iTMS Now Available in the UK, France & Germany

[sparkleytone]

I don't feel like reading 13 pages of thread, so I'll just blindly post.

This is outstanding execution on the part of Apple. They obviously did not give in to any demands for higher prices, nor did they have to create separate stores. They have been able to negotiate a simple opening of the same exact store to a larger audience. This is a homerun. They have nailed it yet again. Keep it up Apple.

 

[Jack White]

i just saw wild postings on 4..no mention of iTunes now avialable in the UK.

 

[a6rnh]

huge choice?

at last, at last but..

there is a serious lack of choice, popular music..where?...hardly any elvis, no madonna, no beatles (yes, i know-apple sort this out quick!). modern stuff-1 scissor sisters ep, we need to have much, much, much more choice than this. 700,000 sounds a lot, but it is a woeful amount.

overall, positive, but a lot of work to now apple, don't let the others catch up...

 

[garybUK]

ok i downloaded my first ever song (well album) from the store... oh my god this adds a new dimension to itunes making a awesome program even better.... its given it a whole new lease of life.

Worked flawlessly quaility is good and the good 'ole integration that only apple can deliver!

Ive already got my mum hooked on the thing, she's given me a list of albums she wants for her car.

I know there are other stores out there but this is the only one that will ween me, my brother and sister off kazaa etc..

 

[singletrack]

I guess they simply only take credit cards (Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Diners Club, etc.) not debit cards (like the EC card, now called Maestro, or the Carte Bleue in France).

Nope. Took my Solo debit card no problem and Solo cards are almost as lame as Visa Electron cards.

 

[asif3]

i just saw wild postings on 4..no mention of iTunes now avialable in the UK.

Yep, I saw it too - I suppose the adverts at bus stops might help a bit too. Great timing tho - prime time inbetween big brother!

 

[deepkid]

Apple taxing just ME for music??

I didn't pay any tax on my download. The Internet is supposed to be tax free.

I'm very happy for the UK, France, & Germany. I'm sure that now iTMS is on the continent the other countries will be soon to follow.

Here's one of my invoices.. notice the tax:

 

[aafuss1]

Nice pricing for thr UK/France/Germany-79p (for the UK), and €0.99 for the other two countries. Don't get your hopes up high for a launch of iTMS in Australia/Canada/Jpan, for example-there is no word on more overseas launches (expect for other European Union countries, which wil get it by the end of this year)

 

[Doctor Q]

This is outstanding execution on the part of Apple. They obviously did not give in to any demands for higher prices, nor did they have to create separate stores. They have been able to negotiate a simple opening of the same exact store to a larger audience. This is a homerun. They have nailed it yet again. Keep it up Apple.

there is a serious lack of choice, popular music..where?...hardly any elvis, no madonna, no beatles (yes, i know-apple sort this out quick!). modern stuff-1 scissor sisters ep, we need to have much, much, much more choice than this. 700,000 sounds a lot, but it is a woeful amount.

It was probably no easy task (are legal agreements ever?), but Apple made the smart move: using the same catalog and making it look, from the surface, that they just added localizations to iTunes and then turned on access in additional countries. They took care of the complexities of licensing and kept it as clean and easy to buy music as ever. The issues of expanding accessibility country-by-country and expanding their music library label-by-label and tune-by-tune should rightly be independent, and there is no reason to think that Apple is putting in less than its full effort on both fronts.

 

[sjonni]

Hey it's not known as "rip off Britain" for nothing you know.

It's called economics. The sterling rate is too high, that's why you get 66 out of it.

 

[curmi]

Well, aside from Japan, they've got the 4 biggest economic powers in the world covered (5 if you include California... )

I love how people think Apple just has to flip a switch and makes things like iTMS work. I work in IT, and I can only imagine the huge logistics, not to mention political hurdles Apple has had to go through to make this available in the U.S. alone, much less in regulation-happy Europe.

That may be so, but Apple should be more than just about covering the "economic powers".

I also work in IT. Other companies in Australia (for example) have got their on-line music store up and running with little trouble. And since Apple won't licence their DRM stuff to anyone else, other countries have NO option for buying music online. Unless we are willing to run Windows, in which case there are plenty of options.

So Apple needs to play fair. If they aren't willing to bother with the lesser economic powers, let someone licence your DRM so your customers in the lesser economic powers can actually buy music on-line. Keep your customers happy everywhere, not just in the "economic powers".

