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iTunes Music Store - 25 Million Songs
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Actually, I see other companies as competing by not putting as much advertising dollars behind their campaigns as Apple. This may work for Rhapsody (Real) and Napster (Roxio). Note that both companies rely on a subscription model which has better margins and a more consistent income. (However, I wonder what the churn on those models is like.)
I want to note here that both Time and Fortune Magazine are owned by Time Warner (neé AOL) which is the largest record label until Sony and BMG merge. So I'll question these particular examples.
However, examples like the Rolling Stone article may be a great example. This magazine is owned by Wenner Media which is independent of the labels (to my knowledge) and is also in business with an iTunes competitor: the little known eMusic.
Not necessarily true. According to reports Apple has somewhere near 50% market share in the MP3 player market and 80% of the downloadable music market (less if you count by revenue due to subscription based services--though it's hard to compute that due to bundled deals like Real SuperPass). If Apple were to gain marketshare in those two areas, that would be cause for worry.
What I find strange is that Apple says the iTunes store exists just to sell iPods, but surely if they opened the iPod to other music stores by supporting WMA format as well, they'd sell more?
It also would be a good way of 'switching' users of other music stores to iTunes (they buy an iPod for WMA, realise it supports AAC as well so they start using iTMS).
Perhaps Apple wants to 'lock down' the market by controlling the format the music is distributed in, but I have a hard job believing Apple will be able to maintain that kind of monopoly in the long run.
It also would be a good way of 'switching' users of other music stores to iTunes (they buy an iPod for WMA, realise it supports AAC as well so they start using iTMS).
Perhaps Apple wants to 'lock down' the market by controlling the format the music is distributed in, but I have a hard job believing Apple will be able to maintain that kind of monopoly in the long run.