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itunes is doomed

When I read the thread title I was expecting to find a post from some troll. The article was OK, I guess. I will be pretty surpised though if selling off all the software portions of Roxio and putting everything behind Napster turns out to be a smart business decision.

By the way, dswoodley the link in your post is double posted, stretching out the right edge of the forum.
 
Well, I'm on Apple's side here--I want to OWN my music, not rent it. I just don't get this subscription model. Gorog says, "We just returned from doing focus groups, and it validated what we all intuitively knew--that portable subscription-based music really looms as being the potential killer app for digital music. We already know that the experience of a music subscription is infinitely better than a download store."

Who the hell was in that focus group? I don't know anyone who would rather rent music than purchase it via one-click. He also mentions the major issue with subscription based services--you are tied to the computer. You can't listen on the stereo, in your car, on a portable player while jogging, etc. So now they are going to add that capability to the subscription model so users will get some benefits but guess what? Users still will not OWN their music. You quit the service, bye, bye songs.

These guys think they are going to become like cable TV was in the 1980s. If you told someone in the early 80s that you paid for TV they would first laught at you, then hit you over the head with a TV Guide. Now it is common to pay for TV. Same with cell phones--phone companies followed that razor company idea of given the razor (phone) for free and charge for the blades (usage minutes). Will this translate into music? I don't know. I hope the sheep don't go for it.
 
I think what's most perplexing is the prediction that Apple will hold less than 10% download market share within 24 months. I'm pretty sure all of those people who spent $250 plus on their ipods will want to get their money's worth over the next two years - and the only service available to them is the iTunes store. It still has the largest and most diverse catalog out there. I am just not following Gorog...
 
I didnt realize they sold the software division to focus on Napster. Very interesting. I hope Toast is still as good of a burning software as it is now.

and I would agree, owning digital music is better than subscription.
 
sigamy said:
Well, I'm on Apple's side here--I want to OWN my music, not rent it. I just don't get this subscription model. Gorog says, "We just returned from doing focus groups, and it validated what we all intuitively knew--that portable subscription-based music really looms as being the potential killer app for digital music. We already know that the experience of a music subscription is infinitely better than a download store."
Click to expand...
Focus groups are also what convinced Coca-Cola to change their formula, and for Ford to introduce their Edsel division. They're useless if not backed up with other forms of research.
 
dswoodley said:
I'm pretty sure all of those people who spent $250 plus on their ipods will want to get their money's worth over the next two years - and the only service available to them is the iTunes store. It still has the largest and most diverse catalog out there. I am just not following Gorog...
Click to expand...
The assumption would be that the overwhelming majority of people who haven't yet bought digital music players will be so taken by competing stores that they will buy devices compatible with them. That's where the "plays for sure" slogan comes in.

That's a mistake, because of course there are also tons of people who use iTMS because it's compatible with iPod. The two products drive each other. Sony seem to have understood this, but they really have to work on the execution.
 
I just bought my 1st album from iTunes Store the other night, a single, and it's soo damn easy. The whole process of searching, to the one click buying/downloading, to burning to Audio CD w/ iTunes took less than 10 minutes . Unless some company can make the process even easier, which I doubt, iTunes will stay and be the Alpha. I don't like the subscription thing, I rather own.
 
iMeowbot said:
The assumption would be that the overwhelming majority of people who haven't yet bought digital music players will be so taken by competing stores that they will buy devices compatible with them. That's where the "plays for sure" slogan comes in.

That's a mistake, because of course there are also tons of people who use iTMS because it's compatible with iPod. The two products drive each other. Sony seem to have understood this, but they really have to work on the execution.
Click to expand...

Do you think Sony will ever be a force in this market even if they do execute? Just curious on opinions.
 
I don't think that Sony will be a force because they will only sell Sony music (unless something's changed). I haven't the foggiest idea what artists are with Sony. It's waaaay to much work for the consumer to keep up with what artist is on what label. Even worse is when artists switch labels.
 
i think Sony's standards are what is going to kill them, if they used AAC or WMA even they would be better off
 
I love iTunes, personally. I love being able to own my music, being able to pick and choose songs, and being able to compile playlists and statistics that are perfectly in sync with my iPod. Love it.

