The iTunes Music Store is dumb

[iGary]

Here's an opinion from a two- to three-hundred dollar a year iTunes user:

1. I don't need album art, liner notes or the CD itself, in fact I'd rather not have all of that. My office is crammed enough as it is.

2. I like being able to listen to what I'm buying ahead of time.

3. I'm not an audiophile. As long as it sounds what I consider good, I don't care about the format it comes it - at all.

4. I like the integration.

I supppose there are several million people like myself.

 

[Les Kern]

iTunes is a part of the whole. You CAN use it occasionally, you CAN buy a cheap album elsewhere, you CAN use your own CD's, vinyl, whatever, you CAN make everything on GarageBand if you'd like.
It's about choices. ITMS is only one choice, not an end in itself, therefore ITMS is NOT stupid. Your logic of complete exclusion and tunnel vision is suspect here.
\Peace

 

[redeye be]

My 4,000-song iTunes library (including apx 100 purchased thru iTMS Canada) has been backed-up at least four different ways...
3) On 4 DVD's, safely stored elsewhere (off-site)
4) On 4 DVD's, stored on-site

just be sure to rewrite those disk once in a while!
http://www.itl.nist.gov/div895/gipwg/StabilityStudy.pdf

Cheers

 

[mpw]

…It's not ultra-high fidelity that is the CD's biggest advantage...

True, cassette tapes can have better fidelity than CD’s.

…Will you ever want to play your music on non-Apple software/hardware?...

I do now, by burning it to CD or using line-out. This suits my needs now and I’m willing to bet more options will come available to me in the future.

…If not in a year, how about in 15 years? Will Apple still be in the music business in 15 years? Will AAC still be supported in any hardware/software players?...

I’m sure there will be various options available. If people have downloaded a billion+ tracks by then there’s going to be a market and if there’s a market there’ll be a product.

Of course any CD will be available as a digital file on-line by then so the market for CD players may have disappeared leaving some people with enormous drinks coaster collections.

Head-on-block moment. I’m willing to bet £100 (I doubt the £’ll be about in 15years either so I’m covering my back there as well) that CD’s will no longer be still in production for music sales in 15years and DVD will also have been superceded to the point of extinction.

 

[wPod]

I’m willing to bet £100 (I doubt the £’ll be about in 15years either so I’m covering my back there as well) that CD’s will no longer be still in production for music sales in 15years and DVD will also have been superceded to the point of extinction.

i think even sooner than 15 years. i bet in the next 5-10 years CD's will be mainly sold electronicly, such as from stores like iTMS. and CD covers and all of this extra stuff will be replaced with downloadable media such as interviews with the artists or music videos. and that we will be able to watch everthing on our super-mediaPods. i even think DVDs will go all electronic once the movie industry sees how the music industry has managed to switch. one day we will say 'can you believe people used to pay for all this packaging of media? and then it just sat around their house. we are so much more efficient now that we dont have packaged media nor the trash from the wrapping!!!'

 

[stcanard]

Nice thought, about the transience, but hardly.

Each one of those has specific limitations, of being fully analogue (and therefore hard to reproduce), large (therefore hard to store/prone to break) or non-standard. Most have a combination of the above.

The same problem appears with digital backups. I have a stack of 5 1/4" PRO-DOS formatted floppies that are completely useless to me. I've got a stack of 3 1/2" floppies that are getting more useless by the month.

I believe the CD will stay in regular use for at least 60 years, if only through the form factor compatibility it has with DVDs.

I agree partially -- CD's are only supported today because of form factor compatibility with DVDs. As soon as the form factor of the current tech changes, CDs will be gone. Look at how fast the DVD format is fragmenting already. If you think we're still going to be using them in 60 years you're dreaming.

You make backups, right?

Nightly. It saved my iTunes and iPhoto collection two weeks ago when I had a harddrive failure.

That's why the bits are more important than the container. The container is prone to failure (DVDs and CDs are a poor storage technology to begin with, they scratch too easily, and degrade over time). The important part is the bits in the container, and that's what you are paying for.

If you take regular backups and remember to transfer them from system to system you're safe. If you put away your CDs and DVDs expecting to use those as the backups, you will be SOL in 20 years when you suddenly realize that you have no way to transfer this old fashioned circular-laser based storage technology to the current quantum storage cubes.

 

[stcanard]

Well it's not quite the same thing. If in 15 years you want to be able to play any of those, you can simply buy a used player if you don't have one. On the other hand, no amount of money you can spend will buy you a player for an obsolete file format for Mac OS 15, unless you plan on funding development yourself.

