Maybe you forgot your own point:
Selling CDs in retail stores is a antiquated selling method for todays media.
I was showing how antiquated it was not and for each one of your reasons with the exception of numbers 3 and 6, I thought I had a pretty good response.
I never said they would obsolete them, just I expect to see online delivery continue to rise.
Now I'm not sure how you expect digital downloads to increase if they aren't going to replace a certain amount of retail buying, because people aren't purchasing on iTunes and then buying the CD but maybe I'm wrong.
Not the point, you can still download "full" albums.
Not sure why full is in quotations but I'll work with it. You asked about artists who had full albums worth buying, I said lots of artists do. Never said you couldn't get it from iTunes.
Yes, I know lots of people that too, but I'm guessing the majority of people only care about the music and any printable equivalents would work.
Good point.
Not sure of your point. I never said digital downloads would replace stores and that they had some advantage, just they would increase.
You were speaking to stores limited selection, I was pointing out that in some cases stores have CDs I wouldn't stumble on in iTunes. Is the opposite true as well? Sure, I'll admit that but store selection isn't as limited in bigger markets.
Not a single retailer in my city has this. (yet)
Remember the point wasn't that stores can't improve or do this but I'm guessing more people would rather doing this sitting at home than standing in a store.
My friend you need to move to a bigger city. And in the store, with a listening station, I can listen to a whole track, the whole CD if I want not a 30 second sample.
No one every said you couldn't find deals. But for every deal you could also say they were over charged items at the same store over online options.
My friend you need a faster internet connection.
I wasn't referencing deals, I was speaking to your statement of "they're" being expensive. "They're" not. They vary in price just as the albums on iTunes do. And no matter your connection speed, you still wait. You could simply have mentioned the wait in the store line but instead you say I need a faster connection. Whatever.
So what's your point? You say to use the Internet to search, but not download if you have that option? Sure some music stores employees might be helpful, but don't try telling me repeated searches and then sampling is easier in a store.
I was giving examples of how to find songs, outside of search and listen on iTunes. In fact doing lyric searches, which I don't think you can do on iTunes, I may be wrong, are how I find songs I don't know. And the internet and iTunes are two separate things, I can use one without the other and vice versa.
Just a dumb assumption by you.
And not a dumb assumption when your argument was having to "go to the store" which entails leaving the house. I just figured you didn't want to leave the house.
Ignoring that, pretty sure there are a hell of a lot more cities than there are Walmart, Best Buys. May be an option for you, but not some.
Walmart is working on there being as many Walmarts as cities, give them time. And iTunes isn't an option for some either.
I think you missed the entire point.
I never said digital downloads would replace stores, just I expect to see downloads sales continue to rise.
Do stores have some advantages, yes, but obviously for many people digital downloads provide an adequate solution and offer many advantages over audio stores. (evidenced by online sales).
Evidenced by online sales? What? Sales are on the rise so that's an advantage? How can you cite that when the two largest retailers are still big chains?
iTunes is the only digital store on the list. From the article:
The MusicWatch findings are especially interesting in that 86.2% of the quarters music sales were in a physical (CD) format, versus a 13.8% share in downloadable format. Unlike Wal-Mart and Best Buy, iTunes gained share despite the fact that it only sells downloadable content. It leapfrogged CD-heavy competitor Amazon to gain fourth place in January.
Even if, big if and I'll eat my hat if this happens, they were to become number one that doesn't mean people are buying more iTunes tracks than CDs. It means people who download tracks are using iTunes more.
Do digital downloads have disadvantages, sure. For some like you sleeves, the size of collection, or even the pleasure of browsing in a store, but that doesn't change the fact that these shortcoming might be improved and hence downloads will continue to rise.
Outside of virtual reality I don't see iTunes replicating the experience of being at the store. I was merely pointing out the holes in your "facts" so that you don't quote them to other people. Everything has advantages and disadvantages but I'll tell you this, that 86.2% is a large number to displace. I believe it will level out 60/40 in favor of CDs depending on many factors (encoding rates, high speed internet availability, DRM, price and things I haven't even thought of yet) but the beauty is we can both use our iPods. Me to listen to my ripped CDs and you to your inferior (just kidding, seriously) downloaded tracks.
