iTunes Still Well Ahead of Amazon MP3 Store

[OldCorpse]

For me all of them are worthless. I want lossless, which means usually FLAC. And NO DRM. So both Amazon downloads and iTunes are out.

I did buy a FLAC download recently (the new Eno/Byrne collaboration), but there's just not much of that available out there to buy. That leaves getting the physical CDs - most I buy used from Amazon, but not only. Many folks I know use bt for FLAC files, which also comes out cheaper - I don't do that, but there's this question: what to do if you want a particular piece of music that's just not available to buy ANYWHERE, so it's bt or nothing? Questions, questions.

 

[VoR]

I'm surprised there's music you want that you can't buy from anywhere?!
I'm not interested in mp3s either, I'm after lossless drm free music that I can play with/on whatever I want.

I'd be very surprised if people are using itunes for anything other than convenience, but I find it strange that people would want to pay more for less compared to amazon.

 

[Michael CM1]

Regarding "Amazon has higher quality".

If you look at the iTunes+ that is currently DRM free it is 256kbps AAC compared to Amazon's 320kbps MP3. Given that AAC is a much more efficient compression algorithm I would still say that iTunes edges out Amazon for the quality of the DRM free tracks, though probably not on the 128kbps, where it is merely comparable. As you get toward the higher bitrates most people will stop being able to hear the difference, either due to equipment that is unable to audibly display the differences or their personal threshold for perceptual differences.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Audio_Coding#AAC.E2.80.99s_improvements_over_MP3

You've got your numbers a little wrong. Standard Apple tracks are 192k AAC, Plus tracks are 256k AAC. Amazon is 256k MP3. I don't think Apple has sold 128k tracks for a while.

 

[OldCorpse]

I'm surprised there's music you want that you can't buy from anywhere?!

What??!!?? Are you kidding me? There are heaps of albums out of print and not available anywhere. Just like with films. And just like with books. My man, do you have the slightest notion how the world works? My guess is you're about 9 years old All kidding aside, there is more music unavailable than available for sale. A ton of those unavailable albums are on bt, ripped from private copies people have, various vaults etc. But a lot of it cannot be sold because they're rips from masters where it's sometimes not even any way to tell who owns the rights anymore. Anyhow, point being, without bt, we'd all be a lot more poor in choices. Of course, if all you listen to is Britney Spears, you may be surprised to hear that there's music out there you can't buy from anywhere, and only can get from bt.

 

[VoR]

Strange response

Well, my guess is you're 19, wear baggy jeans and own an ipod!
To answer your moral question the wrong way, I'd stick to the donkey and usenet for quality, quantity, safety and variety.

 

[batchtaster]

I either buy CDs or lossless files from the artist's website (ie. Nine Inch Nails) or buy the CD on the Amazon Marketplace for $4-$12 shipped. No quality issues, no DRM, no recording industry bull.

With a CD, the recording industry bull comes pre-installed.

 

[OldCorpse]

Strange response

Well, my guess is you're 19, wear baggy jeans and own an ipod!
To answer your moral question the wrong way, I'd stick to the donkey and usenet for quality, quantity, safety and variety.

Maybe I misunderstood you. Anyhow, I'm surprised - I understand your point about usenet, but you lost me with donkey... that's about the opposite of "safety"... of course, I may be confused. I always thought bt was safer than any p2p, BWDIK. Regardless, there's stuff I can't find anywhere - and I mean CDs which were issued like only 10 years ago or so... I tried to buy 'em, and you get "out of print, sorry". And they're not on any of the... ahem... "sharing sites" I've looked at.

PS. No iPod here (I like lossless, remember?), as the capacity simply is not there (160GB doesn't do it at all). And no, baggy pants are so 90's

 

[MagnusVonMagnum]

The labels are said to be demanding more concessions from Apple as they negotiate for DRM-free music in the iTunes Store. Possibilities include variable track pricing and watermarking of individual tracks.

Watermarking is even worse than DRM as it can potentially affect the audio quality (if I am to understand "watermarking" as it has been used in such things as DVD-Audio). And 256 kbit encoding is hardly DVD-Audio quality. Heck, it's not even 16-bit CD quality and those tracks aren't watermarked (shakes head). The industry just keeps coming up with more and more bad ideas. Worse yet, if I buy my music from Amazon.com, I get DRM free music with no watermarking, but if I buy it from iTunes, I get either DRM or watermarking? I guess that means I'll keep buying from Amazon. Are they going to call the watermarked tracks, iTunes +W? I'd want to know if it's watermarked or not ahead of time so I know not to buy it.