In 15 years I can buy a used Mac Mini to plug into my stereo...

 

[CubaTBird]

itunes music store sells ipods! what do u think is selling ipods! thats y apple has the music store... as a front...

 

[Logik]

I'd say the digital copies are more future proof than the hard copy to be honest. your cd will eventually become unplayable in computers and other media players. how will you get the information? not easily. with digital copies you can burn to a cd now.. save to your hologram cube later.. and if iTMS goes down, you can bet someone will come up with a de-DRMer that will remove it.. *cough* HYMM *cough* .. typically there are converters between formats.. iTunes offers converters from WMA to AAC or MP3 right? sure you lose a bit of quality.. but as space goes up you'll be getting lossless formats that become dominant.. at that rate you can take your lossy file, convert it to lossless which maintains the originals quality fully .. sure might take up more space but by the time this happens everything will be lossless so it won't make a single bit of difference. you can do a lot with digital media that you can't do with your physical cd or cassette or dvd.. think about it.

 

[mpw]

i think even sooner than 15 years...

So do I, but we're talking about £100 here. Best not be hasty!

 

[bankshot]

#1) Store a record of which songs I download in my account and let me re-download them for bandwidth costs in case I lose them.

While this would be a nice service, there's no precedent for it, and the copyright holders most definitely would not allow it. It's almost the same as if record stores would give you a new CD-R copy of an album you lost just by showing your receipt. Not gonna happen any time soon!

That said, I'll comment on the original question of the thread. I've bought a total of 93 songs from iTMS. My collection (all legal, the rest coming from CDs) stands at 4616 songs. I care a great deal about music and am very particular about what I listen to. I will never buy a live album or classical music from iTMS until they fix the gap problem. I live with gaps for now, but if/when they get off their butts and fix it, I'll have the original CDs to go back to and re-rip if necessary. Any music that I really want and is easy to find on CD, I'll buy the CD.

Of those 93 songs from iTMS:

• There are 7 complete albums.
• 3 of those albums are out of print and impossible to find on CD. There are a bunch more I'm hoping to get this way, but they aren't on iTunes yet.
• 1 album was an iTunes exclusive EP.
• The other 3 albums I didn't care enough about to get on CD, but am glad I took the chance and downloaded.
• 16 individual tracks are from 5 "Best Of" type albums where I had everything but the new songs that artists always put on their greatest hits to get die-hard fans to buy them. So rather than spending $80+ for mostly music I already have, I spent $16 on all new songs.
• 1 song was an iTunes exclusive single by one of my favorite artists (Joe Satriani).
• 3 songs I just wanted individually on a whim.

I'm not one of those people who only likes a few songs on an album. Most of the music I buy is album oriented and tends to be strong throughout. When listening, I usually shuffle albums, not songs. Clearly I'm not your typical music "consumer" who just likes listening to a wide spectrum of popular singles, shuffling randomly. Over the same period that I bought those 93 songs, I've added about 900 to my library via new CDs. But even given my music habits, I've found a number of things that were worth buying at iTMS. Maybe someone else will find a few things for similar reasons.

 

[jaw04005]

While this would be a nice service, there's no precedent for it, and the copyright holders most definitely would not allow it. It's almost the same as if record stores would give you a new CD-R copy of an album you lost just by showing your receipt. Not gonna happen any time soon!

This comment amazes me. No precedent? Copyright holders would not allow it? Napster allows this feature on a continuous basis, I guess *they* are violating the Copyright holders wishes, huh? Give me a break.

Its up to the individual music store whether they want you to redownload. Apple makes little money off the ITMS, and apparently they don't want to increase those costs with allowing their customers to redownload tracks (bandwith, etc).

And its not the same. You can't accidentally delete tracks off of a CD, and the chances of your CD failing is slim to none. As stated before, if you have lost some or all of your music... Apple will allow you to redownload the tracks, if you email them.

 

[superbovine]

#1 Offer a choice of paying $10 to download the digital album, OR paying $12 to download the digital album and get a CD and liner notes in the mail

#2 (This wouldn't be necessary if they do #1) Store a record of which songs I download in my account and let me re-download them for bandwidth costs in case I lose them.