 

[coldspot]

What about Apple Music Store in Brazil?

When Apple Music Store will be available in Brazil?

 

[rhoughton]

It's not the sterling rate - do the maths.

Looking at, for instance, Praetorius, Dances... on the Naxos label:

US: $5.99
France: €5.49
UK: £7.99

(Retail CD price is £4.99)

 

[the_mole1314]

kinda disapointing with the selection. Many bands in the US store arn't in the international stores, and many bands don't have all their music up yet. The cataloge isn't even near 700,000 tracks

Anyway, lets hope we see more as the week goes on.

 

[rog]

When Apple Music Store will be available in Brazil?

Likely Never. Too low income of a population to justify the expense. You could always move to one of 4 countries now if you really want to access the iTMS. That's what I would do.

 

[applebum]

that's not the point. music comes out here on a monday, and people will expect to be able to get it then.

[Sarcasm] And Apple has always been a company that would conform to the norm just to please people. [/Sarcasm]

 

[ryanw]

I don't feel like reading 13 pages of thread, so I'll just blindly post.

This is outstanding execution on the part of Apple. They obviously did not give in to any demands for higher prices, nor did they have to create separate stores. They have been able to negotiate a simple opening of the same exact store to a larger audience. This is a homerun. They have nailed it yet again. Keep it up Apple.

I agree about the "13 pages of thread" problem. I wish the forums had some sort of rating system involved like slashdot does. When a good discussion gets going it's hard to really keep ontop of it without spending your entire day reading lame posts looking for those few good ones.

 

[musicus]

It's not the sterling rate - do the maths.

Looking at, for instance, Praetorius, Dances... on the Naxos label:

US: $5.99
France: €5.49
UK: £7.99

(Retail CD price is £4.99)

Naxos classical CDs are widely available and always priced at £4.99. Who in their right mind is going to buy them at ITMS for £7.99? I can buy the 'real thing', including post and packing, from Amazon for significantly less.

ITMS-UK is great, but this is a missed opportunity to grow online classical music sales.

 

[Agathon]

Naxos classical CDs are widely available and always priced at £4.99. Who in their right mind is going to buy them at ITMS for £7.99? I can buy the 'real thing', including post and packing, from Amazon for significantly less.

ITMS-UK is great, but this is a missed opportunity to grow online classical music sales.

Who in their right mind is going to buy downloads of Classical music anyway? The sound quality is not that great to start with and the sort of music that Naxos is good for (rare stuff) probably won't be on the store because not many people other than specialists will have ever heard of it.

I wouldn't buy the Naxos Beethoven Symphonies because they are terrible performances. In any case you can get one of the Karajan sets for not much more.

 

[Porchland]

George Orwell's 1984 was £24.99 - Amazon.co.uk have the book for £3.80. Though to be fair audible.com's prices are a rip off too....

As far as I know, the iTMS audio books are provided by audible.com.

 

[JayBee]

Sorry, this is somewhat off-topic, but given the discussion already underway here regarding currency, I have a question of my own.

Hey folks from Europe, I've got a question. Now that (apart from England) the Euro is your universal currency...

Thanks!

Much as I would love Scotland to be signed up for the Euro and be separate from the UK, England is NOT an independent nation, and it is NOT the same thing as Britain.

Sorry about that, but it really irks me when people ask me what part of England I'm from, and when I reply "I'm not from England, I'm Scottish" they ask if that's north or south of the Thames.

 

[wowser]

I met an American who thought Luxenberg was in Scotland, and she asked whether they spoke English in London

 

[aldo]

Likely Never. Too low income of a population to justify the expense. You could always move to one of 4 countries now if you really want to access the iTMS. That's what I would do.

You'd be suprised. Some of the areas of brazil do look like areas of American cities. Apart from large slums next to them -- but I'm sure there is more than 3million 'high income' people in Brazil, which would make it as economical as doing a NZ, Norway or Finland/Sweden store.

On the store front, I'm quite happy but it's been a bad day to launch IMO. It's plauged with 'store is busy' errors and 'this item is unavailable' But it is good to see Apple focusing on the non-US markets.

£ pricing is too high (as always) but much better than the 99p that was touted. Maybe they can get it down to as low as 69p one day.

 

[virividox]

this is great!!! finally!!!

 

[scottybw]

Awesome iTunes

I've been waiting for this for sooooo long.Now it's here , my music buying habits have changed already ! I've already bought two albums plus a few single tracks.