 

[Saladinos]

That doesn't make sense. I never pay more than 99 cents for a song, and often pay less for certain songs with Amazon. If anything, you're spending MORE in iTunes.

I refuse to buy off iTunes now because I typically work alone in a lab setting at my school while editing photographs. I like to stream my laptop to one of the lab's bigger towers with loud speakers, but none of my iTunes DRM tracks will play this way unless I authorize any computer I happen to pick to be my loud jukebox. Now THAT is a hassle.

Yes, and price pressure from iTunes is not a factor in Amazon's low prices. Those corporations just love you too much to make you pay more.

In specific cases, DRM can be a hassle. One easy workaround is to grab a 3.5mm - 3.5mm male to male cable and connect the output of your laptop to the microphone input on the tower. Or just plug the speakers in to your laptop. Or use VLC to stream the audio over the local network.

 

[Loge]

if I buy my music from Amazon.com, I get DRM free music with no watermarking, but if I buy it from iTunes, I get either DRM or watermarking?

Files from Amazon may contain watermarking, although not containing any personal information. I haven't seen any reports about the effect on sound quality.

http://blog.wired.com/music/2007/09/some-of-amazons.html

 

[MacFly123]

On the one hand I like that Amazon is all high-quality DRM-free files.

I want to see more of that.

BUT I am kind of happy they are doing poorly because it gives Apple the power to say to the labels: "Look, we're still in charge, here's what we want to do." Hopefully Apple can squash some of the sillier changes they want made to the iTunes store. (It's also great to see the labels attempt to undermine iTunes (by favoring Amazon) failing on them. You gotta love that.)

Now, if they can make iTunes 100% DRM-free (with music anyway) then I certainly wish Amazon the best and would love to see them take a large part of the market at that point.

But here and now, today, I'm kind of glad iTunes is still so powerful.

I love that the music labels are eating it. I think it is hilarious and was so obvious that it amazes me the people running them are being paid what they are when I could embrace future digital models better than them pretty much lol.

They are idiots just like Hollywood! I hope iTunes stays on top forever Now lets go after the higher bit rate and DRM free with a vengeance Apple

 

[CrackedButter]

I don't really think this is surprising.

Especially with the current economy, more and more people are buying non-iPod MP3 players. All the Sansas are more popular than one would expect, and I'm not even talking about the plethora of generics that you can find in any walmart and target. Plus more and more cars support MP3.

Hence, when I buy music, I only buy MP3s from Amazon. Not only do they have great deals (e.g., the new Killers for 4$ on day of release), but it's DRM free high quality MP3.

My iTunes bought stuff, on the other hand, I can't get on my Sansa or my car.

I don't think so somehow, look at Amazon's mp3 most popular list, John Gruber of Daring fireball was pointing out that in the top 25, 21 spots were occupied by Apple.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/electronics/172630?ie=UTF8&ref_=pd_ts_e_nav

Spots 2 and 3 are occupied by the expensive iPod Touch as well. Spot 14 is occupied by the first non-apple mp3 player so go figure.

 

[rstansby]

We should send a message to the record labels by boycotting amazon digital downloads. Apple is on our side in this one. Variable pricing and watermarks will not help the consumer.

 

[VoR]

What about boycotting amazon and apple until there's even cheaper prices and lossless audio?

 

[castlema]

Most people are content with "Good Enough"

This is the sort of discussion that is seen for all matter or products. "Why do people by DVD players when they can get Blu-Ray?" "Why do people by CDs when vinyl sounds so much warmer?" "Why do people by point and shoot cameras when they can get the EOS-1 Ds Mark III?"

For most, it's price. There is a limit to what people will pay for some (to them) minimal increase in quality. They are content with "good enough". Most people would be hard pressed to tell the difference between a 128kps MP3 and a 256kps. A goodly number would not be able to tell the difference between a lossless file and a compressed file. To them going to the extra effort and expense, no matter how minimal that might be, is just not worth it.

Apple has succeeded in many areas by convincing people that spending more money on their product is worth it because the user experience is better. The digerati loudly proclaim that there are better things out there but the masses don't care. It's not worth it to them to give up that user experience.