People don't realize how volatile digital information is. How many files do you have on your computer that you've had for 10 years? If any, how close have you come to losing them at some point due to hardware failure or whatever? How many websites do you know of that haven't changed in the past 10 years? How many pieces of software do you use that are 10 years old? And this is only 10 years. In 10 more years, AAC is going to be like Cinepak or Indeo Video is today. When you buy from iTMS, you are paying for a fleeting wisp of intangibility... which may be okay for some purposes, but I wonder if people really think about this.

I have hundreds of files that are over 10 years old on my mac that i still use. They are mainly c files that run on unix that I maintain. There are comments from 1990 in some of the source code. Anyway there is such a thing as backuping up data.

I think you are missing the bigger point, it not about weather AAC will be around in 10 years, because CD won't either. The thing you should be thinking about is CHOICE. We live in a free-market, and cosumers want choice. For some people, CD are the correct choice, but for others itunes is just fine. You shouldn't be worried about what people choose to spend their money on, after all it their money. It is just a part of doing business.

 

[stcanard]

he chances of your CD failing is slim to none.

Wow, you must be pretty lucky.

I've had a number of CDs get scratched over the years!

 

[alex_ant]

Here's an opinion from a two- to three-hundred dollar a year iTunes user:

1. I don't need album art, liner notes or the CD itself, in fact I'd rather not have all of that. My office is crammed enough as it is.

2. I like being able to listen to what I'm buying ahead of time.

3. I'm not an audiophile. As long as it sounds what I consider good, I don't care about the format it comes it - at all.

4. I like the integration.

I supppose there are several million people like myself.

Hopefully you will also enjoy the convenience of eventually losing it all to a catastrophic disk crash, as just most people do at some point!

 

[alex_ant]

Head-on-block moment. I’m willing to bet £100 (I doubt the £’ll be about in 15years either so I’m covering my back there as well) that CD’s will no longer be still in production for music sales in 15years and DVD will also have been superceded to the point of extinction.

I'm willing to bet you're right... and I'm willing to bet $100 (which will be worth about $0.45 in today's dollars by then) that m4p files will no longer be in use in 5 years. What I'm really trying to do is get people to think about information preservation. What's interesting to me is the devaluance of official source material. Taking an m4p and dubbing it into another format through line out seems to me similar to taking the Declaration of Independence (not that CDs are as significant, but it's the same idea), Xeroxing it, and chucking the original, since it's all decayed. Voila, a clean copy! And we can OCR it and search it - even better than the original, and without all those old dead guys' fingerprints all over it!

 

[alex_ant]

In 15 years I can buy a used Mac Mini to plug into my stereo...

In 15 years a used Mac Mini will be as appealing as a 386 running Windows 3.0 is today. The m4p files might seem similarly obsolete compared to the 10-channel 192kHz 48-bit combined audio/3D holographic video files we will likely be using then. So will CDs, but with physical media you can open the case, you can thumb through the booklet, you can go, "Hey, I remember this old thing, I was listening to it that one night after I got back from _____ and ______ happened. Those were great times. It's even got my fingerprints on it." Compared to an m4p file, which will have absolutely zero value whatsoever, monetary or otherwise.

 

[bankshot]

Hopefully you will also enjoy the convenience of eventually losing it all to a catastrophic disk crash, as just most people do at some point!

Many of us backup our purchased music as soon as we download it. Everyone should. I think Apple even has a reminder that pops up sometimes when you purchase something, to the effect of "backup these files to protect them from disk problems." I saw it once and thought "what a good idea!" but it seems to be random. They ought to have it show up every time, because that sort of thing only occurs to those of us who are already computer savvy.

When I purchase music online, I immediately copy the files to 2 or 3 other machines - one off site and two others in my house. That way I'm immediately protected against disk crash (which happened recently - didn't lose any iTMS songs). Eventually the songs make it into my regular data backups on CD or DVD as well.

 

[BLDun]

OK, help me out here. Doesn't ITunes have some policy in effect that only allows you to download YOUR songs on a limited # of computers. Even if you burn the to a DVD and try to use them later on another computer there is a problem. If this is so, then what happens in a few years when you have changed computer 5 or 6 times and can't open the tunes on your computer because the little notice appears saying they weren't downloaded to this computer. Will they eventually become useless???

 

[bankshot]

OK, help me out here. Doesn't ITunes have some policy in effect that only allows you to download YOUR songs on a limited # of computers. Even if you burn the to a DVD and try to use them later on another computer there is a problem. If this is so, then what happens in a few years when you have changed computer 5 or 6 times and can't open the tunes on your computer because the little notice appears saying they weren't downloaded to this computer. Will they eventually become useless???