BUT. I have to wonder if Napster isn't on to something. The college I go to signed a big deal with Napster this year. For $4 a student--a charge that comes out of our student activity fee--all students (on PCs, mind you) can tap into Napster and access free streaming and song subscriptions all year. Now, of course, we can't download these songs--that we can do for a .99/song fee. But Napster's being pretty aggressive in their approach to this compedition, and I for one can't discount the challenge they provide.

I mean, they recently signed a deal with Dave Matthews Band, didn't they, offering DMB music for the first time on any online music service? They seem like pretty heavy hitters to me.
 
The reason itunes wont die

It's too "Mac-like". Its something that gets the job done with a minimum of hassle. You get fast and easy search to find your music, you get to preview your music, you get to own your music and what is most important - you dont have to import your music into some other programs. Alot of pc users have to import into a jukebox to play their music, then into another program to burn their music. If they don't do that they may have a jukebox that lets them burn but is still not nearly as easy to use as itunes. I just don't think it gets any better or easier.
 
sigamy said:
Well, I'm on Apple's side here--I want to OWN my music, not rent it. I just don't get this subscription model. Gorog says, "We just returned from doing focus groups, and it validated what we all intuitively knew--that portable subscription-based music really looms as being the potential killer app for digital music. We already know that the experience of a music subscription is infinitely better than a download store."

Who the hell was in that focus group? I don't know anyone who would rather rent music than purchase it via one-click. He also mentions the major issue with subscription based services--you are tied to the computer. You can't listen on the stereo, in your car, on a portable player while jogging, etc. So now they are going to add that capability to the subscription model so users will get some benefits but guess what? Users still will not OWN their music. You quit the service, bye, bye songs.

These guys think they are going to become like cable TV was in the 1980s. If you told someone in the early 80s that you paid for TV they would first laught at you, then hit you over the head with a TV Guide. Now it is common to pay for TV. Same with cell phones--phone companies followed that razor company idea of given the razor (phone) for free and charge for the blades (usage minutes). Will this translate into music? I don't know. I hope the sheep don't go for it.
Click to expand...


This subscription thing won't work for music.
The simple reason is that you want to hear the same music in different locations (on different players) over and over again.
In contrast to that you watch a movie only once (thats why we have video rental). If you really like a movie you buy and own it.
Same for phone service: you make a phone call only once, you won't have the same phone conversation again.
Magazine subscriptions are somehow in between. For the news a limited subscription is enough because you read them only once. But the tech tips in MacAddict or MacWorld you want to own. So you buy and own these magazines.

I can't see this subscritpion thing work, unless you get so dirt cheap access to whole musiclibraries (the student deals) that you don't care about owning anymore. But that is then called digital radio. You listen to the stuff in your car/office and you buy the songs that you really like at iTunes.

my 2 cents, andi
 
What really boggles the mind is how any of the online music stores actually convince the record labels that downloading music, with any form of copy protection is actually secure. As soon as those songs hit a CD I can rip them off as mp3s and blast them all around the Internet for anyone to listen to.

Don't like the subscription service, burn the songs to CD and rip them off again. I've done this with all my iTunes music simply because I'd rather play my music in Winamp and iTunes on my PC.
 
Predicting anything in the legal music download business at the moment is fraught with too many variables.

The models are too new to learn anything useful apart from iTunes being no.1 at the mo -- hell, even many of my PC-using friends use iTunes because it works.

Any thing I read about where this industry will be in 5-10 years has to be taken with a handful of salt.
 
Celeron said:
What really boggles the mind is how any of the online music stores actually convince the record labels that downloading music, with any form of copy protection is actually secure. As soon as those songs hit a CD I can rip them off as mp3s and blast them all around the Internet for anyone to listen to.

Don't like the subscription service, burn the songs to CD and rip them off again. I've done this with all my iTunes music simply because I'd rather play my music in Winamp and iTunes on my PC.
Click to expand...
You're not really a switcher, then, are you? You're an adder, like I am (I own both a Mac and a Windows PC). I agree with you regarding the record labels; they just don't get it when it comes to online music services, do they? There's a couple of reasons I don't burn songs I download to CD solely to re-rip them - it wastes a CD and the sound quality drops. My question - why do you prefer Winamp? The only thing I use Winamp for is converting songs in obscure formats that don't have Mac-compatible players or have Mac players that don't do what I want them to do. Winamp is nice for managing multiple song formats, but if you use it for converting stuff like I do, you can move your entire music collection over to iTunes on your Mac.
 