I do use Amazon some but that's because of my dangerously high consumption of diet pepsi. I can get many things I want from there using my pepsi points, but unlike the days when the promotion was through iTunes you can't access the entire catalog. I still use Limewire some for things I cannot get anywhere else. The most recent example was "Rum by Gum" by the Chad Mitchell Trio.

 

[pdjudd]

What about boycotting amazon and apple until there's even cheaper prices and lossless audio?

OK, so where are you going to get your content legally in which the studios won't be able to toss out the "See we need DRM to stop piracy" nonsense. In other words, bit torrent is not an answer I am going to accept.

And the studios still profit from CD's too before you mention that.

 

[VoR]

Why does a lossy track have to cost more than an encoded one? You can buy a cd for the same price as an album download. It's more convenient for customers and producers, I don't think there should be a price premium or quality compromise. If you're buying media I think it should be a 'full' original copy, I'll decide if I want to download a small encode or a large rip.

I'd also prefer not to have to re-purchase all my dvds on bluray (and then again when they bring out a 'better encoded' special edition, but what can I do? I'd prefer it if they spent more time authing their films to take advantage of higher bandwidth hard/software. I'd prefer it if I still didn't have to consider colour profiles/frame rate/region/etc with all this new technology. I'd prefer a lot of things - I think most of the industry is incompetent, which is more of an issue to me than watching their ideas on how to extract the most money out of people.

OK, so where are you going to get your content legally in which the studios won't be able to toss out the "See we need DRM to stop piracy" nonsense. In other words, bit torrent is not an answer I am going to accept.

And the studios still profit from CD's too before you mention that.

Don't get it legally/do without it for a while. Sony can root kit their cds again, get sued, cover it up and try another tactic - maybe this time it'll be my idea of value.

 

[pdjudd]

Don't get it legally/do without it for a while. Sony can root kit their cds again, get sued, cover it up and try another tactic - maybe this time it'll be my idea of value.

While it is perfectly, legal and possible, it fails on on the practical notion of things. You might get a small population of people organized, but it is going to be negligible as far as the population as a whole is concerted when you talk about music purchasing. People are going to buy music en mass regardless. Any kind of zero sum protest will never get felt by the music companies anyway - millions of either ignorant or uncaring customers will justify whatever the labels businesses - that's because they have exclusive access to highly desired content. Not purchasing it is only going to affect its perceived demand (especially with older content).

As long as the labels own the content that has high demand, a boycott like you propose is going to mean nothing to them. They aren't selling anything to you anyway.

By the way, I mentioned legal options, since piracy is only going to justify DRM more and make you look worse to them. Threatening to steal stuff is a good way to get the wrong kind of attention.

 

[VoR]

You're right of course, most people are ignorant and take what is given to them, my frustration is that we're being taken forward by an incompetent industry rather than educated purchases and complaints/questions.

I didn't propose it, I was just responding to the guy talking about amazon - asking why would you boycott one company and support another when neither have (what I think) is an ideal solution.

I wasn't threatening to steal anything, I also don't really mind the drm. Average consumer who has an ipod/itunes doesn't care as it 'just works', and everyone else (that isn't a media exec) realises that it's completely futile. If I want to use the media I've bought on all the different devices I have it's possible, just an inconvenient process of removing the drm.

It seems a bit silly to me that the best quality and most standard, 'easy to use' media is on the p2p networks - Maybe if all digital media was unlocked and 10x as cheap they'd sell 50x as much? Obviously the industry doesn't think so (what was that itunes thing?), I do (and would) - and I'm the only one that can speak for me.

 

[bankshot]

You've got your numbers a little wrong. Standard Apple tracks are 192k AAC, Plus tracks are 256k AAC. Amazon is 256k MP3. I don't think Apple has sold 128k tracks for a while.

Bzzzt, I'd say you're wrong! At least in the USA. I have never seen a 192kbps track from iTunes. Looking in my purchased files from iTunes, 26 songs are 256kbps (iTunes Plus), and the remaining 286 songs are 128kbps (protected AAC). No other bitrates. This includes 44 songs purchased in the last month.

Looking at those numbers, the continuing deficiency of higher quality, non-DRM tracks in iTunes is why my order of preference for purchasing music is now:

1. CD from Amazon or similar for reasonable price
2. iTunes Plus
3. Amazon MP3
4. iTunes DRM

I always go for the highest quality (and least hassle) first, then move down the list if it's not available in that format.