You can authorize up to 5 computers simultaneously to play your music. When you change computers, you should deauthorize the old one before authorizing the new one. As long as you always deauthorize old machines that won't be used anymore, you'll never run out of authorizations.

That said, I really think Apple needs to make the process easier. Currently, you can only deauthorize a computer if you're using that machine. If your hard drive crashes, you can't deauthorize that machine anymore because the authorization information is lost (unless you backed it up and restore it on a new drive). And I can't imagine most people even thinking of deauthorizing their old computer before upgrading. I'm sure the vast majority of people don't even realize they have to do it, let alone remember.

I don't see why Apple can't just let you login to your iTMS account and manage all 5 authorizations there. It could have a list of your 5 computers and allow you to deauthorize any of them right there. Then having a drive crash or forgetting to deauthorize won't ever be a problem.

Right now, you have to contact them and beg them to reset your account if you have problems. I had to do this recently - I've only ever used iTunes on 4 computers, and I had 3 authorized. I wanted to authorize a 4th but it said I'd already used my limit of 5. Obviously a glitch somewhere, probably from when the upped the maximum machines from 3 to 5. They reset all my authorizations for me, but said they don't normally do that.

 

[Logik]

OK, help me out here. Doesn't ITunes have some policy in effect that only allows you to download YOUR songs on a limited # of computers. Even if you burn the to a DVD and try to use them later on another computer there is a problem. If this is so, then what happens in a few years when you have changed computer 5 or 6 times and can't open the tunes on your computer because the little notice appears saying they weren't downloaded to this computer. Will they eventually become useless???

wrong, wrong and wrong...

you are allowed to "activate" 5 computers to listen to these songs. it doesn't mean you can download them on up to 5 computers. you login to the music store on one machine, buy and download songs. you can then listen to them on up to 4 other computers by copying the songs to those other computers via network, cd, dvd, flashdrive, etc. if you reach 5 computers you will have to deactivate one of the other computers if you wish to add another computer to the list. you can activate and deactivate any of the 5 machines in any order you choose. login on one computer, when finished, log out. goto next machine login then log out when finished.. you don't ever "run" out of computers. you have up to 5 that can be activated at any time.

 

[Logik]

They reset all my authorizations for me, but said they don't normally do that.

odd.. i emailed them and they reset them for me without any questions at all. i had 2 machines crash.. one i had forgotten to "deactivate" before formatting.. oops. they didn't give me any hassle at all and reset it. same goes for audible, they reset the list of machines without any hassle at all.

 

[stcanard]

So will CDs, but with physical media you can open the case, you can thumb through the booklet, you can go, "Hey, I remember this old thing, I was listening to it that one night after I got back from _____ and ______ happened. Those were great times. It's even got my fingerprints on it." Compared to an m4p file, which will have absolutely zero value whatsoever, monetary or otherwise.

So what you're saying is you still have an emotional need for physical media. That's okay, its going to take a long time for society to change. I know a lot of people who still need to see something physical to feel that they actually bought something.

Personally CD covers do nothing for me, other than become annoying when the jewel case breaks. It's hearing the song that takes me back to a certain time.

 

[solvs]

Hopefully you will also enjoy the convenience of eventually losing it all to a catastrophic disk crash, as just most people do at some point!

That's what backups are for.

I'm willing to bet you're right... and I'm willing to bet $100 (which will be worth about $0.45 in today's dollars by then) that m4p files will no longer be in use in 5 years.

I have some old mp3s and wavs from 5 years ago. Jpgs and gifs too. They work just fine. So do some of my old CDs. I have a feeling in 5 years, iTunes will still be around.

 

[iindigo]

Well, I prefer iTMS because I don't have to keep track of yet another CD - I have a foot-high stack of them (without cases! ) and I don't need any more to keep from getting broken, scratched, etc.

That, and because it's instant. Wanna listen to a song you haven't heard in awhile, and want it now? Just head over to iTMS and give a measly 99¢ to listen to it and keep it.

As for the whole "master copy" thing - I have my music on both my HD and my iPod. I highly doubt they would both die at the same time, so I'm safe.

AAC 128kbps doesn't sound bad to me either... it sounds at least as good as a 192kbps MP3, if not better.

And as an added little bonus, seemingly Apple has worked out things so it's legal to use iTMS songs in iMovies - do that with a CD and the record companies/RIAA will sue your a** off.