'm not sure about Korea or China. In Korea, non-iPod mp3 players rule the market, so there isn't much spill-over effect from the iPod. In China, I doubt consumers will pay anything close to $.99 a song when you can buy pirated DVDs and CDs on the street for less than $1 a pop. China is a huge market, for sure, but the dynamics are totally different. I doubt Apple sells that many Macs or iPods to China.
 
beatles songs should not be allowed to be covered. they turned a beautiful song into trash, just like a perfect circle did to Lennon's imagine.

worst. covers. ever.
 
iTunes needs now to diversify and go after old, rare and live recordings. They need to expand to 5 million tracks available within the next 2 years if they want to compete in a much more competitive marketplace. That would seem to be the natural evolution of iTMS.

Although my goal for iTMS would be to offer every single song available that ever existed.
 
ASP272 said:
... It's now become ridiculous to say they want to "preserve the integrity of the album". Please! That just means you might have some songs that suck and you want people to be forced to buy them!
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I agree. But those that want to sell "BY ALBUM ONLY" are able to do that. I've seen it quite a few times. Apple will set it up however they want. The bands just need to get with the program. I can't see why Paul McCartney hasn't jumped all over this. Can you imagine how big a deal (literally) that Jobs would make for an opportunity to have a Beatles iPod with exclusive use of their songs (including some never-released stuff that you just KNOW they have!) It would be awesome! It would blow the U2 promotion away!
 

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tutubibi said:
But not by much.

Dec 16 - Jan 24, 50 mil songs = 1,28 mil a day
Jan 24 - Mar 2, 50 mil songs = 1,35 mil a day

I think it's slowly stabilizing to around 1,3 mil a day. For a next bug jump we would have to wait for new stores.
Click to expand...

Yeah, the rate of downloading is still increasing, but the rate of growth seems to be slipping pretty bad. And, not to be the pessimist, but the rate of growth is really what's important when you're in a market with as much growth potential as this one. The math is pretty basic to show that if, say, napster can sustain a slightly higher rate of growth, but is currently one tenth of the size, it'll completely smash itms in 10 years, anyway. Given that this is still less than 10% of music purchases total, well.... apple needs to keep working hard here, rather than rest on it's laurels.

Anybody got the data for the competition?
 
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