Also, Amazon uses variable bitrate MP3s, encoded by LAME (considered one of the best, if not the best MP3 encoders for sound quality). My Amazon-purchased files range in average bitrate from 160 kbps to 278 kbps. Same target psychoacoustic sound quality, but some songs require more information left in than others to faithfully reproduce them.


Oh, and for people wanting lossless downloads, you do realize that even that is not truly "lossless," right? To put things in terms of lossy (MP3, AAC, etc) versus lossless (CD quality) is a bit of a misnomer, really. CD quality (44.1 kHz, 16-bit stereo audio) is still lossy compared to the original music that is recorded. You could do even better at 96 kHz. 24-bit, 5+ channel audio, or even more. I look at it as a continuous spectrum of quality levels: CD quality is near the high end for human hearing, but not the absolute top.

Of course, I do believe the above paragraph is pretty much a moot point: people may fool themselves into thinking they can hear differences between lossy (MP3/AAC) and CD (or better) quality; but I think the vast majority of people, using the vast majority of listening devices, can't truly tell the difference at all. If you want to test yourself, try a randomized double-blind test sometime. You might be surprised.

 

[pdjudd]

Of course, I do believe the above paragraph is pretty much a moot point: people may fool themselves into thinking they can hear differences between lossy (MP3/AAC) and CD (or better) quality; but I think the vast majority of people, using the vast majority of listening devices, can't truly tell the difference at all. If you want to test yourself, try a randomized double-blind test sometime. You might be surprised.

Exactly. Most people think they hear the artifacts. Nine times out of ten they are hearing things that aren't there, or have been told what to listen for from somebody else. Most people just cannot tell the difference. I happen to be one of them who just cannot tell the difference between lossless and lossy and really could care less about the snobs who either can or claim that they can.

 

[VoR]

Obviously a 128kbps encode is noticeable from one with twice the bit rate on anything but the cheapest earphones (right pdjudd?) but with a decent 256kbps copy I'm not sure I can tell the difference half the time and I still want to download lossless.
If I'm paying for music I'd like it to be as decent as possible.
I'm living in the future now and it's taken so long I don't really need to any more, but if I wanted to re encode a track/album/collection quickly I'd like to maintain some sort of quality. I'd also like to use digital media and not feel like I'm getting ripped off and making a compromise.

Oh, and for people wanting lossless downloads, you do realize that even that is not truly "lossless," right? To put things in terms of lossy (MP3, AAC, etc) versus lossless (CD quality) is a bit of a misnomer, really. CD quality (44.1 kHz, 16-bit stereo audio) is still lossy compared to the original music that is recorded. You could do even better at 96 kHz. 24-bit, 5+ channel audio, or even more. I look at it as a continuous spectrum of quality levels: CD quality is near the high end for human hearing, but not the absolute top.

Of course, I do believe the above paragraph is pretty much a moot point

Apart from that last quoted sentence, urrrr. I would guess most people (the few?) asking for lossless already know the blindingly obvious.

I'm not keen on any of the multichannel music I've listened to, but I'm not sure that's what you mean.

 

[SactoGuy18]

This comes at absolutely NO surprise.
At the end of the day, people want ease of use and something they're familiar with. Amazon may be cheaper and better quality, but their selection just isn't as good, and it's just a bigger hassle than getting stuff on iTunes.

I have to disagree with that! Remember, Amazon has a album downloader program for Windows XP/Vista and MacOS X 10.4 and later that automatically puts a playlist of downloaded music from the Amazon MP3 Store right into iTunes 7.6 to 8.0.x. That way, it's real easy to copy the downloaded music files right into your iPod.

 

[Babasyzygy]

How can Amazon be at 8% when 130 Million tracks is just 5.4% of iTunes alone?

It must be more like 5%. Without any signs of gaining.

Thank you, I was going to post the same. WTF is it with people who don't check basic math?

 

[LEgregius]

Mixed Feelings

I buy music from Apple when it's DRM free, and I buy it from Amazon otherwise. I don't like anyone having such a huge market share, and I see Amazon as a good source of competition. On the other, Apple's market share gives it power to negotiate good things for us consumers since good prices and no-DRM are good for Apple too. Likewise, my gut reaction is to do the opposite of whatever the recording industry wants.