I was funny how he said that because iTMS isn't subscription based, it "isn't even on the playing field." I would never in my life use a subscription based music service. I don't buy songs that often, but the songs I do, I listen too all the time. I still listen to the songs I bought when I first started using iTunes.
I think that he's just trying to make himself feel better because he knows how unbelievibly screwed Napster is.
 
Even if iTMS is the best online music store, doesn't mean squat. If being the best meant something, everyone would be using a Mac right now, but that's not the case. I think MS will win this battle out. Apple may have 70% marketshare right now, but that's 70% of a miniscule market that's only starting up. Right now, the important thing is to get the vast number of people who will EVENTUALLY buy music online to buy it from iTMS instead of the alternatives. Its the distribution of NEW customers that Apple needs to get. Palm lost in a much more developed PDA market. Nobody thought they'd lose, but they have. I'm not saying that Palm is completely sunk, but Sony backed out of the PDA market, and last time I checked, people were choosing Sony Clie's over Palm until recently.

If iTMS only makes up 33% of the market in a year, that's still good. We're in such early stages that MS could still easily win this. They have WMP 10, and the store is accessible through it. It comes with Windows. Whether or not iTMS is better does not matter. Most of my friends don't know about iTMS, but if WMP 10 comes with the ability to browse their music store, and its already on WinXP, then that's going to make the difference.
 
If anything, I'd say iTunes is gaining steam. Unless Microsoft pulls off a miracle very soon, I think that iTunes will forever be the premiere digital music store.
 
Abstract said:
Its the distribution of NEW customers that Apple needs to get. Palm lost in a much more developed PDA market. Nobody thought they'd lose, but they have.
Click to expand...

I don't think this is a fair comparison. I think there are many people who owned palm pilots who eventually switched over to a better PDA. Apple has already sold more than a hundred million songs though, and I think that every customer that has bought more than a couple of songs from iTMS will forever use iTMS. If Apple has the best software, the best hardware, and an already-sold user base, something would have to happen other than just an expanding market to dethrone them. (That something - in my mind - would have to either be much cheaper songs from another service or a much better MP3 player that didn't play iTunes songs).
 
Abstract said:
doesn't mean squat. If being the best meant something, everyone would be using a Mac right now, but that's not the case.
Click to expand...

Should read: If everyone else felt what was best for "me" was also what is best for "them," then everyone would be using a Mac right now. But, that is not the case. ;)
 
Chaszmyr said:
If anything, I'd say iTunes is gaining steam. Unless Microsoft pulls off a miracle very soon, I think that iTunes will forever be the premiere digital music store.
Click to expand...

I agree, many over the years have predicted the end of Apple to their own peril. Apple has already created quite a niche for itself.
 
wrldwzrd89 said:
You're not really a switcher, then, are you? You're an adder, like I am (I own both a Mac and a Windows PC). I agree with you regarding the record labels; they just don't get it when it comes to online music services, do they? There's a couple of reasons I don't burn songs I download to CD solely to re-rip them - it wastes a CD and the sound quality drops. My question - why do you prefer Winamp? The only thing I use Winamp for is converting songs in obscure formats that don't have Mac-compatible players or have Mac players that don't do what I want them to do. Winamp is nice for managing multiple song formats, but if you use it for converting stuff like I do, you can move your entire music collection over to iTunes on your Mac.
Click to expand...

Yah, I have a PB and my desktop is a PC. I can't justify the use of a Mac on the desktop side of things, the performance just isn't there and the games are lacking. But thats neither here nor there. Why do I like Winamp? Its a lot smaller, much faster, and I can use it as my default music player without having it add every sound file I have to its damn library. If itunes if you default player it adds EVERYTHING to your damn library and I don't want that.

About the sound quality dropping, I haven't noticed much discernable difference. I know that I'm recompressing already compressed audio, but I re-rip them into 320kbps mp3s which seems to do a decent job.

If Apple can speed iTunes up a bit, add some more fricken basic options to it that other audio players have had forever and I would use it.
 
CEOs jumping around can't be good

Blue Velvet said:
Predicting anything in the legal music download business at the moment is fraught with too many variables.
Click to expand...

I've yet to see a business that is strong and lasting when a CEO come and go in a short time. I guess Steve Job learned the hard way. From Roxio to Napster, what is next after Napster?

I think it is funny when he keeps referring to the "supscription space" as if it is a concrete and a done deal. To me, he comes across as a salesman rather than a person with a market vision. Maybe I'm just too critical?

-Chomo
 
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